DeGale willing to fight Golovkin at 168

By Boxing News - 12/06/2015 - Comments

1-GolovkinLemieux_Hoganphotos2By Scott Gilfoid: IBF super middleweight champion James DeGale says he would be willing to face the highly popular middleweight Gennady Golovkin (34-0, 31 KOs) if he’s willing to move up in weight to fight him at 168lbs.

DeGale is having problems getting the big money fights due to the super middleweight division being barren of the highly popular fighters that he needs for him to make that big cash.

Golovkin’s promoter Tom Loeffler of K2 Promotions recently spoke of the idea of wanting to match Golovkin against former super middleweight world champion Carl Froch, but it doesn’t look like that fight will take place due to Froch having gained weight since retiring and wanting a fight against Golovkin at 172.

Froch doesn’t seem serious about wanting to come out of retirement though to take on a dangerous talent like Golovkin.

“I would like to think that I probably am the No 1 fighter at 168lbs out there,” DeGale said to skysports.com. “I’m the IBF world champion and I’ll beat (Badou) Jack or (Arthur) Abraham or whoever. If Golovkin stepped up and wanted to fight me then why not? I’ve always said I’m in boxing for the big fights and all the titles, so if he moves up and he wants to fight me – let’s do it.”

The trouble with DeGale’s dream of fighting Golovkin is there’s no money in it for Golovkin to face a big super middleweight like DeGale. Yeah, Golovkin can agree to fight DeGale and likely knock him out cold, but what’s the point? You can’t put that fight on HBO PPV, because DeGale is still an unknown in the U.S. His recent fight against Lucian Bute last month didn’t bring in earth shattering ratings.

DeGale ran out of gas in that fight and won a controversial 12 round decision. The fact that DeGale can’t even dominate 35-year-old fighters like Bute suggests that he’s not even close to being the best fighter in his own division. If Golovkin is going to have to mess up his body weight by moving up to an alien weight division like the 168lb division, then he should at least be facing someone who can bring in the fans and is popular enough to make it a PPV fight.

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DeGale needs to make a name for himself in the super middleweight division before calling out a guy in the league of Golovkin. The only way DeGale can make a name for himself is to take on and beat the Dirrell brothers without controversy and defeat the WBC super middleweight champion Badou Jack. DeGale won’t get anything by facing WBO super middleweight champion Arthur Abraham because he was already beaten by Andre Dirrell and Andre Ward. There’s no point in DeGale fighting him now because Dirrell and Ward already did a great job of beating him.

One way for DeGale to build up a big fan base would be for him to take some risks with his career by stepping up in weight seven pounds and facing the likes of light heavyweights Artur Beterbiev, Adonis Stevenson, Sergey Kovalev, Andre Ward, Juergen Braehmer, Sullivan Barrera, Eleider Alvarez, Andrzej Fonfara, Marcus Browne, Jean Pascal, and Edwin Rodriguez.

If DeGale can whip all of those fighters, then I see him making a huge name for himself and getting that fight against Golovkin that he so badly wants. Short of that, DeGale won’t be making a big enough name for himself to get a fight against Golovkin.



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