Overweight Jacobs Should Fess Up and Quit Crying After Loss!
By: Ken Hissner
On March 17th Gennady “GGG’ Golovkin, 36-0 (33), got on the scale and it was 159¾ while Danny “Miracle Man” Jacobs, 32-1 (29), stepped on the same scale and it was 159½.
Golovkin was defending his WBA, WBC and IBF titles while Jacobs was the WBA World champion. The following day Jacobs failed to show up and meet the IBF rules of a day of the fight weigh-in to keep the weight differences at a maximum ten pounds. Golovkin got on the scales and it was 170 pounds. If Jacobs got up the day of the weigh-in and was 180 pounds he would still have a ten pound advantage in the fight. He obviously was over 180 and possibly as much as 185 and forfeited fighting for the IBF title and possibly having the entire fight cancelled. You know Jacobs got on a scale Saturday morning in order to decide not to show up for a second weigh-in or he would not have skipped Saturday’s weigh-in.
The fight itself lived up to the hype and then some. Jacobs fought well above what was expected which may have given a false opinion for many. In the fourth round Jacobs went down which can be considered the difference of winning and losing at the end.
Judge Max DeLuca scored it 114-113 while judges Don Trella and Steve Weisfeld scored it 115-112 as did this writer. DeLuca gave both fighters 6 rounds each while Trella and Weisfeld 7 rounds to Golovkin and 5 to Jacobs. Though listed as having a 1” advantage in height Golovkin had to look up to Jacobs who obviously had at least a 3” advantage in height.
The way the scoring broke down was as the following:
Golovkin took rounds 1, 3, 4, 5, 8 and 9. Jacobs rounds 2, 6, 7, 10, 11 and 12. Each fighter took 6 rounds apiece but the fourth round was the difference when Golovkin scored the lone knockdown of the fight to take a 10-8 round. Four of the twelve rounds were 2-1 to the winner. Those were Golovkin in the third, Jacobs in the second, seventh and twelfth rounds.
Golovkin keeps his WBA, WBC and IBF titles and improves to 37-0 with 33 knockouts. He is 34. Jacobs drops to 32-2 with 29 knockouts. He is 30. Golovkin made 17 WBA super world defenses, 3 IBF defenses and 1 WBC defense while Jacobs made 4 defenses. Golovkin has been a professional for 11 years and Jacobs 10 years.
Golovkin’s manager Tom Loeffler stated the next defense will be in June in KAZ. Their hope is WBO champion southpaw Billy Joe Saunders, 24-0 (12), from the UK with 1 defense will back up his mouth and put his signature on a contract with all 4 titles on the line.
Golovkin has a tentative September date with WBC super welterweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez, 48-1-1 (34), who must defeat Julio Cesar Chavez, Jr., 50-2-1 (32), on May 6th with a 164½ weight limit. Alvarez has 7 defenses. He has never weighed more than 155 pounds.
Chavez was WBC World middleweight champion and had 3 defenses. His last 5 fights have been at super middleweight with a 172½ high. In his last fight in December of 2016 he came in at 168.
