It’s no secret that middleweight king Gennady Golovkin wants two things more than anything else as far as his boxing career is concerned: a mega-fight with Saul Alvarez, and to own all the major middleweight belts. The Alvarez fight will have to wait (probably until next September at the earliest) but a fight with reigning WBO 160-pound champ Billy Joe Saunders could happen in the next few months – if Saunders really wants it, according to Triple-G’s representative Oleg Hermann.
Speaking with Sky Sports, Hermann spoke of the desire his fighter has to capture the WBO belt (this being the only strap GGG cannot yet call his own), and of the WBA-ordered fight with Danny Jacobs.
“Our plan is to unify the titles but the WBA ordered us to fight Danny Jacobs so we have to focus on that,” Hermann said. “Then we’ll look at the unification fight with Saunders, who allegedly is interested in fighting Golovkin after our mandatory defence. For the Saunders fight, we want to book a Las Vegas arena but as of right now, we don’t take his words seriously. Our experience tells us that a guy who talks too much is not ready to fight.”
If a scenario unfolded whereby GGG fought Jacobs next, in December, say in New York, and then, providing he won, fought Saunders next February in Vegas, everyone would be happy, right? Things are seldom so simple in the sport of boxing, alas. But Jacobs seems genuinely interested in tackling GGG and hopefully, Saunders’ big words (“I’ll fight him in a field”) are a genuine representation of the unbeaten southpaw’s thoughts.
If GGG were to fight and defeat Jacobs and then Saunders – and there would be few people willing to bet against Golovkin winning both bouts – he would have nothing left at middleweight other than the super-fight with Canelo. But will GGG, and us fight fans, get the fights that seem so obvious to make?
It would of course be extra exciting seeing Golovkin box for the very first time in fabulous Las Vegas.