By Sean Jones: Tom Loeffler has listened to Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez bold talk about wanting to knockout Gennady ‘GGG’ Golovkin in their rematch on May 5th, and he’s counting on him going out and trying to do just that when he gets inside the ring.
Loeffler says Canelo talked bold before the fight about how he was going to show Golovkin (37-0-1, 33 KOs) who the ‘true Mexican’ is, but then when the fight started, he was going backwards, fighting on the ropes and being defensive. That surprised Golovkin and his trainer Abel Sanchez, Loeffler says, because they thought Canelo was going to try and back up his boastful talk by standing and going to war with GGG.
Loeffler suggests that it wasn’t a bad thing that Canelo, 27, fought defensively. It was a smart fight for him to do that, Loeffler states, but it wasn’t the war that he had promised it be. Canelo fought to survive for 12 rounds against Golovkin. He was never at any time attempting to knockout Gennady in front of the 20,000 boxing fans that paid to watch the fight live at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Canelo has the speed and power to give Golovkin problems in a one-on-one war in the center of the ring, but I don’t think he’s got the self-confidence needed to him to trust himself to fight for a full 180 second round for entire fight. That may not sound like a lot of time to battle Golovkin in round, but it’s not easy if you can’t stand up to the pace, size and power of Golovkin. Canelo is not really rugged enough for him take the shelling from an Eastern European T-72 tank like Golovkin.
Canelo is still mostly a welterweight with his ability to take shots and stand up to being bombarded. He’s not able to hold up under the kind of shelling from Golovkin. Canelo is like an old T-1 tank, which is an old primitive tank from the 1920s and 1930s. Canelo doesn’t have the ability take being shelled by Golovkin without falling apart, which is why he got on his bike and ran from for much of the fight last September. When Canelo wasn’t running, he was fighting defensively against the ropes and eating jabs.
”We’re looking forward to that [Canelo trying to knockout Golovkin],” Loeffler said to ES News Reporting. ”If Canelo is going to knockout Triple G, he’s going to have to stand there and fight. He can’t go backwards. He can’t go against the ropes. I think he surprised a lot of people. He surprised Abel Sanchez and Triple G about how defensive he was the first fight, because he was stating that he’s the true Mexican, and he’s the one with the real Mexican style and he didn’t fight like a Mexican. He fought smart. He went 12 rounds, and that’s the only second person to go 12 rounds [with Gennady]. So, I think it’s going to be a lot more fireworks in the rematch,” Loeffler said.
I don’t think Canelo is going to be able to stand and fight Golovkin for 12 rounds. No matter what Canelo says about going for the knockout this time against GGG, he’s going to go back to what he did in the first fight. It’s like someone saying they’re going to quit a bad habit like smoking. They say they’re going to do it, but then they fall back into the habit right away.
Canelo is going to do what he did last time, because he’s not going to want to get hurt by Golovkin. As soon as Canelo begins taking shots from Triple and feeling the pain of those blows to the head and body, he’ll get dash off like last time. It won’t even be a conscious thing. Canelo’s body will take over and say, ‘the Heck with this. We’re looking to survive.’ Canelo, of course, will follow the instructions from his body and he’ll scram. When you hear fighters like Canelo saying they’re going to fight differently in the rematch, it’s best to ignore him and count on him fighting exactly how he did the first time against Triple G.
If Canelo was more courageous and if he was a natural middleweight instead of a pumped up one, then I would believe that he would stand and fight Golovkin differently in the rematch and try to knockout him like he’s been talking about. He’s not going to do that though. Canelo has never been courageous when he’s had to take heavy shots. Look at how Canelo fought Austin Trout and James Kirkland. He was against the ropes against both of those guys, playing possum. Canelo lacked the courage and the ability to take the shots from Kirkland and Trout for him to stand in the center of the ring.
Loeffler says the venue for the Canelo-Golovkin fight will be decided by next week. They’re going to decide between New York and Las Vegas, him and Golden Boy president Eric Gomez.
“We’ll sit down and review all the fine points of the bids and make the best decision,” Loeffler said to ES News Reporting in discussing the bids made by venues in New York and Las Vegas, Nevada for the Canelo-Golovkin fight. “I would say by next week,” Loeffler said about when the decision about the venue will be made for the Canelo vs. Golovkin fight. “I’m talking to Eric Gomez of Golden Boy on a daily basis.”
I think it’s very likely the venue for the Canelo-Golovkin 2 rematch will be Las Vegas. It’s where Golden Boy wants the rematch, as it gives Canelo a big boost because it means the crowd will be a pro-Canelo crowd. That’s where Canelo always fights, and where he was arguably saved from a loss by the judges the last time he fought Golovkin on September 16 at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. The judges scored that fight a 12 round draw. The boxing public scored it 8 rounds to 4 for Golovkin. If the rounds close, Canelo will likely be given them. As we saw last time, even if the rounds aren’t close, Canelo was still getting them. One judge had Canelo winning round 7 last September. That Golovkin’s round, as was rounds 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10 and 11. Canelo excelled in rounds 1, 2 and 12.
”Both guys have been in there for 12 rounds,” Loeffler said of Canelo and Golovkin. ”Both corners have had their chance to study it. I’m sure Abel has watched it a number of times. Chepo Reynoso will have watched it a number of times. It’ll be interesting to see the adjustments. I think the first fight was really exciting. But I really think if Canelo decides to go for a knockout, it’ll make it an even more exciting fight than the first time,” Loeffler said.
Canelo’s trainer Chepo Reynoso says Canelo is going to fight differently in the rematch. Chepo is talking a lot, saying that old monkeys can’t learn new things in discussing his views on Golovkin. In the last fight, Golovkin boxed Canelo. If he goes back to his old style, he’ll be doing something entirely different from the first fight, and that’ll be a big chance, whether Chepo wants to realize that or not. Golovkin didn’t pressure Canelo the way he did Kell Brook. If Golovkin had done that to Canelo, he likely would have knocked him out within 6 rounds. Canelo would be completely exhausted after 3 continuous rounds of close quarters slugging from Golovkin. If Canelo can’t get away from Golovkin, then he’ll be forced to fight it out, and he doesn’t have the cardio to do that. Canelo is not designed for that kind of fighting, and he’ll quickly gas out and either be stopped by pressure wearing him down or his longtime trainer Chepo Reynoso will throw in the towel to save him.
