Sanchez thinks Golovkin can face Mayweather or Cotto

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Abel Sanchez, the trainer for WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin, thinks that Golovkin should be in the running for a fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr. and/or Miguel Cotto. Golovkin has a fight next month on November 2nd against contender Curtis Stevens, but Sanchez figures that’ll be an easy fight for Golovkin.

Once Stevens is out of the way, Sanchez wants Golovkin to face Mayweather or Cotto. He believes that Golovkin can down to 154 to face either of them as long as he has a full 8 week training camp to trim down.

Sanchez said to RingTV “Gennedy came into camp weighing 167 before training, so it would be just a matter of getting enough time to get down to 154…we would start losing some of the weight that we have to earlier…it’s just a matter of having the time to do it.”

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Kovalev vs. Sillakh possible for November 30th on HBO

kovalev22WBO light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev (22-0-1, 20 KO’s) could be facing fringe contender Ismayl Sillakh (21-1, 17 KO’s) for his first title defense on HBO on November 30th, according to Dan Rafael. It’s still definite but it’s of the names being mentioned for the 30-year-old Kovalev.

The light heavyweight division has less than impressive contenders, so this might be about as good as it gets unless Kovalev faces Nathan Cleverly again. We already saw how much of a mismatch that fight was with Kovalev stopping Cleverly in 4 rounds last August.

Sillakh’s stock has really dropped since he was stopped by Denis Grachev in the 8th round last year in April. Sillakh was winning the fight handily when he got nailed by a big right hand from Grachev in the 8th round, and then taken out with a flurry of punches.

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Should Wladimir Klitschko been disqualified for holding against Povetkin?

wlad793IBF/IBO/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko (61-3, 51 KO’s) showed very little interest in mixing it up with WBA heavyweight champion Alexander Povetkin (26-1, 18 KO’s) in beating him by a 12 round unanimous decision last Saturday night by the scores 119-104, 119-104 and 119-104 in Moscow, Russia.

For those who thought they were going to see an actual fight it must have been disappointing to the extreme because Wladimir immediately started clinching after every punch in the 1st round of the fight. I lost track of how many times Wladimir opted to clinch Povetkin, but I counted close to 30 after 3 rounds and it was shocking that he been allowed to get away with it by the referee Luis Pabon.

The fight reminded me of the 1976 match between Muhammad Ali and wrestler Antonio Inoki in Tokyo, Japan. It was billed as a boxer vs. wrestler match, but it turned out to be something of a joke with Inoki lying on the canvas kicking at Ali’s legs for 14 long rounds. There wasn’t any wrestling due to the rules and Ali threw only 6 punches in the entire fight. The Klitschko-Povetkin fight reminded me a lot of that bout because there had been a great deal of hype about it, and it was thought that the two fighters would get into some good exchanges.

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Miguel Cotto: Back with a bang and ready, willing and able for some more sizzling super-fights!

cotto552Puerto Rican legend and future Hall of Famer Miguel Cotto put two successive points losses behind him last night in blitzing a usually sturdy Delvin Rodriguez, in the process setting himself up for further massive fights. Cotto, now working with the great Freddie Roach, looked like a beast last night: strong, fast, powerful and full of energy, Cotto absolutely ruined a good fighter.

Okay, some critics have commented how Rodriguez is and never has been on Cotto’s level and that Cotto’s win was expected. But that is doing both fighters a disservice. Cotto showed he still has the stuff to intimidate and overwhelm a fighter who has hung tough in a number of wars in the past and not too many experts were predicting as quick a victory as the one Cotto emerged with.

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Ashley Theophane reminisces about “The One” in Las Vegas

TheophaneCano_Hoganphotosby Ashley Theophane — The dust has started to settle after my appearance on the biggest boxing event the world has seen in a generation.

There was a record 22 million Mexicans tuned into ‘The One’ boxing event featuring Floyd Mayweather, Saul Alvarez, Danny Garcia, Lucas Matthysse, Ishe Smith, Carlos Molina, Pablo Cesar Cano and of course, yours truly. The American PPV audience was over 2 million viewers, and that’s not counting the people watching in movie theaters and on closed circuit in hotels across Las Vegas.

