Gomez: Canelo-Golovkin needs tie-breaker fight

By Boxing News - 09/21/2017 - Comments

Image: Gomez: Canelo-Golovkin needs tie-breaker fight

By Sean Jones: Eric Gomez of Golden Boy Promotions is committed to putting together the rematch between Golden Boy star Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (49-1-2, 34 KOs) and IBF/IBO/WBA/WBC middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin (37-0-1, 33 KOs) for a fight at a still to be determined date. Gomez says Canelo-GGG absolutely need a “tie-breaker” because their previous fight last Saturday night was a “tie”, with the judges scoring it as a controversial 12 round draw at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Gomez will be meeting with Triple G’s promoter Tom Loeffler this Friday on September 22 to discuss the rematch between Canelo and Golovkin. Gomez says he’s heard through the grapevine that Loeffler would like to have the rematch take place outside of Las Vegas. However, Gomez says he still would like the Canelo-Golovkin rematch to take place in that city because it makes the most business sense. It’s understandable for Loeffler not to want to bring Golovkin back to Las Vegas after the way the judges scored the fight in giving Canelo a draw in a fight that the boxing world saw GGG winning.

Leading up to the fight, there was much talk about how Golovkin wouldn’t be given a decision over Canelo in Vegas due to the Mexican star’s popularity and because of the many times he’d fought in that city in big money fights. Unfortunately, the controversial results of last Saturday’s Canelo v Golovkin fight only confirms the opinions of the many boxing fans that Golovkin never had a chance of getting a decision win over Canelo in Vegas.

“This is what everybody wants. Everybody wants a tiebreaker,” said Eric Gomez of Golden Boy Promotions to Fino Boxing in talking of a rematch between Triple G and Canelo Alvarez. “It ended in a tie. I’ve been saying this that in boxing there is no overtime. So we’re going to sit down with Golovkin’s side later this week and we’re going to discuss it. From round 13, we’ll go all the way to round 27,” said Gomez.

In addition to wanting the fight to be staged in a different state, Golovkin and Loeffler will likely want a better deal financially than in the first fight. The judges scored the fight a draw, but it didn’t look like a draw in the eyes of the boxing fans. If Canelo and Golden Boy can keep the same purse split as the previous fight, Golovkin would be getting a raw deal out of. He would be helping Canelo make more money at his expense.

You can argue that if the judges had scored the fight the way the boxing public saw the fight, Golovkin would have won the fight 8 rounds to 4, and he would be entitled to a bigger split of the revenue than in the first fight. Golovkin wouldn’t be getting parity with the more popular Canelo, but he would certainly be getting a better financial deal than the first fight. The draw could really hurt Golovkin financially if his promoter Loeffler isn’t able to work out a better financial deal for him than what he got in the first.

Canelo is getting the major portion of the pay-per-view upside for their September 16 fight. Golovkin was given a guaranteed $15 million for the fight plus a portion of the PPV. Canelo also received a guaranteed $15 million, but he’s getting the major portion of the pay-per-view money. The fight could bring in over 2 million buys. Golden Boy Promotions boss Oscar De La Hoya says that Canelo will clear $50 million easily for the fight. If Canelo is getting that much and more, it leaves the question how much Golovin will be getting for his PPV upside? The draw really helps Canelo more than it does Golovkin. It saved Canelo from a loss, which would have hurt his marketability, and it also puts him in position to the lion’s share of the revenue once again without Golovkin getting a bump up in pay that he would deserve if the judges had scored the fight the way the boxing public saw it with Golovkin winning the fight.

“We’re not thinking anything else but the rematch,” said Gomez to Fighthype about a Canelo vs. GGG rematch. “We want the rematch. This is what Canelo wants. That’s what the team wants. We’re going to sit down and we’re going to talk. It’s all in the negotiations. I feel like the fans want the rematch. It’s a tie. You do a tie-breaker, and that’s what we want. We’re looking for the tie-breaker. Everything is open right now. We’re not committed to any dates. We’re not committed to any site. We’ve got to sit down and talk. You’ve got to do the tie-breaker, that’s it. The last 3 rounds, there was a lot of action. There was a lot of give and take, and everyone was on their feet. I’d hate for either guy to fight another fight [against somebody else], lose, get injured or something,” said Gomez in stating that he wants an immediate rematch between Canelo and Triple G.

The Canelo vs. Gennady fight was technically ruled a draw, but that’s not how it’s viewed by the boxing community that paid to see the fight. They saw Canelo lose the fight. Gomez can say it was a tie, but a good portion of the fans feel that Golovkin was robbed in Vegas by the 2 judges that failed to give him the win. One judge scored it embarrassingly in favor of Canelo by a 118-110 score, while another judge had it a draw at 114-114. That same judge gave Canelo round 7, which was a round in which Golovkin boxed his ears off for three minutes. That was the most one-sided round in the entire fight. Golovkin may take a fight in December if Loeffler can’t put together a rematch against Canelo.

Canelo is supposed to be out of the ring for the remainder of 2017, as he plans on not fighting again until the Mexican holiday Cinco de Mayo on May 5. By Canelo choosing not to fight until next May, it sends a message that if Golovkin wants the rematch with him, he’ll need to fight him when he wants the fight, and he’ll need to fight on the Mexican holiday. If you’re looking to make it a fair fight, it would be better not to stage the rematch on a Mexican holiday. If you want things to be completely neutral, staging it on a day that doesn’t benefit either fighter would be the way to go. You can argue that it puts Golovkin in a one down position by him entering the ring to fight Canelo, who comes from Mexico, on a Mexican holiday in front of a huge pro-Canelo crowd in Las Vegas. Gomez says that he’s open as far as the date and venue goes, but if Golovkin is only given 2 dates, either May or September next year, then he’s not really being given options.

