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Anyone still holding out hope for a fight between Canelo Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin will have to put those hopes in an icebox for the time being. After a Monday meeting between Golden Boy's Eric Gomez and Tom Loeffler of K2, the two sides have agreed to put off the highly anticipated fight until at least the Fall of 2017. This surely isn't what fight fans were hoping for to say the least.
Golden Boy is said to have preferred to delay the fight in an effort to make it bigger commercially as well as give Alvarez some more time to fully acclimate to 160lbs. I find the latter rationale to be mostly a farce as it's pretty apparent that Alvarez is already a sturdy middleweight on fight night. Be that as it may, if the two promoters have come to an agreement to delay the fight for a little over a year, at minimum, there isn't much us lowly fans can do about it.
"I met with Eric on Monday and we had a good, good conversation, and the plan was they want to shoot for fall of 2017," Loeffler told ESPN.com. "It's not going to happen in September of this year, so we'll use the time to build the fight. We wanted the fight in [this past] May.
"It's Gennady's priority to make the Canelo fight as soon as possible, but Golden Boy felt next year would make the most sense on the promotional side and with the weight as well."
Gennady Golovkin was recently handed the WBC middleweight world title after Canelo Alvarez opted to vacate the title rather than be forced into a mandatory fight against Golovkin at this time. As far as I'm concerned, that's all we really need to know about this prospective fight.
Golovkin's promoter, Tom Loeffler, continues to be very diplomatic about the whole situation, saying that they'd prefer to make the Canelo fight now, but that they're willing to make the best out of this situation given Golden Boy's stance on the matter.
Meanwhile, mum's the word for Golden Boy who declined to comment on who Canelo will face next on September 17, but the working theory is that the fight will take place at 154lbs where Canelo may seek another world title.
On the other hand, Chris Eubank Jr. is looking more likely to face Golovkin next, with Loeffler admitting that he's in talks with Eddie Hearn of Matchroom about the fight. If that fight comes together as expected, Golovkin is reportedly willing to travel to England to take the assignment.