Gennady Golovkin with a lot to prove against Sergiy Derevyanchenko

Image: Gennady Golovkin with a lot to prove against Sergiy Derevyanchenko
By Boxing News - 09/30/2019 - Comments

By Barry Holbrook: Gennady Golovkin has a lot of doubters out there going into his fight this Saturday night against Sergiy Derevyanchenko on October 5 at Madison Square Garden in New York. Golovkin-Derevyanchenko will be streamed LIVE on DAZN.

There’s a perception out there that the 37-year-old Golovkin lost something from his game after the pounding that he took in #2 with Saul Canelo Alvarez.

Golovkin has to prove he’s still an elite fighter

GGG has to prove that he can learn from his two fights with Canelo, and fight harder to leave no doubts in the minds of the judges. Although a lot of fans thought the judges robbed Golovkin (39-1-1, 35 KOs) in both of his fights against Canelo, it’s more of a situation where GGG didn’t do enough to show that he was the better fighter.

Golovkin hasn’t beaten an elite level middleweight since his victory over Daniel Jacobs two years ago in 2017, and that was a close affair. A lot of boxing fans thought Jacobs was robbed in that fight. On Saturday, Golovkin will be facing an opponent that is just as good as Jacobs if not better in 33-year-old Derevyanchenko. This guy lost to Jacobs narrowly last year by a 12 round split decision, but he gave him a hard fight.

Banks wants GGG to throw more punches

Golovkin recently switched out his old trainer Abel Sanchez in favor of Johnathan Banks. GGG accomplished the most with Sanchez, but he’s now gone. Banks believes he can improve GGG to get him to throw more punches.

It’s a simple way of trying to improve Golovkin, but thus far it’s not worked. If anything, Golovkin threw fewer punches in his last fight against Steve Rolls than he normally does through four rounds. Golovkin stopped Rolls in the 4th round. Banks looked frustrated after the fight, and it’s understandable why. GGG didn’t throw a lot of punches like Banks had talked about. If anything, Golovkin threw fewer punches. The improvement wasn’t there in GGG’s game.

Loeffler: Golovkin hasn’t lost a fight

 “He hasn’t lost a fight in the ring; he might have lost on the score cards, but we’re not looking back at that. We’re looking forward. He’s looking forward to Derevyanchenko,” said Golovkin’s promoter Tom Loeffler.

Loeffler is in denial about Golovkin’s loss to Canelo Alvarez, and that’s too bad. In normal situations when someone isn’t measuring up, they’re told what they need to fix. In this case like Loeffler isn’t admitting that Golovkin didn’t fight well enough to win.  He let Canelo walk him down all night in their rematch last year in September.