golovkin22 By Scott Gilfoid: Matthew Macklin (29-4, 20 KO’s) will be getting a shot at the title on June 29th at the Foxwoods Resort Casino in Mashantucket, Connecticut. That’s the good news. The bad news is that Macklin will be fighting WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin (26-0, 23 KO’s), who may be the best middleweight in the entire division.

A lot of boxing fans believe that to be true, and I can’t think of any that see the 30-year-old Macklin as being the best fighter in the division. In fact, Macklin is a struggling fighter at this point in his career with him having lost two out of his last three fights in the past two years.

Macklin had this to say about Golovkin: “He’s probably the most hyped fighter in the sport right now. People have made him out to be this monster.”

I don’t think Macklin understands how good Golovkin is because he hasn’t done his homework on this talent. If he had he’d have seen that Golovkin has beaten Andre Dirrell, Lucian Bute, Andy Lee, Matvey Korobov, Yordanis Despaigne and Nikola Sjekloca in the amateur ranks. At the pro level, Golovkin has wins over Gabriel Rosado and Nobuhiro Ishida.

Obviously, Golovkin’s pro experience is still lacking at this early point in his career but he’s still trying to get the top fighters to face him. You can’t do much when you call out the likes of Julio Cesar Chavez Jr., Andre Ward, Sergio Martinez, Daniel Geale, Felix Sturm and Peter Quillin and they fail to take you up on the offer.

To show you how desperate Golovkin is to get a big fight, he’s volunteered to drop down to 154 and fight the winner of the April 20th fight between WBC junior middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez and WBA champ Austin Trout, but you can already guess what the answer will be for the winner of that fight when asked to fight Golovkin. It’s going to be a big no.

Canelo already knows how talented Golovkin was after sparring with him not long ago, and he’s not going to want to mix it up with him in real life and end up getting knocked out or badly schooled.