By Sean Jones: Gennady ‘GGG’ Golovkin (37-0-1, 33 KOs) is Boxing News 24’s Fighter of the Year for 2017 due to his impressive performances against Daniel Jacobs and Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez in back to back pay-per-view fights on HBO.
(Photo credit: World Boxing Council)
It was a hard pick between Golovkin and Vasyl Lomachenko, but Golovkin got the nod because of his more impressive efforts against Canelo and Golovkin.
Golovkin deserved a win over Canelo in the eyes of this writer for their fight on September 16. That win would have possibly vaulted Golovkin to pay-per-view status in the U.S. Golovkin has been treated as the winner of that fight by many in the boxing world. There’s nobody in the sport that had a victory as big as Golovkin’s deserved win over Canelo.
Boxing News 24 2017 Fighter of the Year came down to these boxers:
1. Gennady Golovkin
2. Vasyl Lomachenko
3. Terence Crawford
4. Anthony Joshua
5. Srisaket Sor Rungvisai
6. Andre Ward
7. Alexander Usyk
8. Jermell Charlo
9. Errol Spence Jr.
10. Mikey Garcia
In 2017, Lomachenko beat Jason Sosa, Miguel Marriaga and Guillermo Rigondeaux. What hurt Lomachenko’s chances of winning Boxing News 24’s Fighter of the Year was his selection of Rigondeaux as an opponent instead of one of the top fighters from his own super featherweight division. Had Lomachenko fought WBC 130 lb. champion Miguel Berchelt and beaten him, he would have greatly improved his chances for winning the Fighter of the Year. Lomachenko didn’t even meet Rigondeaux halfway between 122 and 130. The honorable thing for Lomachenko to have done would have been to fight Rigondeaux at a catch-weight at 126. He didn’t do that. He had Rigondeaux come all the way up to 130 for him to beat him.
Golovkin beat Jacobs by a 12 round unanimous decision last March in an exciting fight from start to finish.
Terence Crawford came in at No.3 in B24’s 2017 Fighter of the Year award with wins over Julius Indongo and Felix Diaz. While beating Indongo was an impressive win for Crawford, it wasn’t a good enough win to overcome what Golovkin did in his fights with Jacobs and Canelo. Indongo was a near complete unknown until last year when he beat Eduard Troyanovsky by a 1st round knockout to win the IBF World light welterweight title. It was nice that Crawford beat Indongo, but it wasn’t a huge win by any stretch of the imagination. Crawford’s other victory in 2017 came against Felix Diaz by a 10th round stoppage last May. Diaz had recently been beaten by Lamont Peterson, so it wasn’t a big deal that Crawford beat him.