By Sean Jones: Gennady Golovkin won’t be the next opponent for Saul Canelo Alvarez in September, according to the Mexican star’s trainer Eddy Reynoso, who says they’re interested in unification fights at 160 or 168. However, Reynoso isn’t the one that’s calling the shots for Canelo’s fight in September.
It’s going to be Golden Boy Promotions and DAZN, the streaming company that is paying Canelo his huge $365 million contract, that will make the final call for who Alvarez fights next in September. Canelo needs to fight someone that can bring in subscribers to DAZN.
When asked questioned about whether Canelo will fight Golovkin next in September, Reynoso said, ”No.”
Golden Boy Promotions CEO Oscar De La Hoya mentioned the following four names as candidates for Canelo’s next fight on the Mexican Independence day holiday weekend in September: Golovkin, Callum Smith, Sergey Kovalev and Demetrius Andrade. Just as fast as De La Hoya named those guys, Canelo and Reynoso ruled out most of them as options for the September date.
If Canelo isn’t going to fight GGG or WBO middleweight champion Demetrius Andrade in September, then that greatly limits his options. Canelo can’t fight WBO light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev in September, because he’s defending his title on June 29 against his mandatory challenger Anthony Yarde in Russia. It’ll be too quick of a turnaround for Kovalev to return to the ring in September to face Canelo. Even if Kovalev stops Yarde in the 1st round, it won’t be enough time for the Kovalev-Canelo fight to get negotiated and promoted. With Andrade and Kovalev out of the picture.
Golovkin, 37, brings less to the table for a third fight with Canelo now that he no longer holds a world title. Canelo and Golden Boy Promotions wanted GGG (38-1-1, 34 KOs) to try and win one of the world titles at 160 and 168 so that a trilogy fight would have more on the line than it would otherwise have. Golovkin has been out of the ring for eight months since his loss to Canelo last September, so he doesn’t want to jump into a potentially difficult fight against one of the champions after that much time out of the ring. Moreover, WBO middleweight champion Demetrius Andrade isn’t available to fight in June against GGG, because he’s defending against Maciej Sulecki, his mandatory on June 29.
The only potential fight that Golovkin could have gotten would have been against WBA Super World super middleweight champion Callum Smith (25-0, 18 KOs). He’s considered to be the best fighter in the 168 lb weight class in the eyes of a lot of boxing fans. Callum isn’t the type of fighter that one would want to face after coming off of a long ninth month layoff. It’s not surprising that Golovkin didn’t push his promoter Tom Loeffler to attempt to make a fight with the young 28-year-old Callum.
“My objective is to fight for a title,” Canelo said.
What Canelo fails to realize that his personal career goals he has about wanting to win titles means little in the real world in terms of attracting boxing fans to subscribe to DAZN. Canelo’s dogged pursuit of of winning titles just for the sake of winning them is pointless if it doesn’t increase the bottom line. Canelo needs to fight guys that the U.S boxing fans actually care about seeing, and that’s fighters like GGG.
I saw no emotions, nothing special today. It was a nice sparring match. Boring. They should have given more to the fans. #CaneloJacobs pic.twitter.com/onBjjV9L1q
— Gennady Golovkin (@GGGBoxing) May 5, 2019
Canelo has three of the four belts at 160, and he holds one of the titles at 168. Given Canelo’s huge popularity, it’s a lot easier for him to get access to other belt holders in those two weight classes than it would be for a less popular champion. Some boxing fans fail to realize that. Golovkin wanted to unify the middleweight division when he held the IBF, WBA and WBC titles, but he was never able to put together a fight with WBO champion Billy Joe Saunders. Now that Saunders is no longer a champion, Demetrius Andrade has taken his place as the WBO 160-pound champion, and it’s going to be a lot easier for Canelo to put together a deal with him than it was for Golovkin to arrange a unification with Saunders, who had injury problems and was a tough negotiator. Some of the champions that Canelo will be going up against in his journey to unify the 160 and 168 lb weight classes are less popular fighters in the U.S.
Here are the current champions at 160 and 168:
– Demetrius Andrade: WBO middleweight
– Callum Smith: WBA Super World 168-lb champion
– Anthony Dirrell: WBC 168 lb champ
– Caleb Plant: IBF 168 lb champion
The WBO super middleweight title is vacant at this time. Saunders and Shefat Isufi are fighting for that belt on May 18. Canelo is going to have a difficult time trying to arrange a unification match against the southpaw Saunders if he captures the WBO title this month. That’s not going to be an easy fight for Golden Boy Promotions to put together. With Saunders’ elusive, spoiling fighting style, you have to question the wisdom of Canelo to fight a guy like him. Saunders is like another Erislandy Lara, but even more difficult than him, because he has more offensive skills.
“That’s the wonderful thing about being the man,” said De La Hoya in gloating about how great is is for Canelo to be able to pick and choose who he wants to fight.
It’s more important than De La Hoya realizes for Canelo to take advantage of the still red hot interest from the boxing public in seeing a third fight between Alvarez and Golovkin. That interest might disappear if the 37-year-old GGG struggles against Steve Rolls next month in their fight on June 8 on DAZN at Madison Square Garden in New York. If Canelo wants to let Golovkin wait a year or two before he fights him again, he could potentially be ruining their fight. Golovkin is getting older now, and he could lose at anytime, especially if he goes out of his way to try and meet Canelo and Golden Boy’s request for him to win a world title before they’ll make a third fight with him.
If Canelo was 37, and he was being told by Golovkin that he had to win a world title, it would be a potentially risky situation. When Canelo is 37, he’s likely going to be a lot slower than he is now, and very beatable. Canelo’s fights against GGG and Daniel Jacobs proved, if nothing else, that he’s a six round fighter. Canelo showed in his fights with Golovkin and Jacobs that he can only fight hard for six rounds. Canelo gasses out after six rounds. He’s able to come on strong in the 12th round, so you can call him a seven round fighter. If Canelo were 37-years-old, being slower and only capable of fighting hard for three to four rounds by that point in his career, he wouldn’t be able to beat the elite level guys. Golovkin is still capable of fighting hard for 12 rounds. Although he’s not fast of hand, he was never fast to begin with. It seems like Canelo doesn’t fancy the idea of fighting GGG a third time. It’s hard work obviously, and a lot of pain involved in those fights. It’s easier for Canelo to target guys that bring less pain.
“It’s a great position. Canelo is the king right now. The sky’s the limit. He wants all the top fights. If it’s Golovkin, we’ll sit down and talk about that,” Golden Boy Promotions president Eric Gomez said at the post-fight news conference about Canelo’s situation for his September fight.
Canelo isn’t as much of a king as Gomez and De La Hoya think. He still needs to keep DAZN happy by picking opponents that bring in the subscribers. They were kind enough to let Canelo take a soft job in Rocky Fielding for his first fight with them, but he needs to focus on fighting guys that bring in the subscribers rather than going after pointless titles against no champions.