Gennadiy ‘GGG’ Golovkin vs. Ryota Murata middleweight unification fight has been announced for December 29th on DAZN at the Saitama Super Arena in Saitama, Japan.
Golovkin (41-1-1, 36 KOs) will have his IBF 160-lb title on the line when he steps in the ring to face WBA champ Murata (16-2, 13 KOs) in a fight that promises to be a war from start to finish.
Unfortunately, there’s not a great deal of appeal from boxing fans in seeing the still popular 39-year-old Golovkin face the 35-year-old Murata from Japan, as people want to see GGG face Canelo Alvarez, Demetrius Andrade, or Jermall Charlo.
It’s a bit of a disappointment to see Golovkin sit inactive for 12 months and then come back for a fight against the twice-beaten Murata.
The belief is that Golovkin didn’t want to risk his big payday fight against Murata during the last year by taking on dangerous fighters like Charlo, Andrade, or even Chris Eubank Jr.
There’s a lot of money for Golovkin to make fighting Murata, so you can understand why he’s played it safe for the last year by electing not to fight anybody to risk that payday.
At this point in Golovkin’s career with him being inactive and no longer fighting talented opposition, you have to give Murata an excellent chance of winning.
Big Drama in Japan 🍿⁰⁰GGG & Murata put their middleweight world titles on the line, Wednesday, December 29 on DAZN 👑⁰⁰#GGGMurata pic.twitter.com/UNr0QsCLrI
— DAZN Boxing (@DAZNBoxing) November 12, 2021
Golovkin looked slow and old in his last fight against Kamil Szeremeta in December 2020, and in his fight before that, he won a controversial 12 round decision over Sergiy Derevyanchenko.
Many boxing fans had Golovkin losing to Derevyanchenko, as did this writer because he was hurt and took a real beating from the Ukrainian. Golovkin was wilting from the body attack from Derevyanchenko throughout the contest.
If Golovkin beats Murata, he could face Canelo Alvarez in early 2022 in a trilogy match. Golovkin is one of the options for Canelo’s next fight on DAZN in May on Cinco de Mayo holiday weekend.
With DAZN wanting the Canelo-Golovkin 3 fight, it’s likely that Canelo will finally give in and give them their wish.
The streaming giant has wanted this match-up since they signed the Mexican star to a huge contract several years ago, but he’s been putting it off in mission to become the undisputed champion at 168.
Some boxing fans believe that Canelo is bitter about the trash-talking that Golovkin did before their second fight in 2018 after he’d tested positive for a banned substance.
“That’s the biggest fight. Obviously, he’s [Golovkin] fighting Murata at the end of December, but the biggest fight out there is Canelo – GGG trilogy, in my opinion. It could be for the undisputed,” said Matchroom Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn to Boxing Social on Canelo Alvarez’s biggest fight potentially available to him in early 2022 against GGG if he wins his December 29th unification clash against Ryota.