A victory over Marco Antonio Rubio this weekend could set up Gennady Golovkin for a big-money fight against Miguel Cotto or Saul Alvarez.
The hard-hitting Kazakh puts his unbeaten record and WBA middleweight title on the line when he meets Rubio on Saturday night.
Tickets for the bout in the Los Angeles suburb of Carson, home of Major League soccer club Los Angeles Galaxy, sold out quickly. Extra seats and a standing-room section were added; a sign not only of Rubio’s ability to draw a large following of Mexican-American fans but also of Golovkin’s growing popularity.
If Golovkin wins, a fight against the winner of a projected clash in May between WBC champion Cotto and ?Canelo? Alvarez may become a reality.
Golovkin, who has a record of 30-0, has won 27 of his professional bouts inside the distance. His three-round demolition of former champion Daniel Geale at Madison Square Garden in July was his 17th successive knock-out in a streak stretching back to 2008.
But he has not appeared on a money-spinning pay-per-view television card, and at the age of 32 he’s eager make that leap.
Promoter Tom Loeffler believes Golovkin should be there. “Rubio is clearly the best move at this time for GGG,? he said in Los Angeles this week.
Victory over the durable Mexican could lead to a fight against the winner of the match between Cotto and Alvarez. “How some people rate Cotto over GGG at [middleweight] is beyond me. Nobody that I have spoken to thinks he would have a chance against GGG,” Loeffler said.
Golovkin offers plenty of fireworks in the ring, but he eschews pre-bout baiting and trash-talking. His trainer, Abel Sanchez, has told the Los Angeles Times that when he first met Golovkin, the Kazakh did not believe he could be vicious in the ring.
“He’s too well-mannered,” Sanchez said, although that assessment changed when he began training Golovkin in California. “When he hit the mitts, I felt it all over, down to my toes.”
TRAINING AT BIG BEAR
Golovkin, who launched his professional career in Germany after winning a silver medal at the Athens Olympics, spent much of last year training with Sanchez at Big Bear in the mountains east of Los Angeles.
Rubio, 34, has a record of 59-6-1. Since losing to Julio Cesar Chavez in 2012 he has won six fights in a row, but none against a top-flight middleweight.
“He’s got power. He’s got a very good left hand,” Golovkin said. “He does a great job in his fights and he’s got a good record. I know it’s not an easy fight for him or for me. But the fans will really enjoy it.”
On the same card, Nonito Donaire of the Philippines defends his WBA featherweight title against Jamaican Nicholas Walters.
Donaire, who has held titles at flyweight, bantamweight and junior featherweight, has recently lacked the dominance he enjoyed in an 2012 when he won four ?world? title fights; two by knockout.
He now makes the first defence of the featherweight title he won in Macau in May, when he defeated South African Simpiwe Vetyeka in a fight that ended in an anti-climactic technical decision.
Walters is a hard-hitting fighter and hungry for success in his first ?world? title fight. Donaire has a record of 33-2, with 21 knock-outs, and Walters, fighting for the second time in the United States, stands at 24-0, including 20 knock-outs.
“He’s a very powerful puncher,” Donaire acknowledged this week. “Anybody can see that. And that’s what we’re looking out for: his power. I mean, I have the same thing.”
Live coverage of the tournament starts at 3am (SA, CAT, GMT+2) on SuperSport 7 with a light-heavyweight bout between Edwin Rodriquez and Azea Augustama, followed by a middleweight contest between Abraham Han and Marcos Reyes.
The fight between Donaire and Walters is expected to begin at about 4.10 and the main bout at around 5.20am.
