(Photo Credit: Hogan Photos/Golden Boy Promotions) By Jeff Aranow: WBC middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez made it clear on Tuesday that if a fight between him and IBF/IBO/WBA middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin is going to take place in the future, then it’s going to take place without him giving any concessions to him. Canelo says he himself is not a middleweight, and he doesn’t know when a fight between the two of them will take place.
Canelo does say the fight with Golovkin will happen, but it will be under his conditions. This suggests that if Golovkin wants the fight with Canelo, then he’s going to need to be prepared to boil down to 155lbs to make it happen.
Talk of a fight between Canelo and Golovkin is still premature at this point, as Golovkin has a fight on April 23 against his IBF mandatory challenger Dominic Wade, and Canelo has to defend his WBC title against Amir Khan (31-3, 19 KOs) on May 7 at a catch-weight of 155lbs.
“I’m not a middleweight,” Alvarez said via RingTV.com. “I’m a super welterweight. That’s my weight class. I wanted to fight this time for some sort of title at super welter.”
By saying that he’s not a middleweight, Canelo is letting Golovkin and the boxing world know that they can look forward to him giving the Kazakhstan fighter the conditions that he will need to come down in weight if he wants to fight him. Canelo also made it clear that the only reason he fought for the WBC middleweight title last November was because he wanted to fight Miguel Cotto.
It wasn’t a title that Canelo had his eyes on. He wanted the Cotto fight. This means that if Golovkin presses the issue by refusing to fight at the catch-weight that Canelo wants him to fight at, then it’s quite likely that he’ll vacate the WBC title and leave Golovkin without the big money fight that he wants/needs.
“One thing I’m not going to do; I’m not going to give up any concession or any advantages to GGG,” Canelo said. “I’m in the position where I deserve and I’ve earned my spot. So is the fight going to get made? It’s going to get made. But the conditions have to be right. I have to feel comfortable and he has to feel comfortable as well.”
It looks like Golovkin will have to hop when Canelo says hop and jump when he says jump if he wants the fight with him. Canelo doesn’t sound like he’s going to fight Golovkin at 160. We’ve heard Golovkin and his trainer Abel Sanchez say that they won’t fight at a catch-weight for the WBC title. Their focus is to pick up the WBC title whether Canelo defends it or not. If Golovkin and his team don’t agree to the catch-weight, then Canelo will either have to vacate the title or have it stripped from him by the World Boxing Council for failing to defend it at the full weight for the division.
Canelo is not a middleweight in terms of his height. He looks more like a junior middleweight. However, his weight suggests that he is a middleweight. Canelo is rehydrating into the 170s, and that makes him a full middleweight. Canelo hasn’t fought at junior middleweight since his fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr. in 2013. Canelo says he can still make the weight for the junior middleweight division, but the fact of the matter is, Canelo hasn’t fought in that weight class since 2013.
“Look, the fight will get made,” said Canelo about the Golovkin fight. “Is it going to happen this year? I don’t know. I can’t say. I don’t negotiate my fights. But if the conditions are right and the conditions are met, all the details of the fight, let’s do it.”
Golovkin is probably going to need to agree to fight Canelo at a catch-weight at some point. He can do it in September this year, or he can agree to do it after he picks up the WBC title. The main thing is Canelo is likely going to insist on a catch-weight of some sort before he agrees to fight Golovkin.
Canelo is young enough to wait Golovkin out until he’s older before agreeing to fight him. Canelo can always use the catch-weight as a reason for not fighting Golovkin if he refuses to agree to it. Given Canelo’s resistance in fighting at the full weight for the middleweight division, it might be smart for Golovkin to agree to boil down to 155 to give Canelo the weight advantage that he wants for the fight.
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