By Sean Jones: Golden Boy Promotions boss Oscar De La Hoya states that Saul Canelo Alarez (51-1-2, 35 KOs) still plans on fighting Gennady Golovkin in the future, and he says that the judges won’t be needed for the fight when it does take place. Canelo, 28, beat GGG by a controversial 12 round majority decision last September in their rematch in Las Vegas, Nevada. That was Golovkin’s first career loss, and it highly controversial.
The boxing public was split in thinking that Golovkin either deserved a win or a draw in his second fight against Alvarez last September. However, many of them weren’t surprised that Canelo, one of the most popular fighters in the sport today, was given controversial decision. A year earlier, Canelo fought Golovkin to even more questionable 12 round draw in September 2017 in the same exact venue at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.
“There’s no doubt whatsoever,” De La Hoya said via Omnisport.com whether Canelo will fight GGG in a trilogy fight. “Canelo wants to fight the very best, and I can assure you that, third time around, Canelo will knock him out.”
De La Hoya saying that Canelo vs. GGG 3 will definitely happen is believable, but not the part where he talks about Alvarez knocking Golovkin out. Canelo didn’t come close to stopping Golovkin in their two fights. In fact, it was Canelo that had his legs buckled twice in rounds 10 and 11 in the rematch with Golovkin last September in Las Vegas. That was another very odd fight when it came to the scoring. Canelo needed the 12th round to get the victory, but it was Golovkin that appeared to dominate the Mexican star. Interestingly enough, the judges gave Canelo the 12th round, which enabled him to squeak out a controversial decision by the scores 115-113, 115-113 and 113-113.
Understandably, Golovkin was extremely upset afterwards, and immediately left the ring. It was thought after the fight that Alvarez would make sure that the trilogy fight with Golovkin took place as soon as possible, so that he could erase the controversy surrounding his two fights with him. Instead of doing that, Canelo decided to fight Jacobs in a unification fight on May 4.
It’s a bizarre move on Canelo’s part, because it arguably hurts his popularity with boxing fans that he’s seemingly swerving the third fight with Golovkin in order to face a guy that the Kazakhstan fighter already beat two years ago. In other words, Canelo is facing Golovkin’s leftovers, in the eyes of a lot of boxing fans. Golden Boy negotiated a 170 lb rehydration clause for the Canelo-Jacobs fight. What’s interesting about that is Jacobs chose not to participate in a secondary weigh-in for his fight with Golovkin in 2017 on the day of the fight. The IBF had a 10 lb rehydration limit. Golovkin weighed in successfully, but Jacobs chose not to be weighed in. Jacobs won’t be able to do that for the Canelo fight, because it’s part of the contract that both fighters have to weigh in as part of a secondary weigh-in on the day of the fight.
Canelo is now scheduled to face former Golovkin victim Daniel Jacobs (35-2, 29 KOs) in a unification fight on May 4 on DAZN at a still to be determined venue in the U.S. Many boxing fans believe Golden Boy will put the Canelo vs. Jacobs fight in Las Vegas, possibly even at the same venue that the two controversial Canelo-GGG fights took place at the T-Mobile Arena. Canelo is seemingly impossible to beat when fighting there. Canelo will be defending his WBA/WBC middleweight titles, whereas Jacobs will have his International Boxing Federation 160 lb title on the line. The winner of the Canelo vs. Jacobs fight will hold 3 of the 4 middleweight titles. Although De La Hoya says Canelo plans on fighting Golovkin inthe future, it’s now thought that the Mexican star will go after WBO champion Demetrius Andrade in a unification fight later this year in September. Golovkin, if he doesn’t retire, will likely need to wait until 2020 before he gets a third fight with Canelo. That will make GGG 38-years-old when/if the trilogy fight with Canelo takes place. Whether Golovkin will be old enough for Canelo to finally beat him without controversy remains to be seen.
Canelo moved up to super middleweight in his last fight in defeating WBA ‘regular’ 168 lb champion Rocky Fielding by a third round knockout last month on December 15 on DAZN in New York. The win made Canelo a three diviion world champion, but it also made him a target for boxing fans, who saw it as an incredibly weak move on his part to face what was arguably the weakest of the super middleweight champions in Fielding for him to fight for a world title. The fighter that is viewed as the best champion at super middleweight is WBA Super World champion Callum Smith (25-0, 18 KOs). Canelo fought for the World Boxing Association’s secondary 168 lb title in fighting Fielding for the WBA World [regular] belt.
De La Hoya is assuming that Canelo will beat the 5’11 1/2″ Jacobs on May 4. That’s probably not a good idea on De La Hoya’s part. It’s never a good idea to count your chicks before they hatch. Canelo was getting hit in his last fight against Fielding, and he didn’t look as fast as he was in his two fights with GGG. It’s possible that the punishment that Canelo absorbed in his second fight with Golovkin has slowed him down, making more hittable now than he in those two fights. If that’s the case, Jacobs is going to be bouncing big power shots off the head of Canelo on May 4. Canelo’s punch resistance is arguably not at the level of a Golovkin, who took Jacobs’ shots without any problems in their fight in 2017. As this writer previously mentioned, Canelo was hurt by Golovkin twice last September in the later rounds. Jacobs hits almost as hard as Golovkin when he’s sitting down on his shots. If Jacobs can nail Canelo with some of his best punches on May 4, we may see an upset. However, Jacobs will still likely need a knockout for him to get the victory.
De La hoya says that Jacobs’ promoter, Eddie Hearn of Matchroom Boxing, moved quickly to make the fight with Canelo. Hearn wanted the fight badly, and now he’s got it. Jacobs is going to have to make the most of it. It’s not like Canelo is going to make a career out of fighting Jacobs five or six times. At best, Jacobs will get once chance and one chance only to try and beat Canelo. If Jacobs loses, even if it’s a controversial loss, he’ll likely wind up in the back of a long line, waiting for a rematch like other fighters that have lost controversial decisions to the Golden Boy star in the past like Erislandy Lara and Austin Trout. It’s not easy getting a rematch with Canelo, as those two have found out.
“I sent out a tweet that said we were going to talk to GGG and make the third fight happen and Jacobs’ promoter, Matchroom Boxing, called Eric Gomez the next day and said you have a fight with Jacobs. My plan worked; now we have one of the best middleweights fights in recent years.”
It sounds like De La Hoya didn’t have much interest in making the Canelo vs. Golovkin trilogy fight, judging by his comment about his “plan worked” in getting Jacobs to fight Canelo. Jacobs is coming into the fight with Canelo off the back of two very, very close wins over Maciej Sulekci and Sergiy Derevyanchenko. Jacobs won those fights by close decisions. Those were not great performances by Jacobs by any stretch of the imagination. Some boxing fans think Jacobs isn’t the same fighter after absorbing a lot of punishment in his two fights with Golovkin. If that’s the case, he might be in good company fighting Canelo, who looked deteriorated in his last fight against Fielding after having battled GGG in back to back fights.
If the boxing public has to wait until 2020 or later before seeing the trilogy fight between Canelo and Golovkin, they’re going to believe the worst in thinking that this was a move in order to age GGG enough for Alvarez to finally beat him without controversy. A lot of fans already think that Golden Boy waited until Golovkin was in his mid-30s before letting him fight Canelo in hopes that it would increase the chances of their star in beating the Kazakhstan fighter.