Golovkin will be in the position of having to agree to fight Canelo on one of the 2 Mexican holidays in 2018. I don’t think that’s the way the rematch should be conducted if you’re looking at making the fight fair. If Golovkin gave Canelo the option of only fighting on Kazakhstan’s holiday in a fight staged in a major city where he was arguably robbed in their previous fight, I doubt that Canelo would be too happy about it. Having a fight be truly neutral means that Golovkin should be able to fight on a non-Mexican holiday date in a city outside of Nevada. I don’t think it’s a good deal for Golovkin to have to fight on Cinco de Mayo in Vegas, because I see that as putting him at a potential disadvantage right out of the gate. However, if Gomez, Canelo and Golden Boy are going to leave Golovkin and Loeffler with no other choice but to fight next May if he wants the rematch, then I guess they’ll take it. But it’s pointless for Gomez to talk about him being open about venues and dates, when the only option Golovkin is getting is getting for the rematch is on Cinco de Mayo on May 5.

“He feels bad. He feels that he won the fight,” said Gomez about Canelo. “He feels he made him miss punches. He landed more power punches, you know. If you look at the fight again, Canelo fought an excellent fight. It was a very good fight. All he’s got to do is adjust a little bit. He’s got to make some adjustments. I don’t think Golovkin can adjust anymore. That’s him. That’s his style. I think if Canelo can adjust, he can really close it and really win convincingly. He’s going to rest a little bit. He’s going to relax. I’ve already talked to his training team, Chepo and Eddie, and they want the rematch, and that’s what we’re going to look for,” said Gomez.

Canelo needs to open up his eyes and ears and see what the boxing fans are saying about his fight with Golovkin last Saturday, because VERY few of them think Canelo deserved a draw or a win. Even Floyd Mayweather Jr., who had predicted a knockout win for Canelo over GGG before the fight, has been strangely quiet about the results of their contest. That tells you all you need to know about his thoughts. If Mayweather truly thought Canelo had beaten Golovkin, he likely would have been standing on top of a soapbox telling the boxing world how great a job Alvarez did. Fighters need to realize that they aren’t the ones that say whether they won a fight. It’s a combination of the judges and the boxing fans. When the judges mess up, as 2 of the judges from last Saturday’s fight appeared to do, then the court of public opinion overrules them by picking who really did win the fight.

“We’ve had talks. I’ve talked to Tom Loeffler,” said Gomez. “I have a meeting with him on Friday. So we’re going to sit down on Friday and start talking. Everything is open right now. We’re not going to make any decisions. The most important thing for us is to get the rematch done. Once we get the terms down for the rematch, everything else will fall into place,” said Gomez.

Hopefully, Gomez is serious about the negotiations being real negotiations, and not a one-sided thing that only favors Canelo and Golden Boy. If Team Golovkin is given no other choice but to accept the same financial terms as last time, and the same city of Las Vegas and another fight on a Mexican holiday weekend, then it’s not true negotiations. It’s just a mere show. Golovkin unfortunately doesn’t have enough popularity and pull to make things fairer. If he did, we likely would have had the Canelo-Golovkin fight staged in a different city and on another date besides a Mexican holiday.

“I am [upset about the scoring,” said Gomez. “Golovkin is not the only victim. Canelo is the victim too. We’re the victims, Golden Boy Promotions, because now everyone is pointing at us, as if we did something wrong. The one con was the bad scorecard. It’s a little unfair that people are focusing on that,” said Gomez.

Gomez is right about both fighters being hurt by the controversial scoring in the fight, but it wasn’t just ONE bad score, like Gomez is talking about. It wasn’t just Adalaide Byrd’s 118-110 score in favor of Canelo that was bad. It was also the judge that inexplicably scored the fight a draw at 114-114. That score made zero sense, especially given that the judge gave Canelo round 7, which was Golovkin’s best round of the fight. The scoring by these 2 judges hurt Golovkin more than it hurt Canelo.

Gomez can make it seem like both guys were equally hurt, but it’s not true. By Golovkin failing to get a win, he can’t ask for and be given a better financial deal than he got last time. Like I said, Canelo and Golden Boy can effectively say that because of the draw, the same financial terms should be used in the second fight. That means Canelo can make the same kind of money as he did in the first fight while Golovkin gets stuck with the same deal, despite having won the fight in the eyes of the boxing public.

”I’ve seen some comments out there from Tom that he wants to go somewhere else maybe,” said Gomez in talking about Loeffler not wanting to have Golovkin go back to Vegas again for the Canelo rematch. ”I still think Vegas is the best venue for them. I still think it’s the best place. It’s the best business for us, Vegas, but we’re open to anything. We’ve got to see what Canelo wants. He’s got a BIG say so. I’m sure Golovkin has a big say so. We’re going to sit down like great partners like we did with this fight. We’re going to partner up for the tie-breaker, and we’re going to sit down and see what each side has to say,” said Gomez about the Canelo-Golovkin rematch.

As you can see, Gomez is already tipping his hand in saying that he wants the Canelo vs. Golovkin rematch in Vegas. Since he’s saying it right now, it’s only obvious that this is what he’s going to insist on when he gets behind closed doors with Loeffler this Friday. You can’t call it open negotiations if you’re insisting that the rematch take place in Las Vegas right off the bat. If the Canelo-Gennady rematch must take place on Cinco de Mayo in May or the Mexican Independence Day holiday in September, then that means there’s no real choice for Team Golovkin as well. You can argue that it’s either fight Canelo on one of the Mexican holidays in Vegas, or you’re out of luck, Golovkin. I think that’s a bad deal for Golovkin unless he can knockout Canelo in the rematch.

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