Mosley: Golovkin’s constant pressure will make it difficult for Canelo

By Boxing News - 02/26/2018 - Comments

Image: Mosley: Golovkin’s constant pressure will make it difficult for Canelo

By Sean Jones: Former multi-division world champion ‘Sugar’ Shane Mosley is leaning towards IBF/IBO/WBA/WBC middleweight champion Gennady ‘GGG’ Golovkin beating Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez in rematch on the 5th of May.

Mosley says if Golovkin puts the same kind of pressure he put on Canelo from rounds 9-12 for the entire fight on May 5th, he thinks it’s going to be really tough on the Mexican fighter. If Golovkin (37-0-1, 33 KOs) stays on top of the 27-year-old Canelo (49-1-2, 34 KOs) and makes him fight the whole time without him getting his needed rest breaks, Mosley sees it ending badly for the redheaded Mexican star.

Mosley says Golovkin won their September 16th, because he was the one that was fighting the entire time. Mosley saw how Canelo was trying just trying to keep Golovkin off because he was mentally not willing or able to fight hard. In Mosley’s view, Canelo gave up mentally after he gassed out and was thinking of the next fight and he wasn’t trying to win against GGG. The Las Vegas judges gave Canelo a 12 round draw against Golovkin. The fight took place at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada. Mosley saw Golovkin winning that fight. The rematch will be taking place at the T-Mobile Arena in Vegas. GGG’s promoter Tom Loeffler says Canelo wanted the rematch back in Las Vegas.

Mosley saw how Canelo wasn’t able to take the pressure that Triple G put on him in their other fight last September, and he thinks he’ll have the same problem with Gennady in the rematch. Mosley says Canelo is the sharper puncher and the more technical fighter of the two, but he does not like to fight for 12 rounds. Canelo likes/needs to take rest breaks from the pressure, and he does that by moving around the ring.

”Golovkin is going to come out even stronger,” Mosley said to Fighthype. ”In the beginning, it’s going to be easier for Canelo, and towards the end, because Canelo doesn’t like to fight the whole fight, it’s going to be really hard for Canelo, because Golovkin is going to be on his [backside] the whole fight. That’s going to be a serious problem for him I this fight,” Mosley said.

It might not be easier for Canelo at the beginning of the May 5th fight like Mosley says. If anything, it’s going to be even harder than it was last time, because Golovkin isn’t going to start slowly like he did in the previous fight. Golovkin knows that he made a mistake in giving the first 2 rounds to Canelo last time. If Golovkin had started faster, he would have won the fight on 2 of the judges’ scorecards unless one of them, the guy that scored it a draw, somehow still gave Canelo the first 2 rounds no matter what Golovkin did. It’s important for Golovkin to start pressing from the opening round of the fight, since Canelo will wear down faster if he’s pressured from the beginning. Golovkin waiting until the 3rd round to start pressuring Canelo will give the Mexican star less wear and tear. The pressure from Golovkin has to be similar to the pressure he was putting on Canelo in rounds 9 through 12, because those rounds really wore him out. Canelo was tired and he looked like was coming apart mentally and physically because of the pressure that GGG was putting on him.

“I thought Golovkin won the first one because he put the pressure on, because I think Canelo towards the end didn’t really want to fight him,” Mosley said. “He [Canelo] was throwing punches to get him off of him. So he’d hit him with a good shot just to get him off of him, but Golovkin was keeping the pressure and touching him. It looked like Golovkin really wanted to fight and Canelo was just ready to do the next fight. It looked like Golovkin really wanted it badder. So I think it would have given it to Golovkin,” Mosley said.

Mosley is dead on correct. Golovkin won the first fight with the pressure he put on Canelo. It was nonstop pressure from rounds 3 to 12, and Canelo couldn’t handle it. Even though Canelo was the younger guy than the 35-year-old Golovkin, his stamina was nowhere near as good. This isn’t the first time that we’ve seen an older fighter display better conditioning than Canelo. Floyd Mayweather Jr., who was 36-years-old at the time, did the same thing in 2013, when he gave the 22-year-old Canelo a boxing lesson. Mayweather was the much better conditioned fighter of the two. It was a one-sided fight.

