By Keith Idec
Only one of the participants predicted a knockout Tuesday night during a press event in Los Angeles to promote the Gennady Golovkin-Canelo Alvarez rematch.
It wasn’t the hard-hitting middleweight champion who has knocked out nearly 90 percent of his opponents. While Golovkin declined to pick a round, or even state that he’ll knock out Alvarez in their second bout, the confident Mexican superstar promised that he’ll make sure their rematch doesn’t go to the scorecards May 5 in Las Vegas.
Alvarez made the prediction while answering a question about whether he would’ve fought Golovkin at Madison Square Garden in New York.
“Look, you all know me – I’m gonna fight him anywhere,” Alvarez said through a translator. “I’m not afraid of nobody, and I’ve shown that. The first time, they were saying he was gonna knock me out and I wouldn’t fight him. And look, here we are again. There’s a saying in Mexico – a parrot’s green anywhere he goes. I’m not afraid of him. I’m gonna knock him out.”
Alvarez’s knockout talk drew an audible response from fans that attended the event at L.A. LIVE’s Microsoft Square. Alvarez added later that he didn’t think Golovkin’s vaunted power was anything special when they fought September 16 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, the same site for their rematch.
“I respect him,” Alvarez said. “He has a good punch, but nothing out of this world.”
Neither boxer appeared badly hurt at any point during their initial battle.
Kazakhstan’s Golovkin (37-0-1, 33 KOs) – the IBF, IBO, WBA and WBC 160-pound champion – and Mexico’s Alvarez (49-1-2, 34 KOs) fought to a controversial 12-round draw five months ago.
Judge Don Trella scored their HBO Pay-Per-View main event even (114-114). Judge Dave Moretti had it 115-113 for Golovkin and judge Adalaide Byrd infamously scored the competitive match 118-110 for Alvarez.
“Without a doubt, I felt I won the first fight,” Alvarez said. “But look, thank God we have this second fight … he felt he won, I felt I won. This second fight will erase all doubts when I win.”
Though they disagree about who won their first fight, Alvarez and Golovkin remained respectful toward each other Tuesday night.
“We don’t need to badmouth each other,” Alvarez said. “We don’t need to talk about each other, and all the pushing and shoving. We don’t need to sell it that way. The fans know what we bring, that we both wanna knock each other out. Of course, we both wanna win convincingly. That’s why the fans know what we bring and that’s what we’re gonna do for this fight. I wanna knock him out.”
Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.