By Jeff Aranow: Tom Loeffler of K2 Promotions says that most of the negotiation points have been agreed to for a fight between IBF/IBO/WBA/WBC middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin (36-0, 33 KOs) and Golden Boy Promotions former two division belt holder Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (48-1-1, 34 KOs) for a fight this September. Loeffler says that if both fighters win their next fights, they could be facing each other later this year.
Eric Gomez, the president of Golden Boy, recently expressed optimism that the Canelo-Golovkin fight will get made this year if both guys win their next fights. Golovkin faces Daniel Jacobs (32-1, 29 KOs) on March 18 on HBO PPV. Canelo will be fighting former WBC middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. (50-2-1, 32 KOs) on May 6 on HBO PPV.
While those are both tough fights, Canelo and Golovkin are expected to win them and meet later this year unless something comes up that prevents the mega-fight from taking place. One thing that could stop the Canelo-Golovkin fight from happening is if the Canelo vs. Chavez Jr. fight is an exciting one and is highly competitive. Golden Boy CEO Oscar De La Hoya said recently that he might make a rematch between Canelo and Chavez Jr. in September if their fight in May turns out to be an exciting match. A loss for Canelo in May would obviously be another reason why a rematch with Chavez Jr. would be imperative for September.
“It’s clearly the biggest test for Gennady and Danny,” said Loeffler to secondsout.com. “This will be Gennady’s fifth fight at the Garden. Danny’s from Brooklyn and has a great following. Gennady is 100 percent focused on March 18th. For me, it’s so hard to get guys inside the ring to fight Gennady. I’m looking forward 2 to 3 steps. I’ve been talking to [Golden Boy Promotions president] Eric Gomez since November. Just like Eric says, it looks positive. From our side, it looks like it’ll happen in September. It would have happened last year. It was up to Gennady, but that’s a huge fight. If it can happen this year, it’s great, but first Gennady has to beat Daniel Jacobs and Canelo has got to beat Chavez Jr. You can never plan too far ahead. They’re both risky fights. If they’re both victorious, that will be touted as the biggest fight in the sport of boxing. Gennady wants to fight four times per year. Depending on what happens in March, we’ll see what happens with the Canelo fight. It would be slated for September. If there’s something we can do in between, you never know. Gennady is focused on Danny Jacobs. You can never underestimate Danny. He’s clearly Gennady’s toughest fight and Danny’s toughest opponent. We would be looking to make another fight, yeah,” said Loeffler in talking about a potential fight against someone after the March 18 fight against Jacobs.
This is great news that the Golovkin vs. Canelo fight could happen this year. There are still some major hurdles that will need to be overcome before the fight can take place with their next fights. It’ll look bad if Golden Boy still pushes for the Canelo-Chavez Jr. rematch if the fight turns out to be one-sided. If the only reason for a rematch in September is because their previous fight pulled in a lot of PPV buys, it might look bad in the eyes of the boxing world. They want to see Canelo fighting the best, and not just looking for business fights against guys that were once good fighters five or more years ago like Chavez Jr. or James Kirkland.
Golovkin could fight in June against WBO middleweight champion Billy Joe Saunders if everything turns out alright against Daniel Jacobs on March 18. The Saunders fight will give GGG a chance to pick up the last remaining middleweight title that he’s coveted for a long time. Golovkin wants to hold all the titles at once for the 160lb division. It might even help him get a better deal in the negotiations for the Canelo fight.
When asked if there are any sticking points still for the Golovkin vs. Canelo negotiations, Loeffler said, “I don’t think so. All the broad strokes have been agreed to. The weight was never really an issue. Canelo, if he’s victorious [against Chavez Jr.], he has to come down to fight Gennady. But that has so many elements to it. There’s so much interest in that fight. Hopefully, we can put something together. Gennady just wants to get inside the ring and fight. If he’s successful against Danny, it opens up a lot of doors. We just want to make the best fights for Gennady. We’ve always made a lot of concessions to get opponents for Gennady. If they want to be the lead promoter, as long as we can make the fight, that’s fine. That’s never been a point of discussion,” said Loeffler about Canelo’s promoters at Golden Boy being the lead promoter for the Golovkin fight.
Loeffler seems very confident that the Canelo fight will take place. There’s every reason for both promoters to make the fight. Canelo is going to run out of options for big money fights very soon. He needs to fight Golovkin for him to get a big payday. Even if Golden Boy milks the Chavez Jr. fight for two or three fights, Canelo will still be out of options after that. Miguel Cotto is retiring at the end of the year, and it’s going to look funny if Canelo keeps fighting welterweights instead of fighters his own size.
Canelo needs to show the boxing world and his own fans that he can compete against Golovkin. There are a lot of fans who believe that Canelo is afraid of Triple G. This is Canelo’s big opportunity to show the boxing world that he’s not afraid of him. Canelo already showed that he can still be popular no matter how badly he’s beaten. Floyd Mayweather Jr. easily beat Canelo in 2013, and the loss did little to dampen the interest in the red-haired star from Mexico.
Canelo appears to immune to losing fans after a loss. That’s good for him, because he won’t lose anything when he eventually gets beaten again. However, by not fighting Golovkin, Canelo is losing big time, because many of the fans believe that he’s afraid of the Kazakhstan star. Canelo at least needs to try and beat Golovkin. If Canelo can show fans that he’s not afraid of Golovkin, then he might even become more popular.
Canelo has been saying recently that the offer is on the table for Golovkin, and it’s up to him. Hopefully it’s a good offer and not the flat fee offer that was given to him last year.
