Photo: WBC – Yesterday, Abel Sanchez and his star fighter Gennady Golovkin took part in a teleconference to further promote Saturday night’s historic, 20th world middleweight title defence by GGG. As fans know, Triple-G will face top super-welterweight contender Vanes Martirosoyan in California. Some people, to the surprise of Team-GGG, have criticised the match-up, yet GGG and Sanchez insist they are focused and ready for what could be a tough fight.
Sanchez made some particularly interesting points on last night’s call, stating how “fighters are never the same after they go rounds with Triple-G.” Case in point, Sanchez said, is Danny Jacobs. Jacobs, who took Golovkin all 12-rounds last March, had a rumble with Maciej Sulecki on Saturday night, being pushed hard and, according to Sanchez, “getting hit with every punch in the book.”
Sulecki, originally supposed to fight Martirosyan, certainly pushed Jacobs hard, and Abel says that Jacobs, like a number of other fighters, have been damaged due to their encounter with Golovkin.
“Danny Jacobs was supposed to demolish Luis Arias and instead had a difficult time with him in his first fight back after [facing] Gennady,” Sanchez said on yesterday’s call. “And now, in his fight against Sulecki, he looks terrible. He gets hit with everything in the book. But the reason being, in my opinion, is that once you go 12-rounds with Golovkin, you’re never gonna be the same. It’s not just Jacobs – if you go back to [David] Lemieux, to Curtis Stevens, to [Dominic] Wade, to Willie Monroe, they’re never the same after they go rounds with Golovkin. The young man from England also, [Martin] Murray, he’s never been the same.”
Sanchez also stated how Canelo fought “a different fight than he was supposed to” last March when he held GGG to a controversial draw. “It takes two to tango,” Sanchez said when asked why Golovkin did not go to the body as much as many expected he would in the fight with Canelo.
So, will Canelo ever be the same when he finally fights again? Will Martirosyan be the same after Saturday night’s fight? Does GGG indeed ruin guys, the way other great fighters such as Marvin Hagler once did? GGG is a massive favourite to win and retain his belts for a 20t time on Saturday, but Martirosyan has never been stopped. Could we see a brutal encounter on May 5?
