By Dan Ambrose: Golden Boy Promotions CEO Oscar De La Hoya says he’s convinced that his fighter Saul Canelo Alvarez will be fighting unbeaten middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin next September, possibly at the 80,000 seat AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas. De La Hoya says he’s just waiting for Golovkin and his promoter Tom Loeffler to call him back and start negotiating with him.
De La Hoya says there’s an eight-figure offer [$10 million] on the table for Golovkin if he agrees to fight Canelo next year in September. De La Hoya doesn’t say what percentage Golovkin would be receiving of the overall revenue of the fight. Eight figures sounds like a nice payday, but it depends on what Canelo is going to be getting for the fight. If Canelo is getting $90 million compared to Golovkin’s $10 million, then it’s not such a great deal.
Golovkin vs. Canelo is a fight that could very well bring in well over two million pay-per-view buys on HBO. Three years ago, Canelo’s fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr. brought in over 2 million buys on Showtime pay-per-view. But with Canelo fighting now on HBO, a fight between him and Golovkin will have a great chance of going well over 2 million PPV buys. If all Golovkin is going to receive is $10 million, then it’s probably not a good deal for him; not if Canelo is going to be getting close to $100 million.
“I’m sure a lot of people are going to ask me what’s next [for Canelo],” said De La Hoya after the fight last night. “30 days ago I made an offer to Triple G and his people. I made a significant offer, an eight figure offer. I believe it was an offer of 2, 3 or 4 times as much as he’s ever made, and I haven’t heard back. That’s the bottom line. Look, I want to make this fight, there’s no doubt about it. Jerry [Jones] and I were talking about how he would love that fight [Canelo vs. Golovkin] in his stadium. I told him, ‘Jerry, you’ve got to show me the money.’ Canelo is not afraid of anybody. He’s going to fight Triple G in September. Now with his hurt knuckle, we have to go back to the drawing board and see what’s going to happen in December, because his plans are to fight in December, and then fight in May and then do the big fight in September [against Golovkin]. But I need Triple G and his people to at least to call us back and negotiate and take the offer. Triple G mentions that he’s not a businessman. He’s said publically that Canelo is going to offer him $2 million dollars. Guess what? There’s an eight-figure number [$10 million] on the table for Triple G. Sign the contract, and let’s stop with the nonsense. That’s what the deal is. That’s what we have on the table. Canelo is the biggest star,” said De La Hoya.
De La Hoya and Golden Boy might need to sweeten the offer made to Golovkin by bumping it up to closer to a 50-50 deal to get the fight done. If Canelo is making considerably more than GGG, then the fight isn’t going to get made. Mayweather made $80 million for his fight against Canelo with it bringing in over 2 million buys. If Mayweather was making that kind of money, then you can imagine that Canelo and Golden Boy will be looking to flip the script with them being the one that gets $80 million or more and with Golovkin making the small money. I don’t think that’s going to work for Triple G. If Golovkin is the one that is going to enable Canelo to bring in over 2 million, possibly even 3 million buys, then he’s getting a raw deal if all he’s getting is $10 million. Can you imagine the money Canelo will be getting if the Canelo-Golovkin fight brings in 3 million or 4 million PPV buys? If all Golovkin is getting is $10 million, Canelo could walk away with a bundle. Mayweather made $250 million and Manny Pacquiao $100 million for their fight last year. That fight brought in over 4 million PPV buys. Golovkin accepting $10 million would be grossly unfair if Canelo walks away with over $300 million. That’s not a good deal for GGG.