ARLINGTON, Texas ? It?s deja vu all over again.
Each time Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao came through with victories, talk would turn to the biggest question in boxing: Will they ever fight? And if so, why not next?
With that super fight finally out of the way, the focus is on Canelo Alvarez vs. Gennady Golovkin. Last week, GGG took care of business with a fifth-round stoppage of Kell Brook in London.
On Saturday, it was Canelo?s turn, and the Mexican star used a punishing body shot to knock out previously undefeated Liam Smith before 51,420 fans at AT&T Stadium.
The fight was for Smith?s 154-pound title, but Canelo, 26, remains the lineal middleweight champion and admitted afterward this was probably his final fight at 154 pounds.
The redhead is pegged for a Dec. 10 fight at Madison Square Garden on HBO as long as his injured right hand is OK. That bout would likely take place at the middleweight limit of 160 pounds, where GGG holds three titles. The plan all along has been for Canelo to build himself to 160.
What?s clear is that the mega fight, if and when it takes place, won?t be held any sooner than September 2017.
Alvarez (48-1-1, 34 KOs) claimed in the ring afterward that Golovkin (36-0, 33 KOs) was offered ?two or three times? his career-high payday for a Fall ?17 summit meeting. Promoter Oscar De La Hoya said it was an eight-figure offer to lure the 34-year-old Kazakh. De La Hoya said he was disheartened when he never heard back from GGG?s promoter Tom Loeffler.
