Tureano Johnson, citing injury, declines fight with Gennady Golovkin

It seems Gennady Golovkin will have to look to Plan B after Tureano Johnson, the leading candidate for Golovkin's April 23rd fight, says he can't go because of injury. Johnson hurt his rotator cuff in a decision win against Eamonn O'Kane last October at Madison Square Garden and says the injury continues to nag him.

According to Golden Boy VP Eric Gomez, Johnson will likely need to have surgery on his shoulder and even didn't he'd probably wouldn't be ready to go by the scheduled fight date.

"Tureano will come to the States for a second opinion," Gomez said. "But for the time being the fight with GGG is off. We will not allow him to fight until he is 100 percent medically cleared."

So with Johnson on the sidelines indefinitely, where does Golovkin go from here? His name has been prominently attached to Billy Joe Saunders recently, but discussions between promoters Tom Loeffler and Frank Warren didn't pan out with Loeffler saying that Warren and Saunders "wanted to go in a different direction for his next fight."

That leaves Golovkin and his promoter in a position where they'd rather just skip to it and fight WBC middleweight champion Canelo Alvarez straight away this Spring, though both men have previously agreed to take an interim bouts before facing each other.

"GGG and Canelo fighting in May would make a lot of sense," Loeffler said, "but it would be up to the Canelo/Golden Boy side to do it."

I can all but guarantee that this proposition isn't quite what Oscar De La Hoya has in mind for his prized attraction. And because Canelo is the biggest breadwinner in Golden Boy's heavily depleted stable, you can bet your bottom dollar that they'll do everything in their power to maneuver him very deliberately -- which is just a fancy way of saying don't expect them to be rushed into a dangerous fight with their biggest money-maker.