Gomez: Canelo can adjust and beat GGG easier

By Boxing News - 09/21/2017 - Comments

Image: Gomez: Canelo can adjust and beat GGG easier

By Sean Jones: Saul “Canelo” Alvarez can adjust and beat IBF/IBO/WBA/WBC middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin easier in their rematch, says Golden Boy Promotions president Eric Gomez. He’s convinced that Canelo did enough to beat Golovkin (37-0-1, 33 KOs) by 9 rounds to 3 score last Saturday night, which would put him in the same ballpark as judge Adelaide Byrd when it comes to scoring the Canelo-Golovkin fight. The fight was ruled a 12-round draw for their match at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Byrd gave Golovkin just 2 rounds in scoring it 118-110 for Canelo. Gomez says Golovkin only won 3 clear rounds. He thinks the judges might have scored rounds in Canelo’s favor for the missed punches from Golovkin. Gomez says Golovkin missed a lot. For the record, his connect percentage was 31 to Canelo’s 33, so it looks like he wasn’t the only one missing last Saturday night.

The Canelo-Golovkin rematch is still not a given. Canelo has said he doesn’t want to fight until May of next year on Cinco de Mayo. Golden Boy Promotions will need to hammer out a deal with Golovkin’s promoter Tom Loeffler before we see the two fighters back inside the ring for a second time. Given that Canelo was seen as the loser of the fight last Saturday night, it would seem like Golovkin deserves a much better deal for the rematch.

“I think Canelo can adjust. There is many ways he can adjust,” said Gomez with a gleam in his eyes in talking about how Canelo can do better against Golovkin the next time around, if there’s a next time. “He did some things really, really good, but then he did some things he shouldn’t have done. I think he can adjust and I think he can win a lot easier,” said Gomez.

The things that Canelo did wrong were easy to see. Here are the things that Canelo did wrong:

• Canelo moved too much and didn’t fight enough

• He faded after 3 rounds and appeared to lose the last 9 rounds

• Didn’t take the fight to Golovkin until round 11. By that time, Canelo was seemingly well behind in the fight if it had been scored correctly by the judges

• Not jabbing enough

• Throwing too many pot shots

• Too timid. Canelo gave too much respect to Golovkin

• Fighting off the ropes for all 12 rounds. It looked like Canelo was afraid

• Backing up to the ropes without being pressured

• Too heavy for the fight. Canelo packed on too much useless muscle in training camp for the fight

“It surprised me that he was able to move,” said Gomez about Alvarez moving frequently in the GGG fight. “It surprised me that he was able to stand toe-to-toe with him and bang it out with him. It surprised me how easy it was to go to the body. The combinations, the hand speed, everything was there. It surprised me how many times he made him miss. I’ve never seen Golovkin miss [like that]. Everyone is making so much about the punches he threw,” said Gomez about Golovkin’s high work rate. “He threw so much, but he missed more than he landed. Canelo did a great job. He missed a lot. He landed 1 or 2 [good shots].” said Gomez.

Gomez says he was surprised at Canelo’s ability to stand and fight toe-to-toe. The problem was, Canelo didn’t fight like that until the last 2 rounds. Even then, Canelo could only fight hard for the opening portion of the round. He would mix it up with Golovkin when the bell would ring, and then he would get tired and start moving. A quality judge would have seen how Canelo faded quickly in the rounds and they would have given the rounds to Golovkin.

I think we had a severe lack of quality judging last Saturday night with the 3 judges selected by the Nevada State Athletic Commission. As far as missing punches, Canelo was almost as bad as Golovkin. It’s not being talked about a whole lot, but Canelo missed a massive amount of punches due to his short arms. He was unable to reach Golovkin with his punches, and he kept loading up on his shots.

“Some of those rounds were very, very close. I only gave Golovkin 3 rounds that he clearly won, to say this is his round,” said Gomez. “The other ones you can make an argument. He missed a lot. He probably landed 3 or 4 punches, but Canelo landed also or maybe 5, and Canelo should get points for throwing to the body. I don’t think anybody gave Canelo credit for going to the body. Do you remember Golovkin landing body shots? Canelo landed a [expletive] load of body shots. I didn’t see anybody giving him credit for landing body shots. He did a good job,” said Gomez.

Canelo did land some good body shots, but he looked so tired fighting off the ropes and he was eating jabs from GGG all night long. Floyd Mayweather Jr. used to do a good job of fighting off the ropes in some of his fights, but he never looked exhausted like Canelo. Mayweather was always in control even when fighting off the ropes. You couldn’t say that about Canelo last Saturday. He looked like he’d lost control of the fight after round 2. Golovkin outworked Canelo from round 3 through 12.

“I gave him credit for being aggressive, but there’s a difference between being aggressive and a difference between being effective, and I don’t think he was effective,” said Gomez in talking of Golovkin’s pressure fighting. “I’m some of the judges gave Canelo credit for making him miss. I’m sure that’s what happened,” said Gomez.

It looks like Gomez is still trying to come to terms with Canelo’s deficient performance last Saturday against Golovkin. Gomez isn’t going to be able to single-handedly change the minds of the boxing public that witnessed the fight. They overwhelmingly thought Golovkin deserved the win. Gomez is fighting a losing battle to try and convince the boxing public that Canelo deserved the victory. The fans saw the fight. They know that Canelo was given a gift in their eyes in receiving a 12-round draw against Golovkin.

Gomez would be better off talking about how he can improve Canelo’s many flaws so he doesn’t get beaten again by Golovkin, because Canelo’s career is going to be sinking into the abyss if he gets another controversial draw of if he gets a controversial win. Canelo has already been given controversial wins over Austin Trout and Erislandy Lara. The reason why the boxing public didn’t make that much of a fuss about those fights is because they happened a long time ago, and there wasn’t the same amount of attention on them as there was for the Canelo-Golovkin fight last Saturday night.

After next Saturday night, there will be even more boxing fans that will be aware of what took place in Canelo receiving a controversial draw against Golovkin. HBO Boxing will be showing the Canelo vs. Golovkin replay on regular HBO, so a lot of the boxing fans that didn’t get a chance to watch the fight last Saturday night will be seeing it for the first time. You can bet that those fans will come to the same conclusion that the other fans did that saw it last Saturday in believing that Golovkin was robbed of a win by poor judging.

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