By Juan Flores: Promoter Tom Loeffler was surprised that his fighter Gennady Golovkin was unable to dominate Saul Canelo Alvarez more than what he did last September in their fight in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Loeffler says he didn’t expect Canelo to do as well as he did with upper movement, and fighting in spurts. Loeffler says he still thinks Golovkin (37-0-1, 33 KOs) did more than enough to win the fight by a 116-112 score, but he still thought the fight was going to be more one-sided than it turned out to be.
Loeffler feels that Canelo will have a better chance in the rematch with Gennady, because he knows he can go 12 rounds with him. Canelo understands what works and what doesn’t against Gennady. Loeffler is hoping that the rematch will end with a knockout so that there’s no controversy next time around.
As for the rematch, Golovkin and Loeffler are waiting for Canelo to let Golden Boy know whether he wants to take the fight in May or fight at another time. Loeffler needs to find out, as he wants to schedule an opponent for Golovkin for March or April on HBO. He needs to know as soon as possible for him to find a good opponent for Triple G to fight.
“I really thought Gennady would dominate him more in the first time around,” said Loeffler. “You’ve got to give Canelo credit with his movement. Canelo made him miss, but Canelo never moved as much as he did over 12 rounds. He had good footwork, and he had good upper body movement. He fought in spurts,” said Hearn.
Loeffler should have spoken to Golovkin’s trainer Abel Sanchez before the Canelo fight last September. Sanchez would have told Loeffler what the game plan is, which was to stand on the outside and throw jabs all night long. Golovkin was never going to dominate Canelo using a failed strategy like that for the fight. Loeffler should have talked some sense into the head of Golovkin to let him know that he was not going to beat Canelo by staying on the outside and jabbing.
In scoring the fight, the judges had the choice of giving rounds to Canelo for landing the cleaner and harder shots or give the rounds to Golovkin for throwing mainly jabs. If you break down each round punch by punch, it becomes clear that Canelo landed the cleaner shots in all 12 rounds of the fight. 2 of the judges did a fine job of scoring the fight. One judge had it for Golovkin. That’s the oddball judge. He’s the one that scored the rounds based on jabs rather than on the cleaner landing shots. Golovkin needs to learn how to fight in the pro ranks, because he’s still fighting like an amateur.
”He was only the second person to go 12 rounds with Triple G along with Danny Jacobs. Gennady was able to knock Danny down in one of the rounds, but he couldn’t do that with Canelo,” said Loeffler.
It was easy for Canelo to go 12 rounds with Golovkin. All Canelo had to do is use a little movement with his feet and his upper body, and Golovkin couldn’t land. Golovkin wasn’t cutting off the ring, and he wasn’t getting in the trenches and fighting toe-to-toe the way he needed for him to knockdown Canelo. Who knows? Maybe Golovkin would have had a chance to score some knockdowns of Canelo had he slugged with him instead of fighting scared for 12 rounds. Let’s face it. Canelo exposed Golovkin for not having the inside game to fight in the Mexican style that he often boasts about.
Golovkin does not fight with the Mexican style. He fights with the Eastern European style that he learned while growing up in Kazakhstan. I don’t think Golovkin will ever change his fighting style. He only fights on the outside unless he’s facing someone who can’t punch like Kell Brook, Daniel Geale and Martin Murray. In the three fights that Golovkin had against big punchers in Canelo, Danny Jacobs and David Lemieux, he boxed them from the outside most of the fight. Golovkin couldn’t knockout Canelo or Jacobs. He never came close to stopping either of those guys. The only reason Golovkin knocked Lemieux is because he got tired. Lemieux was exhausted by round 8, and Golovkin hit him with a weak body shot that hurt him. The fight was then stopped.
“It was a black eye for the sport of boxing,” said Loeffler about the Canelo vs. Golovkin scoring results. “It was unfortunate, because these are the type of events that people see who don’t watch boxing on a regular basis. They watch the big fights and then they see a score that is way out of range, and then they wonder if this is some collusion or something going on. Boxing has always had a reputation of being susceptible to that. If you gave every close round to Canelo, then it’s 7-5 [in favor of Golovkin]. The best way to resolve it, Canelo and Triple G, is to do the rematch. If Gennady gets a knockout or Canelo gets a knockout, then there’s no question as to who won the fight,” said Loeffler.
Loeffler sounds like he’s bitter still about Golovkin not doing enough to win the fight. Loeffler needs to accept reality, and look for areas where GGG can improve. When the judges don’t score it in your fighter’s favor, they’re letting you know that you failed. The judges gave Golovkin a gift in the Canelo fight by them not giving him an undeserved win like they did in his fight with Danny Jacobs last March. When I say gift, I mean the judges let GGG know that he needs to improve his game. Instead of accepting the gift the judges gave him, Golovkin has been denying it, and failing to acknowledge reality. That means Golovkin won’t change. As long as Golovkin fails to accept what he failed to do in the Canelo fight, he’ll never improve enough to beat Canelo. Golovkin lacks the open mind needed for him to improve. It’s too bad Golovkin is so stubborn and closed-minded. The younger Canelo was trying to teach him how to improve last September. Canelo learned from his loss to Floyd Mayweather. It doesn’t look like Golovkin is ready to learn.
Loeffler is going to have to get over the fact that Golovkin didn’t do enough to deserve the win over Canelo. Once Loeffler looks at the fight with an open mind, he’ll see that his fighter Golovkin was lucky not to lose the fight, because he didn’t want to mix it up. He fought like he was afraid of Canelo, and the judges saw that obviously. Golovkin appeared to be in awe of the star Canelo, especially in the first 3 rounds. He gave Canelo too much respect, and he fell behind in the fight immediately in losing the first 3 rounds.