By Scott Gilfoid: Carl Froch thinks he would have beaten both Saul Canelo Alvarez and Gennadiy Golovkin had he fought them during his career.
When asked on his podcast on Apple, the former IBF/WBA/WBC super middleweight champion Froch (33-2, 24 KOs) says he would have had too much size, power and talent for Canelo (53-1-2 36 KOs) and Golovkin (40-1-1, 35 KOs).
Froch is one of those fighters that retired too early, and ended up missing out on a lot of mouth-watering fights. Carl retired in his prime still at 37, and he could have fought on for another two to three years to face Golovkin and Canelo.
Carl could have fought Golovkin in 2014
Froch had the chance to fight Golovkin before he retired from boxing in 2014, but he didn’t take that fight. Eddie Hearn of Matchroom Boxing was talking about putting the fight together, and Golovkin was on board. But for some reason, Froch didn’t take it. He likely would have made even more money than he did in his two fights with George Groves, but he didn’t take it.
Why didn’t Froch take that fight with GGG? Was the mind willing but the flesh weak or the opposite? Who knows? All we know is Froch didn’t take the fight, and it’s bizarre that he walked away from that green stuff the would have made.
Obviously ending his career with a knockout loss would have been a downer for Froch, but he would have cried all the way to the bank. For the average person, who will likely never get a chance to make that kind of money, they can’t understand why Froch didn’t take the Golovkin fight.
Froch claims he’d be “TOO BIG” and strong for Canelo
“Too big, too strong,” said Froch on his Boxing Podcast in talking about how he’d have done against Saul Canelo Alvarez. “Jokes aside, when I watched Canelo fight Kovalev, I wasn’t impressed.
“I thought it was close, but I thought he [Canelo] was losing. At that weight [175], he’s slower. He reminded me of Arthur Abraham when I fought Abraham [in November 2011].
“I just kept him long with a jab, met him with combinations, and absolutely hammered him for 12 rounds. It was a flawless victory. I feel like I would have been able to do that to Canelo when he fought Canelo, that version of Canelo,” said Froch.
Unfortunately for Froch, few boxing fans would agree with him about his opinion that he would have beaten Canelo. Froch was too slow, too easy to hit, and too one dimensional for him to handle a skilled guy like Canelo Alvarez.
Froch couldn’t beat Andre Ward, Andre Dirrell or Mikkel Kessler when they were at their best. So if Froch couldn’t beat them, he surely would NEVER had been able to handle a superstar like Canelo.
The size differences between Froch and the 5’8” Canelo would have made the fight difficult to put together. It’s quite likely that Froch would have had to agree to a rehydration clause as well as a catchweight for him to get a fight against Canelo.
Dealing with those two things would have been an ugly witches brew for Froch, and he would have been fighting on fumes from round one. Canelo probably would have blown Froch out of there if he came into the fight in a weakened condition.
Froch thinks he’d have beaten GGG with his jab
“I’d have been too much for him,” said Froch about Gennadiy Golovkin. “I met him and he’s 5’9” or 5′ 10″. When I meet someone and shaking their hand, and looking in their eyes, I might be wrong, but me as a fighter and the warrior I was when I was fighting, I was shaping and sizing him up, thinking, ‘If I ever fight you, no problem, end of the jab, walk you into some shots, I’d be too much for you.’
“He [Golovkin] went 11 rounds with Martin Murray. At that sort of level, you’re not going to give me a problem,” said Froch.
Well, if Froch fought Golovkin in 2014 when the Kazakhstan fighter was still in his prime, chances are that it wouldn’t have gone well for him. The fact that Froch wasn’t willing to stick around long enough to fight Golovkin kind of tells you all you need to know about his mindset at the time.
Froch didn’t want the fight badly enough to continue his career. But if Froch is talking about fighting Golovkin when he was at his own personal best before 2014, then who knows how he’d have done. You can argue that Froch would have beaten the 2019 version of Golovkin, but probably not the 2014 version.
Why didn’t Froch fight Golovkin?
It looks bad on Froch’s part that he didn’t take the fight with Golovkin when he had the chance to fight him in 2014. Froch made a big deal about his two wins over Groves, but that guy had little experience at the time in his career.
Groves was still a raw fighter when he fought Froch. He wasn’t the polished fighter that he became later.
We saw what happened with Froch when he fought a prime Mikkel Kessler and Andre Ward. He lost to both of them, and he arguably lost to Andre Dirrell as well. Froch beat Dirrell by a controversial 12 round split decision in his hometown of Nottingham, UK back in October 2009.
There was a HUGE uproar around the boxing world at the time over Froch’s highly QUESTIONABLE win over the talented Dirrell.
No one gave Froch credit for the win, and to this day, they still don’t. So, you can argue that Froch should have 3 losses on his resume rather than two. Froch was also losing to Jermain Taylor at the time he scored a 12th round knockout win in April 2009.
At the time of the stoppage, Froch was trailing on two of the judges’ scorecards by the scores 106-102, 106-102. The third judge had Froch up 106-102. Had Taylor fought defensively in the 12th, he would have beaten Froch too.
The sad thing is, Taylor was no longer at his best when he fought Froch. He was on the downside of his career after having lost to Kelly Pavlik, and he still almost beat Froch.