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Golovkin VS Canelo: Bringing Back The Middleweight Kings
Boxing in 2017:
Boxing in 2017 is in a strange place in the public consciousness. The slow death of the Heavyweight division from the late 90s and throughout the 2000s destroyed much of the interest in boxing for the casual sports fan. Just 4 years ago if you were to ask a casual sports fan or random pedestrian on the street to name the heavyweight champion of the world, a worrying portion would probably answer with Lennox Lewis or Mike Tyson. This decline is often blamed on the Klitschcko brothers being boring. But several other theories including the better financial options for young athletic heavyweights have been put forward.
However the rise of UK superstar Anthony Joshua has gone someway towards bringing the casual fan back to boxing, as depressing as it might be heavyweight is where the casual fan looks to for their fix despite the fights usually being a much slower pace and with sloppier technique. Joshua who has managed an impressive string of 19 unbeaten with every victory by stoppage even managed to draw a barnburner of a fight out of ‘boring’ Wladimir Klitschko in april of this year. The issue for boxing now is that outside of Matchups with the bronze bomber Deontay Wilder 38-0( 37KO) and New Zealand’s Joseph Parker 23-0(18KO) there is still a dearth of quality heavyweight opposition. An ancient shannon briggs? A past his best and save for his last fight, preying on journeyman David Haye? Perhaps a fight with returning Tyson Fury might bring some interest. However this brings us to a more positive note for the sport. With the renewed public interest in the sport, in part due to the freakshow attraction of Mayweather VS Mcgregor which i won't say anything about other than that both men are laughing all the way to the bank. Now we come to possibly the best fight matchup in the last decade Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez VS Gennady Gennadyevich Golovkin.
The players:
I first became aware of the firebrand mexican after his defeat of the great shane mosley (admittedly far past his prime). Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez- 49-1-1 (34KO) was just 21 years old when he fought mosley in 2012. A native of Guadalajara, Jalisco Mexico the youngest of 8 children, 7 of them boys all of whom have become professional boxers but none with the success of ‘Cinnamon’. He started boxing at the age of 13 and amassed an amateur record of 44-2 over the space of two years. He left the unpaid ranks to turn professional at the age of 15 and other than a draw to Journeyman Jorge Juarez 8 years his senior who was able to tire the teenage phenom out by making the physical gap tell he racked up win after win against increasing levels of competition with his sole defeat coming at the hands of the defensive and psychological warfare genius Floyd ‘Money’ Mayweather-50-0 (27KO) in a fight where many think that Canelo was too young and inexperienced to put into at that stage of his career. Since his defeat to Mayweather he has gone from strength to strength squeaking by the vastly underrated Erislandy Lara, stunning one punch knockouts of Amir Khan and James Kirkland and outpointing the legendary Miguel Cotto for the vacant WBC Middleweight along with one sided beatdowns of fellow mexican Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. and Englishman Liam ‘Beefy’ Smith.
Gennady Gennadyevich Golovkin or Triple G-37-0 (33KO) was born in what is now Kazakhstan at the time part of the soviet union. As an amateur coming from one of the best programmes in the world he won the 2003 world championships in the middleweight division and took a controversial silver medal at the 2004 Summer games again in the middleweight division. He finished his amateur career with an incredible record of 345 wins from 350 fights. As a professional is where the fearsome reputation of ‘Triple G’ began winning his first 8 fights by knockout and going on a phenominal 23 fight stoppage streak only broken by Daniel Jacobs-32-1 (29KO) in march of this year. He has unfortunately not received the recognition that such a fearsome puncher would normally receive outside of hardcore boxing fans despite speaking good english and having deals with major brands such as Air Jordan. He first came to my attention when my uncle, a huge fan of boxing in all forms told me about his crippling body shot KO of the always tough Matthew ‘Mack’ Macklin. I had never seen someone go down from a shot like that save for possibly Alfonso sanchez VS Micky Ward. From then on i payed close attention to the career of the stone cold killer from Kazakhstan as he rampaged his way through the middleweight division, battering the huge for a middleweight Martin Murray, Retiring Curtis Stevens in his corner between rounds, mauling the granite fisted canadian David Lemieux and destroying Kell Brook’s eye amongst others.
