By Charles Brun: Chris Eubank Jr could put himself in position for a lucrative title shot against IBF & WBA middleweight champion Gennadiy Golovkin if he smashes Liam ‘Beefy’ Smith to bits next Saturday night, on January 21st, in a clash on DAZN at the AO Arena, in Manchester, England.
Golovkin’s representative Tom Loeffler likes what he sees in #2 WBC, #2 WBO, and #5 WBA Eubank Jr and views him as a “rising star” despite his ripe age of 33. In truth, Eubank Jr has been spinning his wheels, not getting more popular than he was when he first started out.
You can argue that Eubank Jr was more prevalent in 2018 than he is now, and the reason for that is that he’s disappeared by fighting rarely. When he does fight, it’s always weak domestic-level opposition.
The 40-year-old Golovkin (42-2-1, 37 KOs) lost his last fight against Canelo Alvarez last September, and he still hasn’t decided who he’ll be facing next. He still has his IBF & WBA 160-lb titles, and he might be interested in facing Eubank Jr if he emerges victorious against Beefy Smith and looks good.
In September 2016, Eubank Jr had a shot at fighting Golovkin, but he was too slow in negotiating with him and lost out to Kell Brook, who quickly signed on the dotted line.
It might have been a good thing that Eubank Jr didn’t take the fight with Golovkin at that time because the Kazakh was like a machine, rolling over everyone in his path.
If Golovkin had destroyed Eubank Jr then, he wouldn’t have been able to take advantage of his popular last name to make good coin fighting domestic-level opposition like he’d been doing in the last six years.
“Eubank Jr, I would describe as a rising star, and GGG is a legend,” said Loeffler to Sky Sports. “Eubank is flashy and popular. Eubank Jr has a name,” Loeffler added. “He’s building his brand.
“It really depends on what Gennadiy plans to do. He’s the one that makes all the decisions for his career,” said Loeffler.
The 33-year-old Eubank Jr (32-2, 23 KOs) has been stagnating, wasting his career fighting domestic-level competition since he was schooled by George Groves in 2018, but he’s finally starting to show a little ambition by facing Liam Smith (32-3, 19 KOs).
The lack of ambition that Eubank Jr has had is troubling. He should have done so much with his career instead of fighting mediocre fighters, and the disappointing thing is, he’s STILL doing it. He should be fighting better opposition than the fading 34-year-old Beefy Smith, but again, the ambition just isn’t there.
It would be far better if Eubank Jr were to be taking on one of the talented fighters more his size like David Benavidez, Caleb Plant, and David Morrell, but for him, though, this is a huge step up from the fodder he’s been feasting on in the last four years. We’re talking soft jobs like Marcus Morrison, Wanik Awdijan, Liam Williams, and Matt Korobov.
“I know he’s got a mandatory coming up, so most likely, he’ll go in that direction to defend his title against the mandatory, and then after that, you never know,” said Loeffler about Golovkin.