Golovkin vs. Froch possible says Loeffler

By Boxing News - 11/13/2016 - Comments

golovkin633

By Scott Gilfoid: Middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin’s promoter Tom Loeffler says he’s in talks with Matchroom Sport promoter Eddie Hearn about a potential fight between Golovkin and former super middleweight champion Carl Froch (33-2, 24 KOs). Loeffler says initially they were “half joking” about wanting to put a fight together between Golovkin and the retired 39-year-old Froch, but after seeing how much interest the fight talk has generated on social media, he says they’re seriously interested in making the fight.

Loeffler wants to stage the Golovkin-Froch fight at the 80,000 seat Wembey Stadium in London, England. Loeffler believes the Froch vs. Golovkin fight would break the record for tickets sold from the Froch vs. George Groves fight in May 2014 at Wembley Stadium.

This is interesting news. Froch has been blabbering about him being ‘too big and too strong’ for GGG. This would be his opportunity to prove it. Further, Froch would have a built in excuse he can use to the boxing public if he gets whipped by Triple G. Froch could tell the fans that he had been out of the ring for too long of a time, and that’s why he lost. A certain amount of fans would buy into Froch’s excuse. Some wouldn’t obviously.

Kell Brook had his own excuses after his recent knockout loss to Golovkin by blaming the loss on him suffering an eye injury and him not being a middleweight. I would hope that Froch doesn’t start making excuses if Golovkin knocks him out, but I have a feeling we’d be hearing excuses. Oh well.

Ultimately, it’ll come down to Froch whether the Golovkin fight takes place, says Loeffler. If Froch wants to fight Golovkin, then he’ll agree to it. Froch had the chance to fight Golovkin two years ago in 2014 when the fight was offered to him, but he retired instead. It’s too bad Froch didn’t take the fight at that time, because he was still in his prime. With Froch having been out of action for two years now since 2014, it’s likely that he’ll have a lot of ring rust on his boxing skills. If he doesn’t care about the ring rust, then he’ll take the fight. I don’t think it will really matter for Froch if he takes a few tune-ups. He’s still going to be royally up against it when/if he gets inside the ring with Golovkin.

Loeffler said this to IFL TV about a Froch vs. Golovkin fight:

“We loved the reception in London. We’d love to bring Gennady back to the UK,” said Loeffler. “I was talking to Eddie [Hearn] the other night. A potential Froch fight, we’re working on it. We’re chipping away on it. I mean, he’s retired, but the longer it goes, I think there could be some interest in it. Eddie’s interested. Eddie wants to do a big event, and I think we can break Froch’s record of 80,000 tickets. I think that would be a huge fight. I think a fight like that could inspire him. That’s what Eddie says. Eddie wants to put together a big event, and that’s a huge event. We were kind of half joking. There was so much interest when I sent out that tweet. I think there would be massive interest in that fight. There will be a great fight. The response to social media was big. I think that’s one fight that could lure Carl out of retirement. Eddie says he can make the fight, as long as Carl wants to make the fight. If anyone’s going to lure Carl out of retirement, it’s Triple G. He saw the response to the Kell Brook fight. A fight with Froch, I think, could break the record that he made against [George] Groves. That would be a fight we’re definitely interested in.”

Before Golovkin can face Froch, he’s going to need to take care of his WBA ordered fight against WBA ‘regular’ middleweight champion Daniel Jacobs. Loeffler is hoping that fight can take place between Golovkin and Jacobs in early 2017. They’re going to need to make the fight soon. It’s already cost Golovkin his December 10 fight date on HBO Championship Boxing. If Golovkin still hasn’t gotten the fight out of the way against Jacobs in the first quarter of next year, then it’s going to be bad news. Golovkin will miss another fight date in that case, which means that whatever money the fight with Jacobs makes won’t mean much because he’ll have missed two paydays in order to finally make the fight.

“We’re still in discussions with Golden Boy,” said Loeffler about the Golovkin vs. Canelo fight in 2017. “We’re shooting for September 2017. That’s a huge fight. As far as pay-per-view standpoint, it’s probably the biggest fight right now. We’re working on trying to make that fight, and that’s a huge fight. Right now the good thing is there’s a lot of options for Triple G, a lot of great options. He’s got to beat Danny Jacobs first. He’s the top middleweight. Danny Jacobs is the #2 middleweight. So if he can overcome that, there’s a lot of great options out there for Gennady; whether it’s Canelo. [Julio Cesar] Chavez is talking about fighting now. [James] DeGale-Badou Jack is a good fight. [Gilberto Zurdo] Ramirez is talking about fighting him now. It looks like finally some of the doors are opening so that some of the big names are actually not only willing to talk about fighting him, but actually getting inside the ring with fighting him,” said Loeffler.

We’ll see if any of those options transpires in 2017. Golovkin has options, but it doesn’t mean he’s going to get any of those fights. There’s too many ways for those fights not to happen.

Froch hasn’t faced a meaningful opponent since his win over Mikkel Kessler in 2013. Even that fight wasn’t a big deal, because Kessler was at the end of his career and not the same fighter that beat Froch n the Super Six tournament in 2010. Froch’s last four fights of his career came against Groves x 2, Kessler and Yusaf Mack.

At this point, I don’t know how many fans would be interested in a Golovkin-Froch fight. It might be a big deal in the UK, but I don’t think it would register in the U.S, because Froch isn’t well known with the casual boxing fans in the States. He’s been out of action for a long, long time, and it might not even be a big deal in his own county of the UK.

YouTube video