The games: Mexican Cinnamon
Canelo is not the archetypical seek and destroy left hooking mexican brawler in the Julio Cesar Chavez mould. Despite being a physical powerhouse at 154lbs (former opponent Liam Smith called him a bodybuilder physique) Alvarez does not bull forward relying on superior strength to deal with opponents instead he is a clean punching counter puncher who can also box on the lead but prefers to set traps and pull his opponents into over committing on something. His footwork has been one of the few places he has shown weakness in the past. Against the fleet of foot Amir Khan he was made to look a little plodding in the first 3 rounds, he seems to glide around the ring always on balance in a slight crouch but does very little fast movement which means that against opponents with good ring control he can struggle to ‘cut’ the ring and force them to engage.
Offensively Canelo does not have a particularly high punch output but instead picks at his opponent from range with wide right hands to the body behind his opponent's left elbow. He has also shown a good stabbing jab to the body against several opponents, in fact the Kirkland and Khan Knockouts both came as his opponents were reaching to counter a feinted body jab with a left hook and he swung a shot put right across their chin and immediately rolls underneath the falling man's returning punch. He attacks the body Beautifully at close range with flurries of powerful hooks off both hands mixed in with a sneaky left uppercut and a thunderous right uppercut. The genius of this is that if your man hunches forwards to protect his body he becomes a sucker for the uppercut and if he should stand a little taller to avoid it he leaves his abdomen stretched and vulnerable to the body shot. Against Liam Smith he used the oldest set up in the book for the liver shot a tapping left hook upstairs immediately followed with a left hook hammered home full force into the liver. Alvarez is a master at what i would call the catch and pitch right. He blocks his opponents jab with the palm of his right glove and immediately follows the returning jab back to his mans chin with a right cross. Miguel Cotto was buzzed with this punch in the 3rd round of their fight and he has used it successfully in several fights. When it comes to his right straight Canelo is not afraid to lead with it and will even throw it at a relatively wide arc if he thinks he can catch an opponent stepping out of range. Canelo will also exaggerate his left hook as a lead to gauge the reaction. If his opponent chooses to ‘shell up’ Alvarez will exaggerate a left hook to the head and instead throw a sneaky left uppercut or use the hook to line his man up for the right straight. He mixes this left hook in well with his jab. Against Khan the first solid connection he made was to catch Khan reaching for a supposed jab and instead caught him with a wide left hook (see Broner VS Maidana for a perfect example of this) he will also throw the 1-3-2 or jab left hook right cross combination. Alvarez’ jab whilst not being the railroad spike on a telephone pole nose flattener of someone like sonny liston is sharp enough to stop opponents mid combination and is one of the few punches he had some success with against Floyd Mayweather.
Defensively Canelo is a conundrum. He has moments of brilliant head movement seen against Cotto and Austin Trout where he is stood in front of his opponent hands down and is avoiding anything thrown at him. However in both these cases he was avoiding half committed jabs from range not power punches. Part of Canelo’s defence is the threat of chasing him and running on to a shot you never see coming. Against James Kirkland Canelo found his man running in with his chin ahead of his feet and knocked him down with a perfect right uppercut. Canelo will also occasionally use the shoulder roll off an opponent's right hand combined with the left arm tucked in front of the opponent's chest to create space for an uppercut. However he also has in some fights put himself against the ropes feet almost square gloves glued to his forehead and allowed his opponent to punch away something that against a puncher with a reputation like Golovkin's can only lead to problems for the Mexican.
In summary Canelo is an incredibly skillful boxer a master at breaking his opponents down and making them fight at his pace and picking them apart with sustained body attacks sharp counterpunching and clever traps despite his physical size and strength (perhaps due to having to fight grown men as a teenager) however he can also be troubled by opponents with good footwork and has in the past placed himself against the ropes as an easy target. This fight will also be at 160lbs rather than his more familiar 154.
