Gennady GGG Golovkin Decisions Danny Jacobs (Beauty and the Beast)

Okay, I’m a whiteboy. So maybe you are   thinking  I’m looking at GGG as the “Beauty” and Danny Jacobs as the “Beast.”   It’s the other way around. And I was for Danny Jacobs before I was against him. 

The reason I was for Jacobs at first was because I followed him for a long time, even before he got cancer. He was someone   the amateurs I used to train looked up to as an up and coming star.  Our kids liked fighters from Brooklyn  like   Curtis Stevenson and Danny Jacobs, and Zab Judah, and Riddick Bowe. And others whose names I can’t remember at the moment.

The reason I switched to rooting for GGG at the last minute were duofold.  I have seen that Golovkin, while he has infinitely more fans than many promotors will admit, has been jerked around by many of the avaricious   boxing promoters, as have other Eastern European fighters.  Reason? I hope it’s not because they’re white and they’re Russian.

  On the alt.boxing channels, I’ve had to listen to many scurrilous and disparaging things about Golovkin, the purpose of which was to downplay GGG’s star value so that people like Canelo Alvarez have excuses not to make contracts to fight him.  

The second reason I had for switching  to GGG was because Jacobs had agreed to go for all the title belts up for grabs, including the IBF.  It was the IBF rules that required a same-day weigh-in. 

Everyone could see beforehand that Jacobs is the bigger middleweight, with a bigger frame, and could take on more pounds.  If he didn’t want to make same-day weight he shouldn’t have made that part of the deal. He broke his word.  Golovkin is a true middleweight – the 160 pound class is the perfect fit.  In the post-fight press conference, Jacobs said he weighed 175 – fifteen pounds over the weight.  It's possible he was closer to 180.

Politically and in terms of risk and business, I completely understand why Jacobs wouldn’t want to get down to the 170 lb grace weight.  It was the shot of his career and one I’m glad he got it.

 Personally, I’ve always thought he was a far more dangerous opponent for GGG than Canelo Alvarez.   I said many times, and publicly, that the oddsmakers were crazy making Jacobs the underdog.  It was a 50-50 fight to me from the git-go.  I'd seen Jacobs fight when people weren't paying attention to him.

. GGG never whines as some fighters (and promotors) do and has, right from the beginning, taken on all comers. The larger problem was that there weren’t that many ‘comers.’ Lots of folks made excuses not to sign their guys to fight GGG.

I had Golovkin   the winner mainly because of the knockdown, but not strictly that either.  Even so, the fight was close enough that Danny Jacobs seemed entirely reasonable in his post-fight press conference.  Owing to whatever subjectivity I am prey to, I had the fight 112-115, but I wouldn't swear to it.

Leave out the knockdown and it depends on the kind of fight you like.  Still, there was enough of beauty in Golovkin’s style to satisfy the sweet scientists amongst us.  And there was enough of beast in Danny Jacobs style to reinforce what I’ve always thought – he’s a gifted strong middleweight.

But basically it was  GGG   with his search and destroy style against Danny Jacobs far more complex and in-the-tradition boxing style. Pretty combinations landed hard sometimes – double left hooks, uppercuts in combination, neat stuff.

But in round four when Jacobs was dumped, he clutched at Golovkin’s leg for some reason. It wasn’t to keep himself from falling because he was already down . 

Golovkin’s unorthodox double right hand was what put Jacobs down.  Very creative, I thought.  Creative also was Danny Jacobs remarks in the press conference that the knockdown didn’t hurt him. He did get up and recover, to his credit. And what else would he say in a career that suddenly has gained serious traction from this fight? Danny Jacobs is a seriously smart student of the game and a serious smart and articulate spokesman for himself.

Beauty and the Beast.  In so far as the prettiest boxer of the two, it’s Danny Jacobs hands down. That’s a matter of my own personal choice;  I’m in no way intended to be persuasive.  I like chocolate. You like vanilla. That’s all.  Think of Sugar Ray Leonard as the Beauty;  Roberto Duran as the Beast.  Or Jake LaMotta v. Sugar Ray Robinson. It’s like that.   

I think now that, if matches can be arranged within 2017, both Gennady Golovkin and Danny Jacobs would KO Canelo Alvarez.  If Alvarez doesn’t stumble over Chavez Jr., he’s going to look awfully silly not signing Golovkin.  Unfortunately, Alvarez’ promotors will find it a lot easier to steer clear of Danny Jacobs because of the catchweight problem.