By Keith Idec
VERONA, N.Y. – Gennady Golovkin beat down Curtis Stevens over the course of eight rounds three years ago in The Theater at Madison Square Garden.
David Lemieux knocked Stevens unconscious with one punch Saturday night. The difference in how they each beat Stevens is among the reasons Montreal’s Lemieux believes he has more power than the Kazakh knockout artist, who has won 92 percent of his professional bouts by knockout.
The 28-year-old Lemieux obviously knows just how hard Golovkin hits. The undisputed middleweight champion stopped Lemieux in the eighth round of their October 2015 fight at Madison Square Garden.
“I believe I do,” Lemieux said when asked if he has more power than Golovkin during a post-fight press conference early Sunday morning. “A different kind of power. But I don’t like to talk about what I have. I let the fans say what they see. So you guys saw what you saw. You tell me what you think.”
It would be hard to find fans that weren’t impressed by Lemieux’s hellacious left hook Saturday night, which knocked Stevens out cold in the third round at Turning Stone Resort Casino. Emergency personnel removed Stevens (29-6, 21 KOs) from the ring on a stretcher, but he was released from a local hospital after undergoing precautionary tests Sunday morning.
Lemieux (37-3, 33 KOs), while very confident in his own power, also praised Stevens’ power, particularly his left hook. It was a different type of power than Lemieux felt from Golovkin (36-0, 33 KOs), yet still something Lemieux needed to avoid during their HBO “Boxing After Dark” main event.
“Two very different kind of powers,” Lemieux said. “Triple-G is physically stronger. Curtis is not as strong as Triple-G. He has good explosion, Stevens. He has a good hook. We all know, right? Triple-G’s stronger, but a different kind of power. Triple-G is not too explosive, just heavy-handed.”
Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.