Gennady Gennadyevich Golovkin vs. Robert James Brant

The overall likeliest next option for GGG, if you consider the middleweight landscape and/or set much store by the public musings of Abel Sánchez - and probably the best-case scenario match-up for both men, in terms of risk & reward. Brant gets a huge cash-out (even if at the ultimate expense of having a lengthy title reign, and settling instead for being a rich flash-in-the-pan) and, however marginal his chances, the opportunity to become the second official conqueror of the Kazakh phenom in the pros. Golovkin for his part gets to face a h2h relatively weak titlist (I won't go as far as to call him a paper champ, after that nice performance against Ryōta Murata, but he's certainly below the likes of Canelo, Jacobs, Charlo, BJS, and even Derevyanchenko in most observers' reckoning - and he's stylistically a MUCH easier meal to digest for GGG than is Demetrius Andrade) to boost his confidence and climb back up on the horse before charging full-tilt into a third dance with the ginger, with the bargaining chip of at least some hardware in negotiations.

The date, around the Ides of March, was chosen at random, as Sánchez has long mooted this match-up as taking place in the "first quarter of 2019", and there is precedent for Golovkin competing on St. Paddy's Day weekend (during which he fought Danny Jacobs in MSG in 2017).

 

Says who?

 

So am I the only person who thinks we might see GGG boxing into the early 2020s?

 

I mean, the guy loves to fight and has done it most of his life. He also carries his nation on his back and Kazakhstan isn't the same type of zero-obsessed culture as the US (and he'll still be domestically beloved & celebrated even if he racks up a few L's). People are suddenly acting like he's some diva with dollar signs for corneas, in the PBF mold.

 

First of all where are you getting 3+ from? The early 2020's start in 366 days, technically.

Second, who says he needs to fight exclusively on that grand a stage? He can still trade on his built-up line of name value credit and make decent money fighting any top 15 middleweights. All of that "we only want big dates" stuff is just bluster and posturing by Abel.