By Scott Gilfoid: WBO middleweight champion Billy Joe Saunders (24-0, 12 KOs) is giving IBF/IBO/WBA/WBC middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin (37-0, 33 KOs) until Friday to sign for a unification fight with otherwise he’s going to tell his promoter to go in another direction and move on. Saunders, 27, says that he’s not heard from Golovkin, and he wants to get the fight done.
The problem that is reportedly holding Golovkin back is his promoter is working on a deal with Saul “Canelo” Alvarez for a huge fight in September.
Golovkin’s management is considering taking the fight with Canelo. Taking a fight against Saunders might complicate the efforts to make a fight against Canelo. His promoters at Golden Boy have already said that Golovkin fighting Saunders in June would get in the way of the Canelo-Golovkin fight in September. Golden Boy CEO Oscar De La Hoya even went so far as to say it was a sign of disrespect for Golovkin to be trying to fight Saunders, because there’s a risk of him getting injured in the fight. It would also get in the way of marketing their September Canelo-Golovkin fight.
“I’ve still not heard back from Golovkin. I’ve been on to my manager and my promoter Frank Warren to start looking elsewhere,” said Saunders to the dailystar.co.uk. “I’ve still not heard back from Golovkin. I’ve been on to my manager and my promoter Frank Warren to start looking elsewhere.”
Saunders should be patient with Golovkin and his promoter Tom Loeffler, because he’s stuck between a rock and a hard place with the World Boxing Organization ordering him to fight back to back mandatory challengers. Saunders would allowed to bypass his mandatory challengers for the sake of a unification fight against Golovkin, but if that fight doesn’t happen, it won’t be good for him. It means that Saunders will need to fight his #1 WBO mandatory challenger Avtandil Khurtsidze, which would be a very difficult fight for him. There are a lot of boxing fans who believe that Saunders will lose to Khurtsidze when the fight eventually happens.
Heck, we almost saw Saunders lose his last fight to fringe contender Artur Akavov last December. That was really bad to see how awful Saunders looked in that fight. He blamed it on him being rusty in being out of the ring for a year, and how he had gained and lost a bunch of weight during that time. But no one gets as bad as Saunders was at 27 after just 12 months out of the ring. I think we were seeing the real Saunders in that fight for the most part. Saunders is basically just a little bit better than #10 WBO Akavov.
That’s why it’s better for Saunders to cool his heels and wait as long as it takes for the Golovkin fight negotiations to get made before he moves on. If there’s even a sliver of a chance for Saunders to get the fight with GGG, then he needs to wait on the fight because that’s his best chance right now for a big money fight.
Saunders isn’t going to get a fight against Canelo because he’s got a nice payday contest against Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. on May 6. Canelo has several nice options for his September fight starting with Golovkin. Canelo isn’t going to throw a bone to Saunders. That’s why Saunders needs to wait for his only chance for a big payday against Golovkin. That’s a big money fight for Saunders if he’s patient enough to wait for Golovkin to respond.
“My pen is in my hand ready to sign but I want it to be done for Friday because I want to move on,” said Saunders. “I can’t be bothered to sit around and wait another six months – I’ve got to get on with my career.”
I think it’s pretty obvious that Saunders is going to find out very quickly whether Golovkin will be fighting him in June or not. Golovkin will likely know soon whether he’s going to fight Saunders. Everything hinges on Golovkin getting the fight with Canelo. If he can get that fight agreed on for September, then he’ll likely forget about the Saunders fight.
I don’t think Golovkin will want to take a big risk by fighting Saunders in June. There’s too much potential for an injury to occur for Golovkin in the fight. An injury would wipe out his fight against Canelo Alvarez for sure.
It seems like a no brainer that Golovkin should put his energy into exhausting all efforts to make the fight with Canelo. Collecting another meaningless title won’t do much for Golovkin’s career. He doesn’t need Saunders’ WBO title in order to validate his pro career. The boxing fans already see Golovkin as the No.1 fighter in the 160 lb. division. Golovkin doesn’t need to waste time taking his career backwards to fight Saunders. If Golovkin wants to impress boxing fans, he should fight a rematch with Daniel Jacobs or look to fight Jermall Charlo. If Golovkin can’t get the fight with Canelo, then he can still be involved in huge fights with a lot more meaning than fighting Saunders for his WBO title. If Golovkin can beat Charlo and Jacobs and look good doing so, he would get tons of credit from the fans. Golovkin won’t get credit for beating Saunders because he’s too flawed of a fighter, as we recently saw in his last fight against Akavov. There are a lot of fans who think Golovkin lost to Jacobs. That tells me that Jacobs is a better option for Golovkin if he cares about his legacy instead of winning another title off of what I consider a paper champion.