The games: Kazakh Thunder
Gennady Golovkin is best described in my opinion as a pressure cooking terminator. He is known for walking his opponents down and breaking their will and in the case of poor Kell Brook and Matthew Macklin some bones too. However to hear some former opponents talk about fighting him it's not that he possesses a completely otherworldly power, he hits hard very hard in fact but in the words of Martin Murray who took Golovkin 11 rounds further than anyone else until Danny Jacobs “He hit me hard but i could deal with that. What surprised me about him most was his variety” .
Golovkin is exceptional at knowing when and where to hit. The first knockdown against Murray came as Murray was circling away against the ropes and Golovkin threw a very wide right hand that caught him under the heart and in Murray's own words “i felt like i was having a baby the pain was unbelievable” . This is the genius of the man they call Triple G he hits extremely hard and he knows it but what sets him apart from other bangers is his delivering of that power and the variety of shots in his arsenal. He is exceptional at picking his punch in the moment. That is reacting to the opportunities in front of him and picking the perfect response. Against fellow big puncher Curtis Stevens the first round began very cagey until Golovkin landed a sharp left hook over the top of Curtis’ low right hand. Realising the connection Golovkin immediately fires another left hook into the opening knocking the brash stevenson down leading to the infamous image of a shocked Curtis Stevenson staring in awe at Golovkin as he struggles to drag himself from the canvas. Triple G likes to use his right hand more often as a chopping hook around the guard and behind his opponents ear than the more conventional straight but that is not to say he is incapable of it. This chopping right hook is the shot that finally finished the brave Martin Murray and hurt Daniel Geale.He will also throw a chopping right hand to the kidney as part of his sustained body attack. His left hook is dynamite pure and simple the shot that broke two of Matthew Macklin’s ribs and destroyed Kell Brook’s eye socket. He will use it on the lead as a wider swinging knuckles down ‘russian’ hook to both head and body to open his offence and tie it together with the right hook. If he has his man hurt he loves to combine flurries of power hooks of alternating hands rather than doubling up on one handed offence. He knocked out Macklin off the same setup that Canelo likes to use. An uppercut to stand his man up tall and sucker him for the liver shot. According to compubox Gennady Golovkin held the record for most landed jabs per fight. Incredibly accurate his jab is also a thudding headache maker whilst still being sharp enough to counter an opponent's jab with. Against brick fisted canadian David Lemieux Golovkin snapped Lemieux’s head back with a solid jab anytime the Montreal slugger stepped in to punch.He proceeded to cut him to pieces behind that constant piston jab in a fight that was much more tactical than some expected. In his bout with the Hard nosed and dangerous Gabriel Rosado Golovkin used his jab to back up his bigger opponent to land the chopping right to the ear. His jab is also hard enough that you cannot ignore it and if you bring your right glove too far across the centerline to deal with it. Then that wide Russian hook will not be far behind. Triple G also possesses an incredibly dangerous and somewhat odd for a boxer, stance shifting right hook. He will wait for his opponents to try circle past his right shoulder and step into southpaw as he throws his whole body weight behind the shot leading to a thunderous right hook. This punch flattened solid Polish southpaw Grezgorz Proksa.
Golovkin’s footwork is exceptional in the words of Glenn Holmes “He seems to cover half the ring in 3 or 4 steps but he’s always balanced”. Part of Triple G’s success has been due to his superb ring generalship he is a master at making his opponents work twice as hard as he is. Fighting out of a slightly wider than normal stance he moves in small balanced steps quick enough that the majority of fighters he faces have no choice but to face his fearsome power or exhaust themselves running a half marathon every round while Gennady himself remains relatively fresh staying in the center of the ring and forcing his man against the corners of the ring. Rare is the man who can match the Kazakh’s footwork and ring generalship.
