is Golovkin a top all time 15 great at middleweight?

[ShoulderRoll]

Totally different situation. Canelo wasn't in the mandatory spot for the WBA title, held by Smith. Smith wasn't inexplicably promoted to super champ as soon as his mando with Canelo became due, and Canelo wasn't then told ... you are now the WBA regular champion, and you ain't fighting Callum for the super title, forget about that.

And what about the 2 years that passed between Geale being stripped of the super title for not fighting GGG, and Golovkin being elevated himself?

There was no super champ during that time, but according to you, GGG still wasn't the real WBA champion until they decided to change the name of the title he'd held for 4 years from "regular" to "super"

Yeah, nonsensical is the right word to describe that bullshit!

The "regular" title is the "regular" title. There's no way around that.

[QueensburyRules]

I'm consistent with my thinking. I never gave Canelo credit for being a world champion at 168 just because he beat Rocky Fielding and took his WBA "regular" title.

- -U along with everyone else who know water wet , sky blue and grass green.

Now that Canelo the Ring champ, his unified titles and such retro actively start with Rocky. Same with GGG @160 til Canelo whooped him bad enough he ain't been right since.

[Dr. Z]

If allegedly no one wants to fight you...and you are chomping at the bit to get a big fight with a top P4P caliber opponent...you jump at the chance to face him no questions asked, don't you?

You don't start putting up roadblocks to kill the fight.

Especially if your team claims you'll face anyone from 154 to 168.

The I'll fight anyone from 154-168 claim was made AFTER Ward retired, correct?

I don't see Martrinez, Cotto, Pac, or Mayweather eager to share the same ring with GGG.

Ward was a pound for pound business man, making weight at 164 would have been easy for him. He didn't want the fight. If he did he would have accepted terms.

What Ward wanted to weight in at 168, then re-hydrate up to 180's.

No doubt Kovalev won the first fight over Ward.

Scorecards on Kovalev vs Ward 1.

