By Keith Idec

Abel Sanchez has a lot of confidence in Gennady Golovkin.

The Kazakhstan native’s trainer considers his fighter to be boxing’s best middleweight and one of the top fighters, pound-for-pound, in the sport today. Sanchez admits, though, that Golovkin has some work to do before anyone accurately could consider placing him near the top of the list of the best middleweights in boxing history.

“Sugar” Ray Robinson, Carlos Monzon, Marvin Hagler, Harry Greb, Stanley Ketchel and Bernard Hopkins are consensus choices on those subjective lists that typically create great debate. Golovkin is unbeaten (36-0, 33 KOs), has knocked out 92 percent of his professional opponents and has won 17 straight title defenses by knockout, but doesn’t have an abundance of signature victories on his resume.

Adding Daniel Jacobs (32-1, 29 KOs) to his list of conquests Saturday night at Madison Square Garden would help Golovkin’s cause historically, according to Sanchez.

“I think right now, if we’re fortunate to get by Danny, who’s a very good fighter, on Saturday, I think right now I rate him in the top five,” Sanchez said during a conference call Tuesday. “I think, like you said, his story’s still [being] written. I think that what he’s accomplished in the middleweight division is – hopefully he breaks the great Bernard Hopkins’ record of 20 [straight] defenses. And if they’re all by knockout, it’s really the only guy, or the first guy to do that with that many knockouts in the middleweight division.

“And to have the highest knockout ratio in the middleweight division – we need a couple more fights, I think, to put him up there and mention him in the same breath as Ray Robinson. But we’re getting there. And it’s a matter of just getting him the fights. And hopefully, [promoter] Tom Loeffler and the Hermann brothers, his managers, can secure those things so that he can go down as one of the best middleweights ever.”

The 34-year-old Golovkin has made 17 consecutive middleweight title defenses, all by knockout or technical knockout, since capturing the WBA’s interim middleweight championship in August 2010. Golovkin won that title by knocking out Colombia’s Milton Nunez (then 21-1-1) in the first round 6½ years ago in Panama City, Panama.

Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.