By Keith Idec
Five months have passed since Gennady Golovkin settled for a much-debated draw with Canelo Alvarez.
The unbeaten middleweight champion’s opinion still hasn’t changed. Golovkin thinks he was wronged September 16, not only by two judges, but by HBO’s broadcasting team.
The Kazakh knockout artist discussed his 12-round draw with Alvarez before a press conference to officially kick off the promotion of their May 5 rematch Tuesday night in Los Angeles.
“I’m always for fairness,” Golovkin said. “This first fight didn’t have any fairness. This type of judging is what’s hurting boxing.”
Only one judge, Dave Moretti, scored their fight for Golovkin (115-113). Don Trella had it even (114-114), and Adalaide Byrd submitted a heavily criticized scorecard that gave Alvarez for a 118-110 victory.
Unofficial CompuBox statistics credited Golovkin for landing 218-of-703 punches, 49 more than Alvarez (169-of-505).
Alvarez landed four more power punches, according to CompuBox (114-of-272 to 110-of-342). CompuBox counted nearly twice as many jabs for Golovkin (108-of-361 to 55-of-233).
Golovkin (37-0-1, 33 KOs) believes he did enough to earn a 116-112 or 115-113 win against Alvarez (49-1-2, 34 KOs).
Harold Lederman, HBO’s unofficial judge, gave Golovkin a 116-112 win. Golovkin only watched the fight once in its entirety and walked away feeling as though HBO’s veteran broadcast team of Jim Lampley, Roy Jones Jr. and Max Kellerman favored Alvarez.
“What I saw inside the ring, and what I heard from the ringside commentary, it did not match up,” Golovkin said. “I was disappointed in that. What I watched did not match what I heard. What it seems to me is stats and the commentary didn’t match.
“Commentators are entitled to their own opinions. It’s not bad for me, but it’s bad for the sport. I think I won. The stats prove it and the HBO expert [Lederman] thought I won. And the fans thought I won. I wasn’t the one getting booed when I walked out [of the ring].”
Golovkin, 35, and Alvarez, 27, will come face to face Tuesday night at L.A. LIVE’s Microsoft Square for the first time since they left the ring five months ago at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. Their press conference can be viewed live at RingTv.com or Facebook.com/GoldenBoyBoxing, beginning at 9:30 p.m. ET/6:30 p.m. PT.
Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.