61 TOTAL SCORES POLLED FROM MEDIA [1]

44 Scores for KOVALEV = 72%
16 Scores for WARD = 26%
1 Score for a DRAW = 1%

Allan Fox (************): 117-110 Kovalev
Doug Fischer (Ring Magazine): 117-110 Kovalev
Andrew Harrison (Boxing Monthly): 117-111 Kovalev
Harold Lederman (HBO): 116-111 Kovalev
Michael Montero (Montero On Boxing): 116-111 Kovalev
Tim Dahlberg (AP): 116-111 Kovalev
Shaun Brown (TalkingBoxing.uk): 115-112 Kovalev
Chris Mannix (Yahoo Sports): 115-112 Kovalev
Dan Rafael (ESPN): 115-112 Kovalev
Cliff Rold (Boxingscene): 115-112 Kovalev
Lance Pugmire (LA Times): 115-112 Kovalev
Victor M Salazar (Boxingscene): 115-112 Kovalev
Scott Christ (BadLeftHook): 115-112 Kovalev
Gareth A Davies (The Telegraph): 115-112 Kovalev
Kevin McRae (Bleacher Report): 115-112 Kovalev
Steve Zemach (FoxSports640): 115-112 Kovalev
Jorge Hernandez (SW Fight): 115-112 Kovalev
Tim Starks (Queensberry Rules): 115-112 Kovalev
The Guardian Online: 115-112 Kovalev
Fraser Coffeen (Bloody Elbow): 115-112 Kovalev
Steve Kim (UCN Live): 115-112 Kovalev
Bokser.org: 115-112 Kovalev
FightersRated: 115-112 Kovalev
Heavy Bag Boxing: 115-112 Kovalev
Queensberry Rules: 115-112 Kovalev
Sam Sheppard (Next Big Pod): 115-112 Kovalev
Ron Borges (Boston Herald): 116-114 Kovalev
Boxhard Podcast: 115-113 Kovalev
Ryan Burton (Boxingscene): 115-113 Kovalev
Bernardo Osuna (ESPN Deportes): 115-113 Kovalev
Andy Paterson (Boxing Asylum): 114-113 Kovalev
Daniel Vano (***************): 114-113 Kovalev
Daniel Attias (AUSboxing): 114-113 Kovalev
Beau Denison (The Boxing Truth): 114-113 Kovalev
Boxing Monthly Online: 114-113 Kovalev
Ben Weismann (************): 114-113 Kovalev
G. Leon (Boxtalk): 114-113 Kovalev
Bob Velin (USA Today): 114-113 Kovalev
Kieran Mulvaney (HBO): 114-113 Kovalev
Eric Raskin (HBO): 114-113 Kovalev
Stephen A Smith (ESPN): 114-113 Kovalev
John Angus MacDonald (Boxing Monthly): 114-113 Kovalev
Alex Morris (Next Big Pod): 114-113 Kovalev
Danny Winterbottom (Boxing Monthly): 114-113 Kovalev
Tony Bellew (Sky Sports): 114-114 DRAW
***************: 114-113 Ward
Kevin Iole (Yahoo Sports): 114-113 Ward
Wolfgang Schiffbauer (German Freelancer): 114-113 Ward
Ramon Aranda (3MoreRounds): 114-113 Ward
Brian Campbell (ESPN): 114-113 Ward
Mike Coppinger (USA Today): 114-113 Ward
New York Post Online: 114-113 Ward
LA Times Online: 114-113 Ward
Mark Butcher (Boxing Monthly): 114-113 Ward
Tom Gray (Ring Magazine): 116-115 Ward
Mark Ortega (Freelance): 115-112 Ward
Danny Richardson (Script Media): 115-112 Ward
Adam Abramowitz (Saturday Night Boxing): 115-112 Ward
Paul Smith Jnr (Sky Sports): 116-113 Ward
Tom Craze (BadLeftHook): 116-111 Ward
Ryan O'Hara (BTG): 114-113 Ward

117-110 KOVALEV: 2
117-111 KOVALEV: 1
116-111 KOVALEV: 3
115-112 KOVALEV: 20
116-114 KOVALEV: 1
115-113 KOVALEV: 3
114-113 KOVALEV: 14
114-114 DRAW: 1
114-113 WARD: 9
116-115 WARD: 1
115-112 WARD: 3
116-113 WARD: 1
116-111 WARD: 1

[ShoulderRoll]

The I'll fight anyone from 154-168 claim was made AFTER Ward retired, correct?

Nope.

Andre Ward retired in 2017.

The 154-168 claims were made years earlier in 2012.


Golovkin: I'll fight anyone at 154, 160, 168

[ShoulderRoll]

- -U along with everyone else who know water wet , sky blue and grass green.

Now that Canelo the Ring champ, his unified titles and such retro actively start with Rocky. Same with GGG @160 til Canelo whooped him bad enough he ain't been right since.

What are you talking about?

Callum Smith was the WBA "super" champion and Ring champion at 168 from September 2018 when he beat George Groves until December 29 when he lost to Canelo Alvarez.

Canelo doesn't retroactively erase that reign and retroactively become "super" or Ring champion since 2018.

[QueensburyRules]

What are you talking about?

Callum Smith was the WBA "super" champion and Ring champion at 168 from September 2018 when he beat George Groves until December 29 when he lost to Canelo Alvarez.

Canelo doesn't retroactively erase that reign and retroactively become "super" or Ring champion since 2018.

- -Never mentioned Erase, U DID!

Ever hear of overlapping titles?

How U ignorance thinks Tubsy Lar got 20 title defenses and so on?

What grade U in next year?

[DeeMoney]

So I'm gonna try to take this discussion back to 160 lbs, as its about how we rate Golovkin as a middleweight and thats where middleweight is.

I've always felt Golovkin's prime years were 2010-2015. Now, people deride GGG for not having a good enough resume; so I wonder what top MW (who was actually fighting at 160) during the early '10s did G miss out on that you think he shouldve fought? And in your opinion: why didn't he fight them (duck, timing, etc) and what wouldve happened?

