By Sean Jones: IBF middleweight champion Gennadiy ‘GGG’ Golovkin (40-1-1, 35 KOs) has finally got a date set for his title defense against his mandatory Kamil Szeremeta (20-0, 5 KOs) on June 6 live on DAZN at The Forum in Inglewood, California. Dan Rafael is reporting June 6th is the date for GGG’s defense against Szeremeta.
With that said, the Golovkin-Szeremeta could easily be postponed if California State Athletic Commission still has a ban in place preventing combat sports from taking place by June. As of March, combat sports have been suspended for the month.
GGG has been dealing with a calf injury
There was the possibility of Golovkin fighting next in his native Kazakhstan, but that’s not happening. That would have been an ideal location for his title defense against Szeremeta, as there are a low number of coronavirus cases in Kazakhstan. As of Friday, there were only 6 cases in total of coronavirus in Kazakhstan.
Golovkin could have gotten the fight with Szeremeta out of the way in February, but he suffered a calf injury.
Golovkin, 37, has had nothing but bad luck when it comes to his title defense against Polish fighter Szeremeta. First of all, it’s a fight that few boxing fans are interested in seeing due to Szeremeta having a weak record filled with obscure opposition. Originally, Golovkin was supposed to have defended against Szeremeta on February 29, but then it was moved to March 28, April and now finally June, according to Rafael.
At this point, the only thing you can predict as far as the GGG-Szeremeta fight goes is for it to be moved again. The fight has arguably been al albatross around Golovkin’s neck ever since his team decided to take the fight with Szeremeta earlier than he had to. The IBF hadn’t even ordered the fight with Szeremeta yet, but GGG’s team chose to take the fight earlier for some reason.
GGG vs. Szeremeta could get moved again
Golovkin can’t afford to have his title defense rescheduled beyond June without putting his trilogy match against Canelo Alvarez in jeopardy for September. If GGG still hasn’t defended against Szeremeta by June, he needs to consider vacating his IBF title and just going with the Canelo fight. It’s not worth it for Golovkin to get stuck in quicksand on a yearly basis defending against the IBF’s obscure mandatory challengers.
Some boxing fans believe that GGG wanted to take the fight earlier than he had to in order to make sure he had an opponent that was beatable for his next fight. If Golovkin didn’t take the fight with Szeremeta next, boxing fans would pressure him to face risky guys like Demetrius Andrade, Jermall Charlo, Sergiy Derevyanchenko or Callum Smith. Szeremeta is nowhere near the level of those guys in terms of talent.
With the increasing level of coronavirus cases in the U.S, it could be meaningless that Golovkin and Szeremeta have given a firm date in June. According to Worldometer, there have been 5,819 deaths from the coronavirus of 156,015 cases. If the numbers continue to rise, it wouldn’t be surprising to see the GGG fight needing to be moved off the June 6 date.