The significant worldwide audience in Europe, Africa, South America, Oceania and Asia is yet to be totaled.

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Cotto could move up to 160 for his next fight

cotto900One of the ideas that Top Rank Promotions has for Miguel Cotto (38-4, 31 KO’s) is for him to move up to 160 for his next fight and challenge WBC middleweight champion Sergio Martinez for his title. Top Rank’s Bob Arum would like for Cotto to take on Sergio and sees it as a fight that would make a lot of money if he can get Sergio to agree to the fight.

Cotto also has a slight chance of fighting former WBA/WBC junior middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez. That might be the better fight because it would likely bring in much more money than a fight against Sergio, who is coming off of a poor performance against Martin Murray last April. Martinez is still recovering from hand and a knee injury from that fight.

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Cotto destroys Rodriguez

cotto765Miguel Cotto (38-4, 31 KO’s) unveiled his old left hook and used it to destroy Delvin Rodriguez (28-7-3, 16 KO’s) by an impressive 3rd round knockout on Saturday night in a fight televised by HBO at the Amway Center, in Orlando, Florida.

Cotto badly hurt Rodriguez with a huge left hooks to the head in the last seconds of the 2nd round that had him out on his feet against the ropes. Immediately at the start of the 3rd round, Cotto pounced on Rodriguez and chopped him down with a hard right to the body followed by a tremendous left hook to the head that sent him down.

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Quigg-Salinas fight to a draw, Joshua beats Leo

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In a controversial ending the WBA super bantamweight bout between champion Scott Quigg (26-0-2, 19 KO’s) and Yoandris Salina (20-0-2, 13 KO’s) was scored as a draw tonight at the O2 Arena in London, UK. It was difficult to see what the judges saw in Salina’s performance because Quigg looked like a clear winner by at least 4 rounds possibly more. Salinas didn’t throw nearly enough punches to make the fight even.

The judges scored the fight as follows: 114-114, 115-113 for Quigg, and 114-114.

Quigg really took the fight to Salinas after the first four rounds and punished him with head and body shots. Salinas did look good defensively, but he forgot about his offense for long stretches of the fight and it was difficult to give him a lot of rounds due to his lack of offensive output.

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Klitschko dominates Povetkin in dull fight

wlad6778IBF/IBO/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko (61-3, 51 KO’s) should consider himself lucky that he wasn’t disqualified tonight for the clinching and pushing he did en route to beating WBA heavyweight champion Alexander Povetkin (26-1, 18 KO’s) by a boring 12 round unanimous decision at the Olimpiyskiy, in Moscow, Russia. Wladimir held more than he usually does for his fights, which is hard to believe and he was shoving Povetkin to the canvas and getting away with it until the 11th round when referee Luis Pabon took 1 point away from Wladimir.

Wladimir put Povetkin down 4 times during the fight and seemingly had him ready to be stopped in the 7th after he knocked him down 3 times in the round, but unfortunately spent the remainder of the jabbing and clinching rather than looking to finish off a tired Povetkin. Wladimir’s first knockdown of Povetkin came in the 2nd when he hit him with a left hook to the head that sent him stumbling backwards to the canvas.

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Tyson Fury vs David Haye: February 8th is signed and sealed

fury5333Unbeaten heavyweight sensation and former British, Commonwealth and Irish heavyweight champion Tyson Fury has announced that his fight with former undisputed cruiserweight and former WBA world heavyweight champion David Haye is “signed and sealed” for February 8th.

“This is a message to all my fans and haters, for all those wanting to see me knock out David Haye on behalf of the nation and all those who want to see me put out of my misery,” Tyson said.

“The fight for February 8th is completely signed and sealed from both of us.

“I’m pleased that the fight is on again for February 8th – it’s going to be bigger this time, better, more people watching and I’m going to take pleasure in smashing his face in a bit more.

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