World Boxing Association (WBA) Championships Committee has ordered the mandatory bout between WBA/IBF middleweight super champion Gennady Golovkin and WBA regular champion Erislandy Lara as part of the world title reduction plan.
Golovkin and Lara will have a period of one month to reach an agreement for the fight, which will end on October 23. The winner of this fight will be the only WBA 160-pound champion.
The WBA granted special permission to GGG to move up a division and fight Saul Alvarez on September 17, with the condition that he would return to middleweight to face Lara and would not be granted another special permission.
The WBA has made the decision attached to such resolution and to rule C.11, which states that the champion must defend his championship against the official contender 120 days after winning the title.
Golovkin won the title last April 9 by defeating Ryota Murata, so the deadline expired last August 8 and he must now face Lara in his next fight.
In case the teams do not reach an agreement or one of them refuses to do so, the fight will be sent to auction with a 75% split for Golovkin and 25% for Lara.
It’ll be interesting to see if GGG takes this fight now that he’s a free agent. He’s not the fighter he once was, but neither is Lara and the prospects of tracking him down aren’t as bleak as they used to be.
I like the fight. Yes GGG should retire but if he is not going to, he may as well face another older fighter. Plus Lara has hung in there all this time….25% of a purse in a GGG fight is better then I would have thought he would ever get after his loss to Hurd. I would be happy to see Lara get this fight.
Sounds good to me Pete. Middleweight isn’t a really deep division anyway and it just lost Andrade and I guess no one knows what is going on with Charlo. There aren’t many big names, GGG – Lara works for me.
Unless people go crazy and make a fight with Alimkhanuly. I do not think the people of Kazakhstan would forgive Alimkhanuly. He imo is the reason Andrade left the division in the first place.
Mandatory fights the opponent is automatic 25%. Voluntary defenses are whatever they agree to. Lara could demand more, but won’t get it. At that point he could refuse the fight and then WBA will either go to next person or give them more time. Really is no demand to see Lara fight, so GGG may just give up the belt and fight someone else. Course this gets the Lara, Andrade Charlo fans jacked up that Canelo and GGG are afraid. When really those guys bring no sales.
So true, neither of those guys draws crowds or PPV buys. They are not exciting to watch, they talk like they could be great commentators but could not fill a high school auditorium without another name fighter to draw that crowd!
Not likely
Wow’s there a blast from the past; Erislandy Lara.
There are folks out there who dislike Lara’s previous boxing style (or maybe even current), but Lara provided problems to all his opponents. I hope this fight occurs because I want to see Lara earn a few more payments before he retires.
I am also curious as to whether Lara will provide excessive, ineffective circular movement(s) to GGG or will he provide effective angles/range type movements to GGG.
I am quite sure Lara wants to fight GGG, but I am not quite sure if GGG wants to deal with Lara’s possible movement style so late in his career. I will give GGG the benefit of the doubt that he will fight Lara.
If boxing authorities can find a way, I prefer to see GGG vs. Munguia.
I’ll skip this one, couldnt care less
WBA are just sanction collectors. Never did have much credibility and with the death of money they would rate a ham sandwich. What a disgrace. No need to rush GGG. It just shows what prostitutes are WBA have going on and have been getting worse lately.
They are working on becoming even more irrelevant than the other organizations.
cool. Would be good to see 2 guys scrap who have beaten Canelo in the past.
couldnt say it better myself.
Very good fight. Should be an easy fight for Lara
Sounds good! 2 dudes on the decline of their career but, will definately put a good show! Looking forward to this one!
They were on the decline 5 years ago
Free ESPN fight
Always been a fan of Golovkin but I see Lara winning this on points…..
FOTY
Senior’s tour…both these two need to hang them up.
Yes its a great farewell fight for both! Love these two legends, hope it ends in a draw.
could turn out to be a good fight both fighters were good in their prime have to wait and see