Canelo’s stall tactics worry GGG’s trainer

By Boxing News - 08/15/2018 - Comments

Image: Canelo’s stall tactics worry GGG’s trainer

By Dan Ambrose: Saul Canelo Alvarez’s habit of stalling out the rounds by running in his fight against Gennady Golovkin last September has GGG’s trainer Abel Sanchez worried that he’ll look to stall out the rounds in the rematch with him on September 15.

Sanchez says he wants the Nevada State Athletic Commission to step it up and install 24 second clock to force the Mexican star Canelo to engage instead of just stalling out the rounds by fleeing the battlefield like he did last year. Canelo turned tail and ran from Golovkin in the first fight, spending large portions of the fight on the run and spoiling it for the paying boxing fans that watched it live at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada and the fans that ordered it on HBO pay-per-view at home.

Unfortunately, there are no rules in boxing to keep a fighter from running from his opponents. The judges are supposed to score rounds against those fighters though, which didn’t happen in the Canelo-GGG fight last September. The judges still gave many of the rounds to Canelo even though he wasn’t looking to mix it up.

”Gennady had to chase Canelo, who boasted that he was the true Mexican warrior, around the ring,” Sanchez said. ”It reminded me of the four corners offense those old Dean Smith coached basketball teams used to play. I’m seriously considering asking the Nevada Commission to install a 24 second clock to force Canelo to engage,” Sanchez said.

Canelo has been making light of Golovkin’s punching power lately, saying he doesn’t hit that hard, and that he rates him only as a 9 out of 10. Canelo didn’t want to stand and trade with Golovkin long enough for him to test what his power was like.

Canelo did stop moving late in the fight to some extent in rallying in the first minute of rounds 10, 11 and 12, but he was missing in action after the first minute. Canelo went back to using movement after the first minute after he got tired.

”Compare the activity between the fighters in their first fight,” Sanchez said. ”Gennady did everything in that fight. Gennady wasn’t the one who got booed by the fans when those crazy scorecards were announced. And Gennady is going to do even more in the rematch. I read that Canelo isn’t eating beef in camp. Let’s just hope that he stopped eating duck too,” Sanchez said.

Canelo and GGG have one month to go before they face each other in their second fight in September. The fight last year was a competitive one at times, but each round followed the same exact pattern. Canelo would fight hard in the first minute, then grow tired and spend the last two minutes moving and/or resting with his back against the ropes. The judges made the fight controversial when they scored it a 12 round draw. One judges had Canelo up 10 rounds to 2 at the end. Another judge had Golovkin narrowly winning 115-113. The third judge had it scored as a tie at 114-114. Canelo was supposed to face Golovkin in a rematch on May 5, but he had to pull out after being suspended for six months by the Nevada State Athletic Commission after testing positive twice for clenbuterol.

Golovkin, 36, tied the record for title defenses for a middleweight at 20 with his 2nd round knockout win over Vanes Martirosyan on May 5 of this year. Golovkin will be looking to break the record with his 21st consecutive defense of his middleweight titles on September 15 when he faces Canelo.

Saul Canelo Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin are presently close to being at the same weight ahead of their rematch on September 15 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Golovkin weighed in at 168.3 pounds for the World Boxing Council’s mandated 30-day weigh-in for their rematch at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada. Canelo weighed at 167.3 pounds. Whether the two of them are still close to the same weight by fight time is the important question. Canelo is expected to be lighter than he was in the previous fight. That could still mean that he outweighs Golovkin because he looked considerably heavier than the Kazakhstan fighter last September for their first fight.

Canelo angered a lot of boxing fans in 2016 when he vacated his WBC middleweight title when he was ordered by the sanctioning body to defend the belt against Golovkin, who was the mandatory challenger at the time. Golovkin then was given the WBC 160 pound title by the sanctioning body. Golovkin then defended it against welterweight Kell Brook in stopping him in the 5th round in London, England.

Golovkin wants to punish Canelo on September 15, who he’s branded as a dirty fighter due to his two positive tests for clenbuterol, a potential performance enhancing substance.

The loser of the Canelo-Golovkin fight is going to hear it from the boxing fans for a long time to come, as long as the outcome isn’t a controversial one like he 12 round draw last September.

Golovkin is still the betting favorite to beat Canelo next month. The odds-makers feel that Golovkin is the safe bet. Whatever Canelo tried in the previous fight, it didn’t work. He looked like Golovkin go the better of him.

Canelo, 27, will be receiving a 57.5-42.5 split of the revenue for his rematch with GGG. Golovkin was trying to get a 50-50 purse split, but Canelo and his promoters at Golden Boy refused that split. Golovkin finally backed off and agreed to a lesser split of 57.5/42.5, according to ESPN Deportes. In the first fight, Canelo enjoyed a huge 65/35 purse split.

Golovkin has recently stopped giving interviews in English. He’s now using a translator for his interviews, and he doesn’t look like the same smiling, friendly fighter that he was in his first fight with Canelo. Golovkin looks like he wants to pay Canelo back inside the ring for everything that has happened since their fight last year.

The Canelo-Golovkin 2 rematch won’t have to worry about the Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Conor McGregor contest taking away pay-per-view buys, as those two are not going to be facing each other ahead of their match like they did last year. It’s impossible to know how many PPV buys were lost due to the expensive Mayweather-McGregor fight, which went for $100 per household, being staged three weeks ahead of the Canelo-Golovkin fight last year.