By Victor Salazar
Gennady Golovkin ventured into pay-per-view waters this past weekend, scoring an eight round stoppage of David Lemieux to unify the IBF/WBA/IBO middleweight titles at New York's Madison Square Garden.
Golovkin and his team have now turned their focus to the WBC portion of the middleweight championship.
On November 21st, Miguel Cotto will defend the WBC middleweight crown against Saul "Canelo" Alvarez. The winner must face Golovkin next if they plan to keep the WBC title per the governing body. But many are skeptical of either fighter facing Golovkin next.
Whether Golovkin gets Canelo or Cotto next, his trainer Abel Sanchez wants his fighter to return in February of next year.
"There’s an agreement with the WBC that Tom (Loeffler) and the Herman brothers have, that says the winner must fight Golovkin next or they lost their title,” Sanchez told BoxingScene.com. “I want him to fight in February. I hope it’s allowable by the WBC if not we’ll fight who we have too.”
When asked about a fight with the new IBF mandatory, Tureano Johnson, Sanchez said, “We’d love to fight him.
When asked about what middleweight would give Golovkin the most problems Sanchez surprisingly picked a fighter out of the Premier Boxing Champions stable - unbeaten former champion Peter Quillin (32-0-1, 23KOs), who faces WBA 'regular' champion Danny Jacobs in December.
“Stylistically, Peter Quillin would give Gennady the most problems,” explained Sanchez.
But would the fight happen?
“Probably not,” said Sanchez. “It all depends on Peter, he’s asking 5 or 10 million or something like that when he’s never made more than $500,000.”
