Canelo vs. Golovkin Verbal Agreement Is Nothing More Than a Stunt for Now
Stop the press! Hold the phone! Shout to the masses!
Saul "Canelo" Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin have agreed to fight each other! Yessss!
Canelo vs. Golovkin is exactly the kind of high-stakes, big-money fight that boxing needs right now. When was the last time you’ve been this amped about a fight? This is going to be awesome.
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Heck, HBO needs an event like this too. Has any regime over there started as poorly as Peter Nelson’s takeover as head honcho? Think about it. How many good fights have you seen recently? How many fights have made you say, "This is exactly the fight I wanted to see and when I wanted to see it"?
Wait a minute. What’s that you say? The Canelo-Golovkin bout will happen in the fall? Even better!
Summer will fly by faster than a Manny Pacquiao left hand. It’s just right around the corner, folks, and there’s plenty of time between now and then to promote the fight. This is going to be awesome—wait, what?
What?!
The fight won’t happen until next fall? Like 2017? The soonest the fight can happen is 15 months from now, per the verbal agreement between the two camps reported by Lance Pugmire of the Los Angeles Times?
Oh. Um…OK.
I know I’ve been leaning toward the negative side of things lately, but what kind of ridiculous nonsense is this? What’s the point? Why even leak that sort of thing to the media? The brainchild behind this move should feel completely embarrassed.
Boxing relies on too many stunts.
I’m all for building fights up. I'm the one who said Alvarez isn’t quite ready for Golovkin yet. Why rush a fighter into such deep waters so fast? Alvarez may be the lineal middleweight champion for historical purposes, but pretty much everyone in boxing believes Golovkin is the best middleweight on the planet.
Besides, Alvarez has never even faced a real 160-pound fighter. Should his first really be Golovkin?
Still, doing smart things like not rushing into a bout doesn’t mean one should also do silly things like agreeing to said bout 15 months from now. That doesn't satisfy the fans or even the sport in general. It’s a vanity move intended to save face, and it’s not going to work.
And what exactly does Golovkin get out of the deal again? Why agree to such ludicrous nonsense, especially with the side that already welched on a previous agreement for pretty much the same thing?
While a 25-year-old Alvarez has plenty of time left in his career to carve out a legacy, Golovkin, at age 34, does not. He needs big fights, and he needs them now.
And does GGG have much left to achieve at middleweight? Look down the list of potential matchups. Except for Alvarez, does more than one or two more of them seem like interesting bouts?
We’ve been told for years now by Team Golovkin that its fighter will fight anyone in boxing from 154 to 168 pounds. But he hasn’t. Golovkin has consistently competed at the 160-pound limit, and the only non-middleweight fighters he’s faced over the years have been middling contenders who have either come up or down in weight to meet him on his terms.
For the record, I do believe Golovkin is sincere in his willingness to face anyone, and I do believe he has had many good fighters turn down offers to face him. But his team has also made some hard stances as to who he will fight and when.
Andre Ward said Golovkin turned him down for a bout at 168. Remember? Erislandy Lara has called him out numerous times. Why hasn’t that one happened? And Team GGG even refused Alvarez a catchweight that might have helped an agreement come about sooner.
The point to this little tirade? This so-called verbal agreement is just plain silly.
Memo to all parties involved: stop all the posturing. Ditch all the stunts. Either fight each other or don’t. But don’t try to sell us something that will supposedly happen over a year from now in a sport that has seen bigger fights fall through in shorter time over less.
It’s dumb, pointless and a slap in the face to fight fans.
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