Golovkin, 35, was roughly same age Mayweather was when he fought Canelo, and he showed that he was the better conditioned athlete. That’s not going to change. No matter what Canelo is doing for this training camp, he’s not going to display significantly better stamina than last time. Canelo is going to need for his conditioning to be worlds better than it is now.

It’s academic that Golovkin should have been given the win over Canelo last time. That’s not even a discussion point. The only thing that’s worth discussing about the previous Canelo-GGG fight is by how many rounds Golovkin beat Canelo. Some fans think 2 rounds, while other boxing fans say 4 to 6 rounds. Having recently seen the fight before writing this article, I had Golovkin winning by 6 rounds by a 9 round to 3 score. Golovkin won the fight and 2 of the judges turned in bizarre scorecards of 118-110 for Canelo and 114-114 even.

”This fight, I think it could go to Golovkin, because now he knows he started off late against Canelo with the punches,” Mosley said. ”I think Canelo is the better and sharper fighter and sharper technician and he has more tools. I think Golovkin is bigger, stronger and I don’t think Canelo can fight the whole 12 rounds. I think he needs to take breaks. He’ll do his thing, more around a little bit, and more around. If Golovkin stays on top of him the whole 12 rounds like he did in the first fight in the 9th, 10th, 11th and 12th rounds, if he starts out like that, it’s going to be very hard for Canelo,” Mosley said.

Canelo has a chance of winning this fight without controversy if he can improve his stamina enough for him to fight high paced 3-minute rounds against GGG. But if Canelo could do that, he would have already done it by now. Canelo is about to turn 28, and he’s not young for that age. He has mileage on him. The stamina issues that plague Canelo now have been there since he was a teenager, and they’re not going to go away by the time he face Triple G on May 5th. Canelo has to try and do the best he can with the cards that had been dealt to him in terms of stamina. He needs to look at the positive. He’s popular beyond belief and he has fast hands. Those are his advantages in the GGG fight.

Canelo will never be tall with a long reach and he’ll never possess good stamina. You can’t get everything in life. Being a popular fighter arguably saved Canelo from losses to Golovkin, Austin Trout and Erislandy Lara. Canelo might be saved from a loss to Golovkin in their rematch on the 5th of May. The fans that show up to see Canelo-GGG for the fight at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas will likely be pro-Canelo, and they’ll be cheering for him loudly. That could help Canelo win rounds that he might lose if he wasn’t popular.

”Psychologically, it looked like Golovkin had that edge mentally, because he was the one chasing after and going after Canelo,” Mosley said. ”Canelo was like, ‘I’m tired and I want to get up out of here.’ So if anyone has the mental, it’s going to be Golovkin, the mental confidence. I’m not saying Canelo won’t have confidence. Canelo, I wouldn’t say outclassed, but he was touching Golovkin with all kinds of stuff. He was able to take Golovkin’s power, but Golovkin was hesitant. That’s because of Canelo’s power, because he wasn’t sure if Canelo could rock him,” Mosley said.

Mosley is right. Golovkin will be the more popular of the two fighters, because he proved that he could get the better of Canelo last September. Golovkin showed that he could wear Canelo down and force him to run from him in the same way welterweight Kell Brook ran from him in their fight in 2016. Canelo fought like a welterweight afraid to stand up to Golovkin. Canelo doesn’t have the mentality to fight in the middleweight division against the best fighters like Golovkin. That gives GGG confidence, because he saw the fear from Canelo. It’s sad but true that Canelo is still a welterweight mentally and not confident enough in his own ability to stand up and fight Golovkin the way that other middleweights. Mosley sees the second fight between Canelo and Triple G being just like the first one. Canelo will land shots, and then run from Golovkin to keep from getting worn down and stopped.

In the May 5th rematch, Golovkin will stay closer to Canelo this time and force him into the fight that could end quickly for the Mexican star. Without his rest breaks, Canelo could be chewed up by Golovkin and stopped within 6 rounds. It might even be over with in the first 3 rounds. James Kirkland had Canelo exhausted and hurt in the 2nd round in their fight in May 2015. Kirkland jumped on Canelo in that fight and forced him to brawl without a rest break for the first 2 rounds.

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