Golovkin: The PPV Flop

By Angel Flowers - 03/22/2017 - Comments

Image: Golovkin: The PPV Flop

By Angel Flowers: This past weekend the number one middleweight Gennady “GGG” Golovkin fought who many regard as the number #2 middleweight in Daniel “Miracle Man” Jacobs. This was a fight that Golovkin wanted to price himself out of by not giving Jacobs what was fair. Golovkin argued that he was the “A” side of the fight and Jacobs should be happy with whatever he was given. I can understand this way of thinking, after all who exactly is Daniel Jacobs? Jacobs has only beaten Peter “Kid Chocolate” Quillin who himself is questionable.

Jacobs is the guy who was thoroughly embarrassed and knocked out by Dmitry Pirog. Golovkin wanted what he thought he was worth, especially as the undefeated knockout artist was bringing his talent as the number one middleweight to pay per view. Jacobs eventually took what he could get and no matter how shaky Golovkin’s performance was or no matter how anyone viewed the fight Golovkin won and walked away with his title, arguing over the outcome is a moot point. Well how did Golovkin the Pay Per View king do? Under a 151k PPV buys, I said earlier the reason for this is because the boxing public knows a fraud when they see one.

Golovkin has fought everyone put in front of him, that is the makings of a good fighter, not a great one. Former Flyweight champion Manny “PacMan” Pacquiao did not have to fight Oscar De La Hoya, Miguel Cotto, Shane Mosley, Tim Bradley or Floyd “Money” Mayweather. None of those people were his mandatory opponent and yet Pacquiao is well loved because he went out and sought those challenges, rather than facing whoever was just put in front of him. Pacquiao had ppv sales of 890,000 and 800,000 for facing Tim Bradley in their first two fights and 1.25 million for Cotto. I could go on and on about how many PPV buys he has garnered but does anyone believe he would have made those numbers staying at flyweight? I could go on about how former Jr. Lightweight Champion Floyd Mayweather became a PPV darling by going up in weight and seeking challenges and the same can be said for former super lightweight champion Miguel Cotto. Golovkin however talented is scared to challenge himself, this I think should be obvious.

As a guy who can only bring in 150k in PPV, he fancies himself on the same level as Super Welterweight Champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez. Alvarez has brought in over 2 million in PPV buys before, a far cry from whatever Golovkin did. I believe this is because Alvarez challenges himself, the guy came from welterweight and has fought the greats. He fought Floyd Mayweather, he fought Miguel Cotto and in each case knew his role in the negotiations. Heck he even fought Erislandy Lara after being warned no to and won, a man Golovkin has been scared to face. Alvarez in an attempt to challenge himself offered to fight Golovkin at 155 pounds and 10 million dollars once Golovkin said he would be willing to go down in weight to 154 pounds and face former Jr. Lightweight champion Floyd Mayweather. I mean Golovkin in making his case for fighting the former Jr. Lightweight claimed he was small for middleweight. The money at the time would have been 5 times more than Golovkin had ever made but instead he went with the safe fight in welterweight Ezekiel “Special K” Brook. Golovkin cannot make the big money despite his eye pleasing style because he keeps taking soft touches. Many would argue the reason he is not more known is because of his race/nationality which is false.

Many people believe Alvarez has become the King of PPV because he is Mexican. This is outrageous false since Floyd Mayweather definitely was not Mexican. The biggest PPV of all time took place between a black guy and an Asian. Pacquiao is not only not Hispanic, he isn’t even American. Miguel Cotto is another non Mexican who can say he has repeatedly outdrawn Golovkin. Gilberto “Zurdo” Ramirez is a good looking undefeated Mexican kid who holds a world championship, surely then he should be making the big money then right? Of course not, because who exactly has Zurdo fought. The boxing public knew what they were getting with those warriors, just like the numbers show they also know what they are getting with Golovkin.

In short Golovkin is like a middle school yard bully, he may be the toughest guy on the playground but is scared to ever step foot outside of that playground. He won’t ever try the same thing at High School, we all saw the way he ducked Andre Ward forcing him to go up and weight and had Sergey Kovalev a beating. Golovkin is also scared to even go to primary school as evident by the way he ducked fighting all of those who called him out such as Erislandy Lara. Golovkin is even scared to face primary schoolers who threaten to come to his playground. Alvarez wants the fight, his promoters agreed to the weight Golovkin wanted and offered him 15 million, way more money than he had ever made. Golovkin still argues that he needs more based off his popularity. 150K ppv buys makes this guy think he is a shot caller to a guy that has brought in 2.2 million. Golovkin if he wanted respect should follow the blueprint that has already been set out, Roy Jones Jr. could have stayed in the middleweight division but he did not. Bernard Hopkins and James Toney also could have done the same. The next PPV star in the making, Vasyl Lomachenko has already made the jump from featherweight to super featherweight and I expect him to eventually land at jr. welterweight. If Golovkin could put aside his fear of Alvarez I believe he could do the same.