By Dan Ambrose: Gennady Golovkin’s trainer Abel Sanchez isn’t ruling out an upset victory for Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. (50-2-1, 32 KOs) in his fight against favorite Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (48-1-1, 34 KOs) in their fight on May 6. Sanchez says that the fight could be turned around by one big punch from Chavez Jr. to Canelo. When he’s at his best, Chavez Jr. is kind of a beat with his ability to absorb shots and dish out punishment. who can forget how Chavez Jr. made the 5’10” Sergio Martinez look small in comparison in their fight in 2012. Martinez is taller than Canelo by at least an inch, possibly two. We don’t really know how tall Canelo is. He might be shorter than his listed height of 5’9″.
Sanchez believes that Golovkin is at risk of losing his next fight to WBA World middleweight champion Daniel “Miracle Man” Jacobs (32-1, 29 KOs) on March 18. Jacobs is a big puncher, and viewed as a risky fight for Golovkin. Of the two fights, you’d have to say that Golovkin is at greater risk of losing to Jacobs than Canelo is in facing the ring rusty Chavez Jr, who will need to melt down to 164 ½ pounds to face him at a catch-weight.
Golden Boy Promotions was smart to require that Chavez Jr. agree to a catch-weight for his fight against Canelo. The catch-weight will do a good job of taking a lot of the strength from Chavez Jr., and possibly leaving him too weak to pull off an upset against Canelo.
You can argue that if Golden Boy wasn’t worried about the weight, then they wouldn’t have required that Chavez Jr. fight at a catch-weight. They would have let him come in at whatever weight he’s comfortable with, which nowadays seems to be in the low 170s. Even in that weight, Chavez Jr. looks weight drained. Chavez Jr’s walking around weight must be pretty high for him to be looking weight drained in the 170s.
“I am among those who thinks that fighting at this level, like Golovkin is doing with Jacobs, that anything can happen, and I feel the same way with Canelo and Chavez,” Sanchez said to ESPN Deportes. “At this level they are all good and one punch can change everything – obviously, Golovkin is preparing for that not to happen. Today there is talk that Canelo will go against Golovkin, but it can still become Golovkin with Chavez, or Jacobs with Canelo. That’s the interesting thing here – that everyone has the possibility to win.”
If Canelo gets into an all-out war with Chavez Jr. on May 6, then anything is possible. Chavez Jr. proved against Sergio Martinez that you do not want to stand in front of him and trade shots. Chavez Jr. hits too hard, and he’s got a left hook that can hurt you. Canelo seems to prefer to fight on the inside, and he likes to try and use head movement like Floyd Mayweather Jr. to avoid shots. The problem for Canelo is that Chavez Jr. is more of a body puncher. He prefers to throw to the body.
The wide-bodied Canelo won’t be able to avoid getting hit with body shots no matter how hard he tries. Canelo needs rest breaks against the ropes. That’s a given. Once he goes to the ropes to take his normal one-minute breather in each round, Chavez Jr. is going to work him over with body shots. Those punches are going to take a lot out of Canelo. He’s not used to fighting guys that throw punches to the body.
Golden Boy has matched Canelo against mostly head hunters with moderate to weak punching power. Chavez Jr. can punch, and he’s going to be thinking body first and head second. That’s not good news for Canelo, because he was already hurt in the past with a body shot against Austin Trout. The shot effected Canelo so badly that he spent the entire second half of the Trout fight against the ropes, protecting his midsection from further body shots.
Where Sanchez is wrong is him thinking that Golovkin could potentially be facing Chavez Jr. if he beats Canelo. Golden Boy Promotions CEO Oscar De La Hoya has already said that if the Canelo-Chavez Jr. fight is close or ends in controversy, he’ll schedule a rematch between them. De La Hoya has gone so far to say that he’ll have three fights between Canelo and Chavez Jr. It could be even more than that if the fights wind up as being close and making a lot of money. Chavez Jr. is not going to walk away from a rematch against Canelo, especially if he beats him on May 6. Chavez Jr. would get a bigger cut of the revenue in a rematch with Canelo if he defeats him in May. I don’t think Golovkin is going to get a chance against either of these guys, even against the lower of the fight.
If Jacobs defeats Golovkin, I think he’s not going to be high on the list for Golden Boy for a fight against Canelo. The 6’1” Jacobs doesn’t have a large fan base, and he’s a lot bigger than the tiny 5’9” Canelo, who might not be any taller than 5’8”. Canelo and the 5’8” Floyd Mayweather Jr. looked like they were both the same height in their fight in 2013. I don’t think Canelo has grown any taller since then.
If you put Canelo in the ring with Jacobs, he could lose the fight based on reach alone. Canelo had problems with the 5’9” Erislandy Lara’s reach. Can you imagine the problems Canelo would have against a fighter as tall as Jacobs? That’s why I don’t see Golden Boy letting Jacobs anywhere near Canelo if he gets Golovkin on March 18. Golovkin, 34, is aging and someone that Golden Boy can wait out. They can’t do that with the 29-year-old Jacobs, because he’s too near the 26-year-old Canelo in age. For all we know, Jacobs might age better than Canelo, so it might not work if Golden Boy tried to wait until Jacobs was older before making a fight between the two.
It would be nice if the winners of the Canelo-Chavez Jr. and Golovkin-Jacobs fights fought each other in September in a big mega-fight, but I don’t see it playing out like that.