By Allan Fox: WBA World middleweight champion Daniel “Miracle Man” Jacobs (32-1, 29 KOs) is seen by many boxing fans as the next knockout victim for IBF/IBO/WB A/WBC middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin (36-0, 33 KOs) in their fight on March 18 at on HBO PPV at Madison Square Garden in New York. Jacobs’ trainer Andre Rozier says that he’s not going to be knocked down by Golovkin in the fight, and he’s not going to be making any mistakes in the fight like he did in his 5th round knockout loss to Russian Dmitri Pirog in 2010.
Rozier says Jacobs was winning the fight against Pirog at the time of the stoppage, which is true. Jacobs was ahead by the scores 39-37, 39-37 and 39-37. Jacobs didn’t do a good job of taking the right hand that Pirog knocked him out with in round 5.
Jacobs is a much different fighter when he’s the one that is coming forward rather than when he’s backed up. In Jacobs’ 12 fights since his loss to Pirog, he’s always been the one that has been taking the fight to his opposition.
You can argue that the guys that Jacobs has been matched against have so poor that he hasn’t had to worry about being backed up by anyone, because the only guy he’s fought with any kind of power is Peter Quillin, who didn’t have much of a chin. He was knocked out quickly by Jacobs in December 2015.
Rozier said this to Thaboxingvoice.com about the Golovkin vs. Jacobs fight:
“Danny will be ready for this fight,” said his trainer Rozier about his fight against Golovkin. “Danny has only had three people escape his punching capacity. Danny is a wickedly sharp puncher, and if he comes in thinking he’s going to run across the ring, fire punches and not get hit, he’s going to be sadly mistaken. It might be over before it gets started. Danny is a much better fighter than he was six years ago. Danny’s jab is going to be omnipotent, and he’s going to be using it constantly. If you go back to the Pirog fight, after round 1, Danny did really well in the Pirog fight. Actually, every round thereafter until he got caught with a shot that put him down, he was winning. It never fails to amaze me that people can’t remember that fight. They remember two things – the knockdown and the referee not allowing him to get back up. Golovkin does what he does on a consistent basis. He pressures you. He likes to go to the body, and he gets hit. If you get hit enough, the armor will crack, and on March 18th, the armor will be cracking,” said Rozier.
Jacobs has good punching power, but he’s not a one-punch knockout artist. He’s not a Julian Jackson type of puncher. He’s more of a guy that needs to land over a longer period of time for him to get a knockout. Guys like Sergio Mora and Caleb Trux were able to go 7 and 12 rounds respectively. If Jacobs is going to be able to KO Golovkin, he’s going to need to be able to stand in the pocket and hit him with more than one shot.
Jacobs gets hit when he stands and fights. I don’t think he’s going to be willing to be stationary for a guy like Golovkin. More than likely, Jacobs will be moving constantly trying to evade Golovkin so that he doesn’t get knocked out. That’s how Jacobs fought Pirog in 2010. Jacobs was moving all the time, and getting hit hard. The scoring of the fight was a little off. It looked like Pirog was the better fighter going into the 5th round.
Rozier has things twisted. Pirog was getting to Jacobs with his constant pressure, and his shots were doing more damage. The fight was stopped because Jacobs had his eyes closed while he was on the canvas, and he didn’t show that was conscious for several moments. Referee Robert Byrd had to stop the fight under those circumstances.
“He is not going to make mistakes in this fight,” said Rozier about Jacobs. “Golovkin in his fight with Kell Brook, he did a wonderful job of breaking him down. He never dropped Kell Brook. He never put him on the canvas. This is a welterweight. He never did it. He’s not going to be dropping Danny Jacobs. He’s not going to drop him. Danny has been dropped twice in his career that has spanned 30 fights. I’ve known the greatest fighters on the planet that have been down a whole lot more than that. It’s not a problem going down. If you go down, you get back up. We’re not planning on going down, but should it happen, we’re going to get out [expletive] back up and back to work,” said Rozier about Jacobs.
If Rozier believes that Golovkin isn’t a big puncher, which is what he appears to be saying here, then he should let Jacobs stand in the pocket and fight him. If Golovkin can’t punch, then Jacobs should stand still and say in the trenches and fight him. I don’t think that will work too well for Jacobs if he tries to fight Golovkin, but if like Rozier says, he couldn’t knockout a welterweight in Kell Brook, then that must mean that he won’t be able to knockout a middleweight like Jacobs. I think Brook has a better chin than Jacobs. It doesn’t matter than Jacobs is a little heavier and a little taller than Brook. I think Brook takes a better punch than Jacobs, and he has much better defensive skills.
Kell Brook didn’t go down against Golovkin, but that’s because he was moving all the time. By the 5th, Brook was done. He would have went down if his trainer hadn’t thrown in the towel. He was no longer throwing punching, and he was trapped just trying to duck shots. The head movement was no longer working for Brook in the final sequence of the fight. Golovkin was punching down on the top of Brook’s head and hitting him over and over again.