What could a prime GGG have done at middleweight to have proved that he was a better middleweight?

[QueensburyRules]

- -GGG the MAN til Canelo.

[drablj]

So I'm gonna try to take this discussion back to 160 lbs, as its about how we rate Golovkin as a middleweight and thats where middleweight is.

I've always felt Golovkin's prime years were 2010-2015. Now, people deride GGG for not having a good enough resume; so I wonder what top MW (who was actually fighting at 160) during the early '10s did G miss out on that you think he shouldve fought? And in your opinion: why didn't he fight them (duck, timing, etc) and what wouldve happened?

What could a prime GGG have done at middleweight to have proved that he was a better middleweight?

golovkin was very unlucky. you know how people say "he's a nobody, who did he beat". well some fights were easy to make or were even made but fell through that would have made golovkin a bigger name. while he was with universum in germany, sturm, zbik and sylvester are the obvious ones. ggg would become number 2 if he fought them and he would undoubtebly have defeated them. instead everybody just wasted his time then. fast forward to 2012. and the match with pirog is scheduled for his us debut. pirog suffered a career ending injury. then in 2014. a fight with julio cesar chavez jr. at 168 is scheduled for summer. a big fight gg is craving. chavez would earn 8 million but he decides that he wants to leave arum and the fight is canceled. talk about bad luck.

meanwhile martinez' money fight was against chavez. that had to be settled. after that victory, sergio was damaged. he fought 1 homecoming fight and a cashout vs. cotto at 39. if we consider everything, one can not be mad at sergio.
money fights are usually made before fights with real threats. so before well known names fought golovkin at least these fights had to happen:
martinez - chavez jr.
martinez - cotto
cotto - canelo
canelo - chavez jr.
dumbass chavez postponed some. mayweather - pacman postponed cotto - canelo.
i don't even blame martinez, cotto, mayweather (lol) and canelo for "ducking" (quillin outright ducked golovkin though). the problem is not fighting sturm, zbik, sylvester, pirog and chavez. that would have made golovkin a more attractive option for the stars sooner.

[DeeMoney]

golovkin was very unlucky. you know how people say "he's a nobody, who did he beat". well some fights were easy to make or were even made but fell through that would have made golovkin a bigger name. while he was with universum in germany, sturm, zbik and sylvester are the obvious ones. ggg would become number 2 if he fought them and he would undoubtebly have defeated them. instead everybody just wasted his time then. fast forward to 2012. and the match with pirog is scheduled for his us debut. pirog suffered a career ending injury. then in 2014. a fight with julio cesar chavez jr. at 168 is scheduled for summer. a big fight gg is craving. chavez would earn 8 million but he decides that he wants to leave arum and the fight is canceled. talk about bad luck.

meanwhile martinez' money fight was against chavez. that had to be settled. after that victory, sergio was damaged. he fought 1 homecoming fight and a cashout vs. cotto at 39. if we consider everything, one can not be mad at sergio.
money fights are usually made before fights with real threats. so before well known names fought golovkin at least these fights had to happen:
martinez - chavez jr.
martinez - cotto
cotto - canelo
canelo - chavez jr.
dumbass chavez postponed some. mayweather - pacman postponed cotto - canelo.
i don't even blame martinez, cotto, mayweather (lol) and canelo for "ducking" (quillin outright ducked golovkin though). the problem is not fighting sturm, zbik, sylvester, pirog and chavez. that would have made golovkin a more attractive option for the stars sooner.

Wow, Very good answer. I was always led to believe Sturm paid the WBA to make him the 'Super' champ so he didnt have to defend against GGG- thus they gave GGG the 'regular belt'.

Maybe I am wrong about that, but I remember even reading it on various places, I think even here. If true, it seems kinda silly that G is downgraded for not facing a guy who literally paid his way out of not fighting him, but then again it may just be one of those boxing tales.