By Sean Jones: Saul Canelo Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin will be scraping it out for the vacant Ring Magazine middleweight title in 10 days from now on September 15 in their rematch at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada. Ring Magazine voted to have their vacant Ring middleweight title on the line for the Canelo vs. Golovkin 2 rematch because these two fighters are considered the best middleweights in the division.
Some boxing fans would argue that Jermall Charlo and Billy Joe Saunders are better than Canelo, but it would be difficult for those two to be put ahead of Canelo because they haven’t achieved as much as him in boxing. Still, Charlo would be a real problem for a short middleweight like 5’8” Canelo in a real sense, but unfortunately he doesn’t have the resume to vault him ahead of the red-headed Mexican star.
Canelo vs. GGG 2 is a fight that is more than big enough to have the Ring middleweight title on the line. The next best fights at middleweight right now are the Daniel Jacobs vs. Sergiy Derevyanchenko and Billy Joe Saunders vs. Demetrius Andrade fights. Jacobs already lost to Golovkin by a 12 round unanimous decision in 2017, and Derevyanchenko, 32, has only beaten one notable opponent during his career in Tureano Johnson. Their fight is clearly unworthy of having the Ring title on the line. Saunders only has wins over Chris Eubank Jr. and David Lemieux as far as notable wins, and he’s injured constantly. Andrade has fought just once at middleweight in beating Alantez Fox, and that was well over a year ago. Andrade has been inactive since then.
The Ring 160 pound strap was previously in the possession of Canelo Alvarez, who won the belt in beating Miguel Cotto by a 12 round decision in a catch-weight fight at 155 pounds in November 2015. Canelo lost the Ring belt after he tested positive twice for clenbuterol last February and was given a six month suspension by the Nevada State Athletic Commission. The Ring middleweight belt then went vacant rather than being given to Golovkin, who had been hoping to capture the strap in a rematch with Canelo on May 5. With Canelo being suspended, Golovkin, through no fault of his own, was unable to fight for Ring title.
Should Canelo have been stripped of his Ring middleweight title in 2017?
In what some fans feel was a questionable move, The Ring allowed Canelo to keep his middleweight title after he vacated his World Boxing Council 160 pound belt, and moved back down to 154 to face WBO champion Liam Smith. Canelo defeated Smith to capture his WBO 154 pound title, and then moved up to super middleweight and fought Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. at a catch-weight of 164.5 pounds. Canelo won that fight by a 12 round decision. However, Canelo failed to defend his Ring middleweight title for two years after making a defense of the belt against Amir Khan in May 2016. Canelo finally defended it against Gennady Golovkin last year in September. The two fighters then fought to a controversial 12 round draw.