By Barry Holbrook: IBF middleweight champion Gennadiy Golovkin (40-1-1, 35 KOs) and his mandatory Kamil Szeremeta (21-0, 5 KOs) have agreed to terms for a fight in February or March, according to Dan Rafael. Although Golovkin’s mandatory with the International Boxing Federation isn’t yet due, he’s decided to take care of it early.
GGG might have been better off vacating the IBF strap, and choosing to fight a good opponent rather than facing the unknown Szeremeta. The perception the fans are going to have with this fight is GGG is milking his title by fighting poor opposition in order to keep from being beaten again. Golovkin has been pushing hard for a trilogy fight against Saul Canelo Alvarez, but the Mexican star has been resistant.
Canelo wants to see Golovkin fight the best
The reason Canelo has been turned off on a third fight with GGG is because the Kazakhstan fighter has stopped fighting dangerous opposition. Before his recent match against Derevyanchenko, Golovkin fought 35-year-old Steve Rolls in a mismatch. Now Golovkin is about to fight another weak opponent in Szeremeta. Canelo wants Golovkin to fight the best every time out the way he’s doing.
It’s a predictable move on Golovkin’s part in defending early against Szeremeta, as he fought on his undercard in his fight last month on October 5. Szeremeta, 29, wiped out an over-matched Oscar Cortes (27-5, 14 KOs) in 2 rounds in a showcase fight.
The Golovkin-Szeremeta fight will be taking place in Chicago in order to take advantage of Szeremeta’s popularity in the area with his Polish boxing fans. He’s from Poland.
GGG NOT giving Derevyanchenko a rematch
Golovkin, 37, was practically booed out of Madison Square Garden in his last fight against Sergiy Derevyanchenko last month on October 5 in New York. GGG was booed from the moment the results were announced until he left the ring. Given how unpopular the decision was, Golovkin should have scheduled a rematch with Derevyanchenk, because it looks bad in him moving on without clearing up the controversy.
The fans might be willing to give GGG a break if he were facing a talented contender or champion like Jermall Charlo or Demetrius Andrade, but that’s not the case. Golovkin is facing an unknown contender in Szeremeta, who has a lowly 23.81% KO percentage. In other words, Golovkin doesn’t need to worry about getting hammered for 12 rounds by Szeremeta like he did in his last fight against Derevyanchenko.
GGG heavily booed
The crowd didn’t like the results of the fight. These were Golovkin’s fans, as he was the one that they have cheered the loudest for when he entered the ring before the fight. But the fans weren’t going to ignore a bad decision by cheering Golovkin. This was a new experience for Golovkin being booed the way he was against Derevyanchenko. That’s why he should have done the right thing and set-up a rematch with him instead of moving on to face the little known light hitting Szeremeta.
GGG getting booed out here lol! That’s how you know it should have been a draw or a lost pic.twitter.com/MVCunnHZNT
— OvODQ (@odq0717) October 6, 2019
The fans saw the 2008 Olympian Derevyanchenko as deserving the victory in that fight, as he outworked GGG, and had him close to be being stopped in rounds 5 and 10. The referee Harvey Dock appeared to save Golovkin in the 5th round when he was badly hurt and taking withering fire from Derevyanchenko.
Somehow, Dock got in the way of the action when Golovkin was retreating all over the ring. Golovkin bumped into Dock while he was getting hammered. Rather than moving out of the way, Dock stopped the action, and had the two fighters restart. This move might have saved the badly hurt Golovkin from being knocked out or at the very least being dropped.
Golovkin has got to fight better
The judges scored it for Golovkin by the scores 115-112, 115-112 and 114-113. Boxing News 24 had Derevyanchenko winning 7 rounds to 5. Golovkin knocked Derevyanchenko down in the 1st round after catching him with a shot to the back of his head. The referee could have waived the knockdown off due to the shot hitting Derevyanchenko behind the head, but he let it stand. Saul Canelo Alvarez saw the fight and had Derevyanchenko as the winner. Canelo says that he’s going to beat Golovkin and send him into retirement when/if the two face each other in a trilogy match.
It was a mistake for Golovkin to go after the IBF title, because he would have been better off fighting one of the Charlo brothers, Callum Smith, Billy Joe Saunders or Demetrius Andrade. Although the fight between Golovkin and Derevyanchenko turned out to be an exciting one, the outcome was bad for GGG.