Defensively Gennady is not as slick as Alvarez his head movement seems to be limited to dipping forward from the waist as he steps forwards towards his opponents. However so rare is the fighter that can match his firepower whilst getting past that sledgehammer jab that we have not seen much of Golovkin having to block and counter going backwards. Instead what we have seen is Gennady marching his man down behind a tight high double forearms guard. The double forearm shell is the most basic form of defense and in recent fights we have seen this be the only crack in the armour of Golovkin. Welterweight moving up two weight classes Kell Brook landed a peach of a right uppercut against the Kazakh destroyer that definitely caught his attention and Danny Jacobs in Golovkin’s last fight was able to land some cuffing right hands around the gloves and some decent body work underneath the elbows. However this leads to a point that you cannot ignore when it comes to Golovkin-Chin. The Kazakh possess an excellent ability to eat a punch and continue unphased. Against Geale (who admittedly carries a KO percentage of 44%) he ate a clean right hand to the chops mid throwing his own right. Geale’s punch landed clean a fraction of a second before Triple G’s and it didn’t even slow down the winging right fist that put him down for the finish. Golovkin also took clean left hooks from Lemieux (80% KO) and right uppercuts from Curtis Stevens (60% KO) and Kell Brook (66% KO) without blinking. However Golovkin is 35 years old and has fought 37 Pro and 350 Amateur fights so will his chin hold up against the dangerous mexican?
The Fight
I have so many questions heading into Saturday’s epic clash. Will Canelo be able to avoid Golovkin’s power? Will Triple G’s chin hold up at 35? What happens if it goes into the later rounds will Gennady tire? Will Canelo take the risk of punching WITH Golovkin? I originally at the start of this write up favoured Canelo. He is the younger man, has superb boxing skills and a wealth of high level experience against a man who in boxing terms is getting up there in age and whose defence has been shown to be fallible in his last few fights. However having looked into it further i wonder if Golovkin’s superb footwork and naturally bigger frame will take a toll on the Firebrand Mexican. This is a true 50/50 fight. A throwback to the welter to middleweight glory days of Hagler, Hearns, Leonard and Duran. The best matchup arguably of the decade and a fight that has piqued my interest and passion for boxing like no other. I have no idea who will win when the two best middleweights in the world face off in Las Vegas on Saturday the 16th of September but by all the rights it should be an all time classic of a fight. And that is the beauty of boxing, if everyone knew who was going to win what would be the point in watching?
Boxing in 2017:
Boxing in 2017 is in a strange place in the public consciousness. The slow death of the Heavyweight division from the late 90s and throughout the 2000s destroyed much of the interest in boxing for the casual sports fan. Just 4 years ago if you were to ask a casual sports fan or random pedestrian on the street to name the heavyweight champion of the world, a worrying portion would probably answer with Lennox Lewis or Mike Tyson. This decline is often blamed on the Klitschcko brothers being boring. But several other theories including the better financial options for young athletic heavyweights have been put forward.
However the rise of UK superstar Anthony Joshua has gone someway towards bringing the casual fan back to boxing, as depressing as it might be heavyweight is where the casual fan looks to for their fix despite the fights usually being a much slower pace and with sloppier technique. Joshua who has managed an impressive string of 19 unbeaten with every victory by stoppage even managed to draw a barnburner of a fight out of ‘boring’ Wladimir Klitschko in april of this year. The issue for boxing now is that outside of Matchups with the bronze bomber Deontay Wilder 38-0( 37KO) and New Zealand’s Joseph Parker 23-0(18KO) there is still a dearth of quality heavyweight opposition. An ancient shannon briggs? A past his best and save for his last fight, preying on journeyman David Haye? Perhaps a fight with returning Tyson Fury might bring some interest. However this brings us to a more positive note for the sport. With the renewed public interest in the sport, in part due to the freakshow attraction of Mayweather VS Mcgregor which i won't say anything about other than that both men are laughing all the way to the bank. Now we come to possibly the best fight matchup in the last decade Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez VS Gennady Gennadyevich Golovkin.
