Gennady Golovkin drilling Curtis Stevens during their HBO clash on Saturday night (Photo: Naoki Fukuda)
By Chris Robinson
On Saturday night, Nov. 2, WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin continued his string of knockout victories by registering an 8th round stoppage over Curtis Stevens inside of the Theater in Madison Square Garden.
Fighting on HBO for the fourth time in a little over a year, Golovkin chose his shots carefully, dropping Stevens in the second round with a booming left hand and administering serious punishment on him in the following frames.
After eight rounds, Stevens’ corner elected to throw in the towel.
Sharing his thoughts on his fighter’s performance, trainer Abel Sanchez seemed pleased with Golovkin’s effort.
“You know, I thought that he did well,” Sanchez said. “He didn’t really follow the game plan to a T. He was a little upset about all of the BS that was happening before. I think he wanted to punish Curtis.”
Sanchez affirmed that Golovkin will be returning on Feb. 1 in Monte Carlo, Monaco, and while he is completely in the dark on a potential opponent, he did note that the plan is to keep his charge as active as possible.
“You know, we have to stay busy, like we said before we started this campaign of fighting regularly,” Sanchez revealed. “He needs to stay busy and the fights will come. We just have to make sure people keep talking about him, you guys keep asking the questions, you guys keep forcing them to step up.”
One strong possibility for Golovkin’s future is a meeting with super middleweight kingpin Andre Ward, who is set to defend his WBA title in two weeks’ time against unbeaten Edwin Rodriguez.
While that seems to be one of the more appealing fights to make in the sport, Sanchez again clarified why it’s not out of the question for Golovkin to drop down in weight to face off with WBA/WBC junior middleweight champion Floyd Mayweather.
“You know, that’s the smartest business man in boxing right now,” Sanchez said respectfully of Mayweather. “When he wants things to happen, he makes them happen. I think that Golovkin is really the only name out there that is going to get him the kind of payday that he had in his last bout with Canelo.
“There’s nobody on the horizon that’s going to get him a $40-$50 million dollar payday,” Sanchez added. “And if Golovkin is the guy, then we’re willing to go down to 154. It’s a matter of Floyd putting it together and I think he can.”
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Chris Robinson can be reached at Trimond@aol.com