By Jeff Aranow: Danny “Miracle Man” Jacobs says he’s going to create enough public pressure from the boxing fans to force Saul “Canelo” Alvarez and Gennady “GGG” Golovkin to fight him. The ingenuous way that Jacobs (32-2 29 KOs) plans on having the public create the pressure by him fighting and winning, and over time the fans will force Canelo and Triple G to face him.
It might not take a lot of pressure for Golovkin to give Jacobs a rematch, because his trainer Abel Sanchez is already talking about Golovkin facing him soon after he exhausts his fights with Canelo and beats WBO champion Billy Joe Saunders.
“I’m willing to be patient while GGG and Canelo settle their business,” Jacobs said to RingTV.com, “and I’ll keep winning and they’ll be forced to fight me because of public demand.”
Jacobs, 30, is going to need to fight more than 2 times per year for him to create pressure on Canelo and GGG from the fans. Right now, Jacobs is complaining that none of the top fighter in the middleweight division wants to fight him. That’s not good news for Jacobs, as it means he’s going to need to face lesser fighters to remain active.
You don’t create pressure fighting scrubs from the 2nd and 3rd tier. In the last 7 years, Jacobs has mostly faced lesser fighters rather than the quality guys. From 2010 to 2014, Jacobs might as well have been called the “Invisible Man,” considering that he wasn’t being talked about due to the poor-quality opposition that he was facing. Jacobs lost to Dmitry Pirog in 2010, and then fought 10 bad opponents in a row before he finally got a good opponent in Pete Quillin in 2015.
After beating Quillin, Jacobs fought a needless rematch against Sergio Mora, who you can argue isn’t a relevant fighter in today’s middleweight division. He’s someone that was a good fighter 10 years ago at 154, but not at 160. Jacobs lost to Golovkin on March 18 of this year by a 12 round unanimous decision. Since that fight, Jacobs hasn’t fought and he still doesn’t have an opponent for his next fight in October.
“I absolutely feel like I’m being avoided,” Jacobs said. “Nobody seems interested shows that I’m the most avoided guy in the division because a lot of people think I beat GGG.”
You can argue that one reason why Jacobs is supposedly being avoided by the top fighters at 160 is because how big he is. If you saw how heavy Jacobs looked in his fight against Golovkin last March, he looked like someone from the 168-lb. division. Jacobs looked huge. He skipped the IBF mandated same day weigh-In for the GGG fight, presumably so that he could have more time to add water weight after having made weight the day before the fight. Some boxing fans believe that Jacobs rehydrated to 190 for the Triple G fight.
If the promoters for the other fighters believe that Jacobs is putting on massive amounts of weight after he rehydrates for his middleweight fights, then it makes sense that they wouldn’t want to match their fighters against him. Without a rehydration clause to make sure Jacobs isn’t coming into the fight as a cruiserweight, why would the promoters want to put their fighters in with him? It doesn’t make sense. Jacobs has fought above the 160lb limit 24 times in his career. What does that tell you? It suggests that he’s arguably a super middleweight who melts down to middleweight. Why do fighters to that? The reason why is it gives them an advantage over guys that are made for that division.
There are some boxing fans that think that Jacobs beat Golovkin, but most think he lost. Jacobs was knocked down by Golovkin, so that doesn’t help his case. Jacobs can’t live off talking about the Golovkin fight for the remainder of his boxing career. Jacobs needs to get back into the ring and fight someone good.
To create the pressure that Jacobs is talking about, he’ll need to defeat these guys:
– Jermall Charlo
– Ryota Murata
– David Lemieux
– Matt Korobov
– Luis Arias
– Andy Lee
– Curtis Stevens
– Sergey Derevyanchenko
– Tureano Johnson
– Willie Monroe Jr.
– Rob Brant
– Maciej Sulecki
– Hassan Ndam
Jacobs could beat most of those guys, but probably not all of them. Tureano Johnson, Jermall Charlo, Derevyanchenko, Lemieux and Luis Arias would be a real problem for Jacobs. Murata, Lee and Korobov would have a puncher’s chance of beating Jacobs. The problem with Jacobs is he doesn’t have the greatest chin. He was knocked out by Pirog, and hurt by Ishe Smith, Sergio Mora, and Michael Walker. Jacobs doesn’t react well when he gets hit hard, and he seems to lose his confidence and fight below the level of a world class fighter.
I would be surprised if Jacobs’ management is looking to match him against fighters from the above list. I doubt that they’re trying to put him in with guys like Lee, Johnson, Arias, Murata, Charlo or Derevyanchenko, because if he loses to those guys, it’s game over for him. Jacobs can forget about ever fighting Canenlo and Golovkin if he gets beaten anytime soon. It would take Jacobs years to come back from a defeat right now, and he doesn’t have a lot of years to try and get a rematch with the 35-year-old Golovkin.
Jacobs has fought 24 of his 34 fights as a pro in the super middleweight division. If his management can’t fight a suitable fighter from the 160lb division to face him, then they should look to recruit opposition from the super middleweight division. Jacobs is certainly big enough to fight guys from the 168-lb. division, and we’ve already seen him fight 24 times at super middleweight above the 160lb. weight class. Why not fight someone from 168 if Jacobs supposedly can’t get any of the middleweights to fight him.
Jacobs’ management should look to put him in with these fighters from the 168lb division if they can’t find anyone at 160 to fight him:
– Fedor Chudinov
– Rocky Fielding
– Patrick Nielsen
– David Benavidez
– Caleb Plant
– Arthur Abraham
– Vincent Feigenbutz
If Jacobs’ manager can’t get anyone to fight him from that division, then he can always match Jacobs with light heavyweights. Those are guys that rehydrate to 190. If Jacobs is rehydrating to 190 for his fights at middleweight, it shouldn’t be a problem for him to fight guys in the 175-lb. division. He would be fighting guys his own size.
Here are potential fighters at light heavyweight that Jacobs could fight:
– Artur Beterbiev
– Oleksandr Gvozdyk
– Marcus Browne
– Juergen Braehmer
– Badou Jack
– Sullivan Barrera
– Sergey Kovalev
– Dmitry Bivol
– Joe Smith Jr.
– Andrzej Fonfara
– Eleider Alvarez
– Edwin Rodriguez
Jacobs would impress a lot of boxing fans if he stayed busy by fighting top guys from 168 and 175 if he couldn’t get any of the middleweights to fight him. As big as Jacobs is, he has no excuse not to fight opposition in the super middleweight and light heavyweight divisions. Like I said, Jacobs has already fought 24 fights at super middleweight. Making that small jump from 168 to 175 shouldn’t be an issue for Jacobs if he wants to stay busy and create real pressure on Canelo and Golovkin. If the idea is to create pressure on Canelo and GGG to fight him, there is only one option for Jacobs and that’s for him to pick the best fighters at 168 and 175 that are interested in fighting him. I’d be willing to bet that fighters at 175 would be open to facing Jacobs. They wouldn’t be at a weight disadvantage against Jacobs. They’d be the same size as him. Put Jacobs in with Beterbiev, Bivol or Gvozdyk. He’d impress boxing fans by fighting those guys and beating them if he could.