The surly powder keg image of the Charlos is somewhere between prime Mike Tyson and a jacked up World Star version of a grim Sonny Liston?
Golovnelo.
Like it?
It?s the boxing equivalent of Hollywood?s Brangelina or Bennifer, the Universo Pugilistico?s two-headed monster of wild entitlement that has managed to suck the life out of the middleweight division for the last three years or so.
And before you go into a tizzy about YOUR guy not being to blame for a 160 lb. division where everyone?s just sort of standing around, killing time, realize that your hyper-defense of a man who probably wouldn?t bother to piss on your head if your hair was on fire is downright looney. Remove the Kool-Aid IV drip and start on that long road to the sane world that used to be, the one where fighters were actually judged on the weight of their r?sum?s and not on the persistence of their public relations team.
Somehow Golovnelo got you convinced that 18 consecutive world title soft touches (okay, maybe 15 soft touches and 3 stylistic mismatches) is proof of greatness because, you know, you HAVE to be great if the swamp-assed nerds in the boxing media say everyone decent is afraid of you. Golovnelo also got you convinced that a lineal middleweight champ can actually be a lineal middleweight champ without having actually ever faced a real middleweight at the full middleweight limit.
The mere presence of the economically mighty Golovnelo and the drama it produced (and continues to produce) over whether it would fight one time and then whether it can get back into the ring for another fight is enough to freeze the upper level of a division that would otherwise be fighting. Instead of pairing off against one another for relative chump change, high-end fighters are standing back for a chance at nabbing a pay day against one-half of the split-apart beast.
Billy Joe Saunders? second postponement of his Martin Murray clash, for instance, may be more about a desire to wedge himself between the beast than a simple pulled hammy. And don?t expect any of the other top middleweights to tie themselves to anything even moderately risky until they see just what?s up with Golovnelo?s September 15 Vegas parthenogenesis party.
OK, now, finally, we get to the central idea of this piece.
There very well may be a solution to this Golovnelo madness infecting so many and so much.
Jermell and Jermall Charlo could be what boxing needs right now?guys who don?t feign humility or fistic nobility and who truly do live just to fuck people up.
In the face of pandering and role playing, it?s actually kind of refreshing to have someone tell you what they REALLY think?even if that comes in the form of ?I?m gonna fuck you up? bellowing or dressing down the media for not knowing how to ask a boxing question.
Yeah, the Charlo Brothers? bad guy act is a bit of an affectation, an attempt at a gimmicked persona?but, so is being a smiling, humble killer or an ?aw shucks? farm boy. Everyone is playing a role to a degree and the surly powder keg image of the Charlos is somewhere between prime Mike Tyson and a jacked up World Star version of a grim Sonny Liston on the boxing bad-ass-o-meter.
I can?t imagine either Charlo trying to tell the world, with a straight face, that they have to fight six years of tailor made stiffs because two lower-weight fighters won?t give him the payday he thinks he deserves. I can?t imagine the media allowing him to get away with it, if he did. The media has no fawning, blind adulation of Jermall or Jermell.
As a fan, I just want to see fights get made. I get no kick out of years of ?will they-won?t they? Sam & Diane tension. And, as a writer, no more Golovnelo means no more crazy-eyed 60-year-old male stalkers who want to ?bring me down? and no more fist fight challenges via email.
It would be a happy day to be able to just deal in fights.
I?d love to see real energy put into elevating the Charlos and giving them some of the extreme push treatment a small handful of fair complected fighters currently receive from media and networks. It?s not like they don?t deliver compelling performances inside (and outside) the ring.
I?d be willing to gamble on some new blood if it means Golovnelo gets cast into the fiery pits of artificial star making from whence it came.
