By Sean Jones: Gennady “GGG” Golovkin (37-0-1, 33 KOs) is “deteriorating,” says HBO commentator Jim Lampley after watching him arguably get robbed in his last fight against Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (49-1-2, 34 KOs) on September 16 on HBO pay-per-view.
Lampley says Golovkin couldn’t cut off the ring or throw body shots against Canelo. His opinion is Golovkin is slipping as a fighter, because of his decision not to throw body shots and the problems he had in cutting off the ring on the 27-year-old Canelo.
Lampley openly admits that he had Golovkin winning the fight against Canelo. But despite thinking that Golovkin won, Lampley is critical of him instead of Canelo for some reason. I’m wondering how HBO feels about seeing Canelo get exposed by Golovkin. The deterioration I saw in the fight was on Canelo’s side. The guy literally couldn’t fight hard beyond 1 minute of each round. We saw Canelo fight hard for 12 minutes during the entire 12 round fight. The other 24 minutes, Canelo was gassed against the ropes, eating jabs and fighting like he was hoping GGG would stop attacking him and give him his normal rest breaks. Canelo has always fought at a slow pace in his fights. He couldn’t do that against GGG, and it showed. The red-haired Mexican star was constantly in a state of exhaustion during the fight. Lampley not talking about that makes me wonder. Is there an agenda?
Golovkin exposed these MAJOR flaws in Canelo’s game:
• Stamina
• Short reach
• Lack of a jab
• Inability to fight in the center of the ring
• Only capable of fighting hard in first 45 seconds of rounds. The last 2 minutes of rounds, Canelo was gassed and needing rest breaks against ropes
• Power inadequate for middleweight division
• Too short for 160 lb. division
“I think they were evenly matched,” said Lampley said to secondsout.com about the Canelo vs. Golovkin fight last week. “We learned that Gennady Golovkin is deteriorating before our very eyes. I think he’s slipping. I didn’t see it as clearly in the Jacobs fight, and I saw it this time, most particularly his footwork, and his ability to trap opponents and press on them isn’t there anymore,” said Lampley.
Golovkin had no problems keeping up with Canelo. I’m not sure where Lampley got his about GGG not cutting off the ring. He was doing that all night against Canelo, which was why he was so exhausted. Canelo would only move 20 feet to the left and then post up against the ropes. It’s not as if Canelo was moving in circles. I’m wondering if Lampley remembers the fight. He sounds like he’s talking about a different fight. Canelo never moved much at all. It was predictable what Canelo was doing. He would move from the side of the ropes to the corner. Golovkin would stay on top of him and nail Canelo with head-snapping jabs. Canelo would then try and throw a wild shot, and miss most of the time due to his lack of reach.
Lampley should have been talking about Canelo being exposed by Golovkin. The fact that Lampley didn’t mention his flaws with his stamina makes me wonder if the idea is to keep hyping Canelo no matter how badly he fights. Canelo brings in a lot of viewers. It’s probably not good if there’s a lot of talk about how poorly Canelo fought, because then it might hurt the amount of boxing fans that tune in to watch him.
Canelo was moving constantly, and looking like a fighter at least 15 years older than his 27 years. Canelo fought like someone in his 40s in terms of his stamina. You don’t see fighters Canelo’s age gassing out after 3 rounds. Canelo was exhausted by round 4, and incapable of fighting hard after the 1 minute mark.
It’s interesting that Lampley is targeting Golovkin for his criticism rather than Canelo, who gassed out badly and was given a controversial draw that the boxing fans have widely criticized. Like HBO commentator Max Kellerman, Lampley had very little negative to say about Canelo during and after the Canelo-Golovkin fight.
It seemed peculiar that Lampley wasn’t commentating on how Canelo had gassed out and wasn’t capable of fighting hard after the 1st minute of each round. This was something needed to be talked about, because it’s an issue that will be exposed in the future when Canelo fights guys that push him hard the way that Golovkin did. HBO might be looking for a new star to circle their wagons around if Canelo can’t improve his stamina. I didn’t see the deterioration with Golovkin, but I did see Canelo’s stamina problems that limited what he could during rounds.
”He only landed 8 body shots in the fight, apparently concerned with being countered upstairs by Canelo,” said Lampley. ”I say that despite the fact that I thought Gennady was the winner of the fight.”
The game plan for Golovkin was to use his reach to jab Canelo. It wouldn’t have made sense for Golovkin to throw body shots, because that would have put him in harm’s way of Canelo’s uppercuts and counter punches. I don’t think Lampley is on point with what he’s saying. Counter punchers want you to come in close and throw to their body, because then they can counter you. Golovkin would have to take a lot more shots if he committed to the body the way Lampley wanted him to.
Why would Golovkin do that when there was already a blueprint out there in how to beat Canelo by jabbing him from the outside. Floyd Mayweather, Erislandy Lara and Austin Trout all used their jab to get the better of Canelo on the outside. Mayweather got the decision over Canelo, while Lara and Trout were arguably robbed by poor scoring.
They got the better of Canelo, but they ended up in the same position GGG was in with horrible scoring. What Golovkin should have done is open up with more combinations. When Golovkin unloaded with a 6 punches at the end of the fight, Canelo lost is senses completely and started slapping with his shots. Golovkin’s naturally more powerful punches connected cleanly to the head of the tired Canelo, and it looked like Golovkin had him on the verge of being knocked out.
”Seeing what I saw in the fight, I’m not sure I make him the favorite to win the rematch, because I think Canelo may have learned enough about what Gennady does,” said Lampley. ”If Gennady cannot get back what it seems to me he’s lost, if he’s going to be that timid about throwing body shots in the second fight, then Canelo is going to take big advantages of that. You’re going to have to see a stylistically different Gennady Golovkin if he’s to be the winner in the second fight,”said Lampley.
I don’t think Lampley knows what he’s talking about. He says Canelo will take advantage of Golovkin if he can’t or won’t throw body shots. Mayweather wasn’t throwing body shots against Canelo, and he wasn’t taken advantage of. Canelo had nothing to counter. The way you beat a counter puncher is you take away their ability to counter by jabbing them and backing away when they move forward. Canelo was eating jabs all night long, and he only rarely was able to land his power shots. It was always in the first minute of the round where Canelo would land his power shots. After that, he’d get tired and start running.
