By Jim Dower: Gennady “GGG” Golovkin’s trainer Abel Sanchez has a warning to give Saul “Canelo” Alvarez for the Golovkin vs. Canelo fight on September 16. He wants Canelo (49-1-1, 34 KOs) to realize that he won’t have Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. (50-3-1, 32 KOs) when he gets inside the ring with Golovkin (37-0, 33 KOs) in their fight on HBO PPV in four months from now. It’s going to be a much different story out there for the redheaded Mexican attraction.
Chavez Jr. embarrassed himself and ruined an expensive PPV fight on HBO by throwing punches last Saturday night. Chavez Jr. complained afterwards that he felt weak. But that doesn’t explain why he didn’t let his hands go. Fighters that are weak and over trained like Chavez Jr. was; they usually are able to still throw punches. They don’t just show up and stand there taking punches. They let their hands go, but lack power. Chavez Jr. wouldn’t throw punches, period.
“I think Canelo displayed today some great boxing skills and great combinations, but he’s not going to have Chavez Jr. in front of him. It’s going to be Gennady Golovkin,” said Sanchez at the post-fight press conference last Saturday. ”I think this is going to be a great fight. This is the type of fight that can go 2 or 3 times.”
It’s going to be a harder fight for Canelo because Golovkin will be attacking him in various ways. Golovkin will test Canelo early to see what kind of power he has. If it’s not major power that he’s worried about, then he’s going to look to bomb him out with big shots as fast as possible. That’s what Golovkin does if he doesn’t respect his opponent’s punching power.
Canelo doesn’t have the punching power that Golovkin’s last opponent Daniel Jacobs possesses. Canelo is possibly a bigger puncher than Kell Brook, but not by much. Golovkin took Brook’s power and stopped him in the 5th round. We might see another knockout of that type unless Golovkin decides to play it safe ad box for 12 rounds like he mostly did in the Jacobs fight. The boxing fans deserve a good fight after the the dull match between Canelo and Chavez Jr. last Saturday night.
Golovkin is going to be trying to get the boxing fans their money’s worth because this is a great opportunity for him to expand his fan base by beating Canelo. I think Golovkin will likely play up the whole ‘Mexican style’ bit that he likes to call his fighting style. Besides that, Golovkin will be sure to talk up wanting to make the Canelo fight a real “drama show.” Golovkin said that about the Jacobs fight, but instead he boxed him for 12 rounds, and disappointed a lot of fans.
“The styles are there. They should mesh together on my part,” said Canelo about the Golovkin fight.
Canelo won’t be able to get away with the things he did against Chavez Jr. in a fight against Golovkin. Canelo will need to be a lot more strategic, and put more emphasis on defending rather than going after GGG. Canelo isn’t used to defending for long periods of time. He’s going to have to keep his guard up against Golovkin, because he’ll get hit with something big and knocked out.
“I saw a Chavez Jr. that I could barely recognize,” said ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith. “It was similar to what he did in the first 11 rounds of his fight against Sergio Martinez. He was getting completely out-boxed and outclassed. Canelo was throwing jabs all day long, and they were hitting him in the face. He was throwing body shots to the liver. He would throw uppercuts. No matter what he threw, Julio Cesar Chavez would refuse to counter. On top of that, he would setup and get close and would touch foreheads. That was the perfect opportunity for Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. to harken back to what his style really is in terms of mauling you and throwing haymakers and throwing body shots, and throwing uppercuts. He barely threw any of those. It was a one-sided fight. I wouldn’t blame people for asking for their money back,”
So far, the boxing public isn’t making nearly as big a deal about the Canelo-Chavez Jr. being dull compared to the amount of fans that bitterly complained about the Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Manny Pacquiao fight that under performed in 2015. It could be that the fans aren’t as bothered about the Canelo vs. Chavez Jr. fight because it had a much lower price tag of just $59.95 compared to the $100 the fans were asked to pay for the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight. We’ll have to see though. In the next few weeks, we’ll see if the fans are upset or not about the Canelo vs. Chavez Jr. fight.
“The score was 120-108 on all three of the judges’ scorecards,” said Smith about the Canelo-Chavez Jr. fight. “One fighter showed up to fight. The other fighter showed up. It was an incredibly disappointing fight. I know for me, they stole $59.95 of my money. The man was 50-2, with an impressive record. He’s a knockout artist. He’s usually putting people to sleep. He was a world class fighter. He always had that puncher’s chance. Nobody could anticipate that Chavez Jr. wouldn’t bother throwing punches. Canelo Alvarez threw over 600 punches. Chavez Jr. threw barely over 300 punches. You expected him to throw haymakers, trying to knock him out. He wasn’t throwing punches,” said Smith.
What Smith doesn’t understand about Chavez Jr’s impressive 50-2 record was the level of opposition he fought in order to build that record. Chavez Jr. has faced a lot of poor opponents during his boxing career, and some of the fights were controversial decision wins for him. Chavez’s draw with Carlos Molina in their first fight probably should have been a loss for Chavez Jr. Further, Chavez Jr’s win over Matt Vanda in their first fight and his win over Brian Vera in their first fight were both bouts that should have gone the other way.
Chavez Jr’s 50-2-1 record going into the Canelo fight should have been 48-5. That’s still a good record, but the victories came against B-level opposition and not the talented fighters in boxing.
” I can promise you this; Triple G will show up and he will throw punches,”said Smith.
Golovkin will bring it because he knows that there will be a lot of fans paying to see the fight, and he’s going to want to impress them. Golovkin will also want to show the fans that he’s a better fighter than what he showed in the Jacobs and Brook fights. Stephen A. Smith pointed out that he believes that Golovkin intentionally took it easy on some of his opponents recently in order not to scare away Canelo.
This makes you wonder if Golovkin didn’t go all out in his fights against Jacobs and Brook so he could look vulnerable in those fights. It might explain why Golovkin didn’t attack Jacobs like he normally does with his opponents. Golovkin raised a lot of eyebrows when he opted to back away from Jacobs after knocking him down in the 4th round. That was very strange for Golovkiin to do that, because he had made it look so easy in dropping Jacobs.
The logical thing for Golovkin to do would have been to press ahead once he had Jacobs hurt, but instead he backed away from him and let him survive. That’s the biggest hint that GGG might have purposefully allowed Jacobs to go the full 12 rounds so that he could look vulnerable enough for Canelo and Golden Boy promotions to want to make the fight with him. If Golovkin did do that against Jacobs, then it was a risky thing because the fight was very close at the end. Golovkin clearly won the fight, but it was still very close.
