Gennady Golovkin vs. Vanes Martirosyan official for May 5th

Gennady Golovkin and Vanes Martirosyan have officially put pen to paper for a May 5th showdown at StubHub Center. The IBF, which previously threatened to strip Golovkin if he did not face mandatory Sergiy Derevyanchenko, will allow him to keep the belt without sanctioning the fight as a title defense.

HBO Latino will reportedly broadcast the other two bouts, the previously announced Roman Gonzalez-Pedro Guevara fight and Cecilia Braekhus vs. TBA.

Martirosyan (36-3-1, 21 KO) has never weighed in above 158.5 and has not fought since a decision loss to Erislandy Lara two years ago. He fought Lara to a technical draw the first time out and was competitive against both Demetrius Andrade and Jermell Charlo, but to call this matchup a downgrade would be a grievous insult to the word “downgrade,” which did not fight its way into the dictionary to be undersold like this.

He could conceivably bother Golovkin (37-0-1, 33 KO) a bit with his craft, but it’s hard to imagine any outcome besides “GGG” hunting him down and breaking him.