The players:
I first became aware of the firebrand mexican after his defeat of the great shane mosley (admittedly far past his prime). Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez- 49-1-1 (34KO) was just 21 years old when he fought mosley in 2012. A native of Guadalajara, Jalisco Mexico the youngest of 8 children, 7 of them boys all of whom have become professional boxers but none with the success of ‘Cinnamon’. He started boxing at the age of 13 and amassed an amateur record of 44-2 over the space of two years. He left the unpaid ranks to turn professional at the age of 15 and other than a draw to Journeyman Jorge Juarez 8 years his senior who was able to tire the teenage phenom out by making the physical gap tell he racked up win after win against increasing levels of competition with his sole defeat coming at the hands of the defensive and psychological warfare genius Floyd ‘Money’ Mayweather-50-0 (27KO) in a fight where many think that Canelo was too young and inexperienced to put into at that stage of his career. Since his defeat to Mayweather he has gone from strength to strength squeaking by the vastly underrated Erislandy Lara, stunning one punch knockouts of Amir Khan and James Kirkland and outpointing the legendary Miguel Cotto for the vacant WBC Middleweight along with one sided beatdowns of fellow mexican Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. and Englishman Liam ‘Beefy’ Smith.
Gennady Gennadyevich Golovkin or Triple G-37-0 (33KO) was born in what is now Kazakhstan at the time part of the soviet union. As an amateur coming from one of the best programmes in the world he won the 2003 world championships in the middleweight division and took a controversial silver medal at the 2004 Summer games again in the middleweight division. He finished his amateur career with an incredible record of 345 wins from 350 fights. As a professional is where the fearsome reputation of ‘Triple G’ began winning his first 8 fights by knockout and going on a phenominal 23 fight stoppage streak only broken by Daniel Jacobs-32-1 (29KO) in march of this year. He has unfortunately not received the recognition that such a fearsome puncher would normally receive outside of hardcore boxing fans despite speaking good english and having deals with major brands such as Air Jordan. He first came to my attention when my uncle, a huge fan of boxing in all forms told me about his crippling body shot KO of the always tough Matthew ‘Mack’ Macklin. I had never seen someone go down from a shot like that save for possibly Alfonso sanchez VS Micky Ward. From then on i payed close attention to the career of the stone cold killer from Kazakhstan as he rampaged his way through the middleweight division, battering the huge for a middleweight Martin Murray, Retiring Curtis Stevens in his corner between rounds, mauling the granite fisted canadian David Lemieux and destroying Kell Brook’s eye amongst others.
The games: Mexican Cinnamon
Canelo is not the archetypical seek and destroy left hooking mexican brawler in the Julio Cesar Chavez mould. Despite being a physical powerhouse at 154lbs (former opponent Liam Smith called him a bodybuilder physique) Alvarez does not bull forward relying on superior strength to deal with opponents instead he is a clean punching counter puncher who can also box on the lead but prefers to set traps and pull his opponents into over committing on something. His footwork has been one of the few places he has shown weakness in the past. Against the fleet of foot Amir Khan he was made to look a little plodding in the first 3 rounds, he seems to glide around the ring always on balance in a slight crouch but does very little fast movement which means that against opponents with good ring control he can struggle to ‘cut’ the ring and force them to engage.
Offensively Canelo does not have a particularly high punch output but instead picks at his opponent from range with wide right hands to the body behind his opponent's left elbow. He has also shown a good stabbing jab to the body against several opponents, in fact the Kirkland and Khan Knockouts both came as his opponents were reaching to counter a feinted body jab with a left hook and he swung a shot put right across their chin and immediately rolls underneath the falling man's returning punch. He attacks the body Beautifully at close range with flurries of powerful hooks off both hands mixed in with a sneaky left uppercut and a thunderous right uppercut. The genius of this is that if your man hunches forwards to protect his body he becomes a sucker for the uppercut and if he should stand a little taller to avoid it he leaves his abdomen stretched and vulnerable to the body shot. Against Liam Smith he used the oldest set up in the book for the liver shot a tapping left hook upstairs immediately followed with a left hook hammered home full force into the liver. Alvarez is a master at what i would call the catch and pitch right. He blocks his opponents jab with the palm of his right glove and immediately follows the returning jab back to his mans chin with a right cross. Miguel Cotto was buzzed with this punch in the 3rd round of their fight and he has used it successfully in several fights. When it comes to his right straight Canelo is not afraid to lead with it and will even throw it at a relatively wide arc if he thinks he can catch an opponent stepping out of range. Canelo will also exaggerate his left hook as a lead to gauge the reaction. If his opponent chooses to ‘shell up’ Alvarez will exaggerate a left hook to the head and instead throw a sneaky left uppercut or use the hook to line his man up for the right straight. He mixes this left hook in well with his jab. Against Khan the first solid connection he made was to catch Khan reaching for a supposed jab and instead caught him with a wide left hook (see Broner VS Maidana for a perfect example of this) he will also throw the 1-3-2 or jab left hook right cross combination. Alvarez’ jab whilst not being the railroad spike on a telephone pole nose flattener of someone like sonny liston is sharp enough to stop opponents mid combination and is one of the few punches he had some success with against Floyd Mayweather.
