De La Hoya: ‘Preliminary talks’ for Canelo-GGG 3 have begun

Oscar De La Hoya says that talks are underway for a trilogy fight between Canelo Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin.

WBC-WBA middleweight champion Canelo Alvarez (51-1-2, 35 KOs) will return to the ring on Cinco de Mayo weekend, but his opponent remains a mystery. One option appears to be yet another fight with Gennady Golovkin (38-1-1, 34 KOs).

Oscar De La Hoya recently revealed in an interview with ESPN 97.5 Houston that discussions are underway for a trilogy between the two rivals.

“Last night I had preliminary talks with Golovkin’s people. We threw it out there about fighting for the third time on Cinco de Mayo, which is the biggest weekend in boxing in Las Vegas,” De La Hoya said.

The next day, he tweeted that he’s given his “marching orders” to Golden Boy Promotions president Eric Gomez to begin talks with Golovkin.

Alvarez is coming off a third-round TKO of Rocky Fielding at super-middleweight, which marked his debut on sports streaming service DAZN. He signed an 11-fight, $365 million deal with the company, but hitting specific subscriber benchmarks could see his earning potential increase. His previous two fights with Golovkin each eclipsed one million buys on pay-per-view, and were highly compelling to watch.

Many observers felt Golovkin was robbed of victory against Alvarez in September 2017, as a controversial split draw was announced. The September 2018 rematch was a thriller, with scorecards all over the place, but Canelo prevailed by majority decision to end GGG’s reign atop the division.

Golovkin is a US broadcast free agent who’s been courted by ESPN, DAZN, and Premier Boxing Champions (FOX/Showtime). It was reported earlier this week that Golovkin had been offered as much as $10 million by PBC for “the equivalent of a tune-up fight.” According to Golovkin’s promoter Tom Loeffler, he’s not yet made a decision, and he’ll announce it himself when he’s ready.

It’s definitely worth monitoring how negotiations go here, and whether or not Golovkin ends up with DAZN even if Canelo isn’t his next opponent.

Update: This probably isn’t a good sign for negotiations. Gomez said (in Spanish) that “Looks like [Golovkin] does not want Canelo anymore. Prefers easy [fights] as before. We will see friends.”