With Floyd Mayweather retired (for now) and Manny Pacquiao on his way out the door, the boxing world's focus has shifted from welterweight to middleweight where Canelo Alvarez is the lineal champion and Gennady Golovkin is the hard-punching knockout artist desperately seeking a unification bout.
Golovkin and Alvarez's camps agreed to a deal that pushes back their mandatory bout until after the two fight interim bouts this spring -- Golovkin faces Dominic Wade on Saturday, April 23 and Alvarez faces Amir Khan on Saturday, May 7. After those fights, pending the outcomes, Golovkin and Alvarez should be on a collision course, but Golovkin continues to feel like Alvarez and his camp are going to try to dodge him again like they did when scheduling the Khan fight.
“Fighting Amir Khan, then maybe [Manny] Pacquiao...hey, listen, Canelo, I have double the championship belts,” Golovkin said to the Los Angeles Times. “Make the fight with me. It’s a good fight for us. Not an easy fight. Everyone understands that. But then next...you can bring on Manny or Floyd [Mayweather]. For me, it’s about who’s the best? Who’s No. 1 in the division? That’s what’s No. 1 to me. Second is money.”
Golovkin holds two middleweight belts -- the IBF and IBO titles -- and is the mandatory challenger for Canelo's WBC title, but boxing's next great megafight is still yet to be set in stone for one major reason.
Canelo now finds himself at the center of the boxing world, capable of carrying a pay-per-view event to over a million buys with his name alone. He's not only the most famous boxer in the world, he's also the top Mexican fighter, which makes him a massive draw.
To maintain this status, Alvarez and his promoter Golden Boy must toe a delicate line when deciding on fights as a loss could be a significant hit to his brand and ability to bring in huge money. Golovkin is, without question, the biggest threat to Alvarez in the ring in the middleweight division and he knows that "the business" is why Alvarez is dodging him, but he's fed up with that tactic.
“Yes, I understand that [a loss would hurt his brand],” Golovkin told The Times. “I understand this decision is maybe 20 percent Canelo’s and 80 percent [his promoter], Golden Boy. It’s business, but it’s not respectful of boxing. Everyone says Canelo is a great champion, the idol of Mexico. The idol for what? For boxing? No. Or as a businessman? Right now, he looks like a businessman.”
Canelo's team has been brilliant in building him back up from his loss to Floyd Mayweather in 2013, when he was clearly the inferior opponent. Since then, he has worked his way back up, fighting both bombers with inferior boxing skill and technical fighters that lack the power to bother him.
His last two fights fall into that second category. Miguel Cotto, the former middleweight champion, was a perfect target for Alvarez, who has himself admitted that he's not a true middleweight.
Neither was Cotto, a point Golovkin has made repeatedly.
“Canelo says he’s the middleweight champion. Middleweight is my best weight,” Golovkin said. “Everybody says Canelo’s this great champion. I saw his last fight. Cotto’s not a real middleweight. Great champion, not a middleweight.”
Cotto fought at a 155-pound catchweight, five pounds below the true middleweight limit of 160. Canelo's a natural junior middleweight (154 pounds) and Cotto, a long-time welterweight, rarely even made it to the catchweight limit. In their title fight, Canelo walked through Cotto's power punches and was able to knock around the champ in a convincing decision victory.
Now, Alvarez turns to another undersized star for his first title defense as he welcomes Amir Khan to the middleweight division at the same 155-pound catchweight. Khan, who couldn't find a quality welterweight willing to take him on, has departed the division for greener pastures -- the green of a dollar bill.
Khan will be the smaller fighter in this bout as well. The entire thing is a brilliantly orchestrated ploy by Golden Boy to take heat off of Canelo for dancing around a Golovkin fight. Khan is a well-known fighter and one many will commend Alvarez for taking on. Khan should be a challenge as a technical fighter to Alvarez, of that there is little debate, but it won't matter if Alvarez is able to walk forward without fear of Khan's power like he did to Cotto.
This is where Golovkin scares Alvarez. There is no questioning the power of Golovkin, a true middleweight at 160 pounds. Alvarez is a very technically skilled fighter, but he's at his best when he's able to unload power shots. Against Golovkin, Alvarez would need to be a more tentative fighter to avoid opening himself up to the power of Golovkin's right hand.
Even Alvarez's camp is willing to admit these fears, as they have repeatedly said that Golovkin should come down to a catchweight to take on Alvarez.
“Canelo is not a middleweight," said Eric Gomez, a Golden Boy Promotions executive to The Times. "If Gennady really wants to make the fight, maybe we can talk about some catch-weight where Gennady comes down [in weight] and Canelo goes up, but he’s truly a 154-pounder. If Canelo is giving up weight, Gennady should, too.”
Golovkin has been steadfast in his belief that the middleweight title should be fought at the middleweight limit. To any rational person, this seems like a reasonable request and that it's silly to think there would be anyone that thinks otherwise. But this is boxing, where far too often reason and common sense get ignored in favor of the bottom line.
They say styles make fights, and for Alvarez, his strengths would be neutralized by Golovkin. That's not to say Alvarez wouldn't be able to outbox Golovkin to a win, but the odds of a loss would be significantly higher against GGG than any other opponent in the division. The chance of that loss is terrifying to Alvarez and Golden Boy, who know there are boatloads of cash to be made over the next few years.
The champion should have to face the mandatory challenger, of that there is no debate. The question Alvarez will face following his bout with Khan is whether the reward of retaining middleweight belt is more valuable than the risk of a loss to Golovkin?
Unfortunately for Golovkin and fight fans, the answer to that question is could very likely be no.