Defensively Canelo is a conundrum. He has moments of brilliant head movement seen against Cotto and Austin Trout where he is stood in front of his opponent hands down and is avoiding anything thrown at him. However in both these cases he was avoiding half committed jabs from range not power punches. Part of Canelo’s defence is the threat of chasing him and running on to a shot you never see coming. Against James Kirkland Canelo found his man running in with his chin ahead of his feet and knocked him down with a perfect right uppercut. Canelo will also occasionally use the shoulder roll off an opponent's right hand combined with the left arm tucked in front of the opponent's chest to create space for an uppercut. However he also has in some fights put himself against the ropes feet almost square gloves glued to his forehead and allowed his opponent to punch away something that against a puncher with a reputation like Golovkin's can only lead to problems for the Mexican.
In summary Canelo is an incredibly skillful boxer a master at breaking his opponents down and making them fight at his pace and picking them apart with sustained body attacks sharp counterpunching and clever traps despite his physical size and strength (perhaps due to having to fight grown men as a teenager) however he can also be troubled by opponents with good footwork and has in the past placed himself against the ropes as an easy target. This fight will also be at 160lbs rather than his more familiar 154.
The games: Kazakh Thunder
Gennady Golovkin is best described in my opinion as a pressure cooking terminator. He is known for walking his opponents down and breaking their will and in the case of poor Kell Brook and Matthew Macklin some bones too. However to hear some former opponents talk about fighting him it's not that he possesses a completely otherworldly power, he hits hard very hard in fact but in the words of Martin Murray who took Golovkin 11 rounds further than anyone else until Danny Jacobs “He hit me hard but i could deal with that. What surprised me about him most was his variety” .
Golovkin is exceptional at knowing when and where to hit. The first knockdown against Murray came as Murray was circling away against the ropes and Golovkin threw a very wide right hand that caught him under the heart and in Murray's own words “i felt like i was having a baby the pain was unbelievable” . This is the genius of the man they call Triple G he hits extremely hard and he knows it but what sets him apart from other bangers is his delivering of that power and the variety of shots in his arsenal. He is exceptional at picking his punch in the moment. That is reacting to the opportunities in front of him and picking the perfect response. Against fellow big puncher Curtis Stevens the first round began very cagey until Golovkin landed a sharp left hook over the top of Curtis’ low right hand. Realising the connection Golovkin immediately fires another left hook into the opening knocking the brash stevenson down leading to the infamous image of a shocked Curtis Stevenson staring in awe at Golovkin as he struggles to drag himself from the canvas. Triple G likes to use his right hand more often as a chopping hook around the guard and behind his opponents ear than the more conventional straight but that is not to say he is incapable of it. This chopping right hook is the shot that finally finished the brave Martin Murray and hurt Daniel Geale.He will also throw a chopping right hand to the kidney as part of his sustained body attack. His left hook is dynamite pure and simple the shot that broke two of Matthew Macklin’s ribs and destroyed Kell Brook’s eye socket. He will use it on the lead as a wider swinging knuckles down ‘russian’ hook to both head and body to open his offence and tie it together with the right hook. If he has his man hurt he loves to combine flurries of power hooks of alternating hands rather than doubling up on one handed offence. He knocked out Macklin off the same setup that Canelo likes to use. An uppercut to stand his man up tall and sucker him for the liver shot. According to compubox Gennady Golovkin held the record for most landed jabs per fight. Incredibly accurate his jab is also a thudding headache maker whilst still being sharp enough to counter an opponent's jab with. Against brick fisted canadian David Lemieux Golovkin snapped Lemieux’s head back with a solid jab anytime the Montreal slugger stepped in to punch.He proceeded to cut him to pieces behind that constant piston jab in a fight that was much more tactical than some expected. In his bout with the Hard nosed and dangerous Gabriel Rosado Golovkin used his jab to back up his bigger opponent to land the chopping right to the ear. His jab is also hard enough that you cannot ignore it and if you bring your right glove too far across the centerline to deal with it. Then that wide Russian hook will not be far behind. Triple G also possesses an incredibly dangerous and somewhat odd for a boxer, stance shifting right hook. He will wait for his opponents to try circle past his right shoulder and step into southpaw as he throws his whole body weight behind the shot leading to a thunderous right hook. This punch flattened solid Polish southpaw Grezgorz Proksa.
