By Dan Ambrose: WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin (32-0, 29 KOs) came in one pound under the limit today in weighing in at 159 pounds during his official weigh-in on Friday for his fight tomorrow night at the Forum in Inglewood, California.
Golovkin’s opponent for Saturday, Willie Monroe Jr. (19-1, 6 KOs), weighed in right at the middleweight limit at 160 pounds.
The 5’10 1/2” Golovkin looked like the taller fighter of the two compared to the 5’10” Monroe. However, Monroe looked bigger with his upper body than Golovkin. Whether Monroe’s bigger size will translate to more power than what we’ve seen from him in the past is unclear.
Monroe is a good fighter, as he showed in winning ESPN’s 2014 Boxcino tournament, but he’s out of his class here. Monroe is more of a fringe level fighter with an inflated ranking rather than a guy that is ranked #2 by the WBA. He’s good at the ESPN level for his fights, but he’s stepping it up against the best fighter in the middleweight division.
Monroe doesn’t have the punching power to compete with Golovkin, and his slick ESPN-level fighting style is no match for Golovkin. Monroe is good against ESPN tournament fighters like Brandon Adams, but he’s far too weak and too much of a runner to compete against a puncher like Golovkin.
I think Monroe would be in the same hot water if he were matched against other top middleweights like Miguel Cotto, Daniel Jacobs, Andy Lee, Peter Quillin, Marco Antonio Rubio, Tureano Johnson, Jorge Sebastian Heiland, Billy Joe Saunders, Martin Murray, Daniel Geale, Hassan N’Dam, David Lemieux, Chris Eubank Jr., and Sam Soliman. I believe those guys are all a level above Monroe in talent.
Golovkin’s interim WBC middleweight title won’t be on the line for the fight due to Monroe not participating in the 30-day pre-weigh-in.
WBC World flyweight champion Roman “Chocolatito” Gonzalez (42-0, 36 KOs) weighed in at 111 pounds for his title defense against 35-year-old former WBC light flyweight champion Edgar Sosa (51-8, 30 KOs). For his part, Sosa weighed in at 112 pounds after initially weighing in at 112.2lbs. Sosa stripped off the extra .2 pounds after being given two hours to take the weight off. Unless Sosa was weakened by the process of taking off the extra weight, this fight should be the more competitive fight on the card compared to the main event between Monroe and Golovkin.
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