Golovkin’s footwork is exceptional in the words of Glenn Holmes “He seems to cover half the ring in 3 or 4 steps but he’s always balanced”. Part of Triple G’s success has been due to his superb ring generalship he is a master at making his opponents work twice as hard as he is. Fighting out of a slightly wider than normal stance he moves in small balanced steps quick enough that the majority of fighters he faces have no choice but to face his fearsome power or exhaust themselves running a half marathon every round while Gennady himself remains relatively fresh staying in the center of the ring and forcing his man against the corners of the ring. Rare is the man who can match the Kazakh’s footwork and ring generalship.
Defensively Gennady is not as slick as Alvarez his head movement seems to be limited to dipping forward from the waist as he steps forwards towards his opponents. However so rare is the fighter that can match his firepower whilst getting past that sledgehammer jab that we have not seen much of Golovkin having to block and counter going backwards. Instead what we have seen is Gennady marching his man down behind a tight high double forearms guard. The double forearm shell is the most basic form of defense and in recent fights we have seen this be the only crack in the armour of Golovkin. Welterweight moving up two weight classes Kell Brook landed a peach of a right uppercut against the Kazakh destroyer that definitely caught his attention and Danny Jacobs in Golovkin’s last fight was able to land some cuffing right hands around the gloves and some decent body work underneath the elbows. However this leads to a point that you cannot ignore when it comes to Golovkin-Chin. The Kazakh possess an excellent ability to eat a punch and continue unphased. Against Geale (who admittedly carries a KO percentage of 44%) he ate a clean right hand to the chops mid throwing his own right. Geale’s punch landed clean a fraction of a second before Triple G’s and it didn’t even slow down the winging right fist that put him down for the finish. Golovkin also took clean left hooks from Lemieux (80% KO) and right uppercuts from Curtis Stevens (60% KO) and Kell Brook (66% KO) without blinking. However Golovkin is 35 years old and has fought 37 Pro and 350 Amateur fights so will his chin hold up against the dangerous mexican?
The Fight
I have so many questions heading into Saturday’s epic clash. Will Canelo be able to avoid Golovkin’s power? Will Triple G’s chin hold up at 35? What happens if it goes into the later rounds will Gennady tire? Will Canelo take the risk of punching WITH Golovkin? I originally at the start of this write up favoured Canelo. He is the younger man, has superb boxing skills and a wealth of high level experience against a man who in boxing terms is getting up there in age and whose defence has been shown to be fallible in his last few fights. However having looked into it further i wonder if Golovkin’s superb footwork and naturally bigger frame will take a toll on the Firebrand Mexican. This is a true 50/50 fight. A throwback to the welter to middleweight glory days of Hagler, Hearns, Leonard and Duran. The best matchup arguably of the decade and a fight that has piqued my interest and passion for boxing like no other. I have no idea who will win when the two best middleweights in the world face off in Las Vegas on Saturday the 16th of September but by all the rights it should be an all time classic of a fight. And that is the beauty of boxing, if everyone knew who was going to win what would be the point in watching?
