|
MIDDLEWEIGHT DIVISION (UP TO 160 POUNDS)
1. Gennady Golovkin (37-0)戈洛夫金
Unified middleweight titlist Gennady Golovkin has been waiting for a fight against Canelo Alvarez. Nick Potts/PA via APUnified world champion Golovkin hoped (like most boxing fans) that Canelo Alvarez would fight him this year in what had been a mandatory fight. But Alvarez fled, giving up his alphabet belt and saying he might fight Golovkin in the fall of 2017. Titleholder Billy Joe Saunders also blatantly ducked GGG after calling him out and the same goes for contender Chris Eubank Jr., with whom they were far down the road to a deal. With the top middleweights outright avoiding GGG, he took on willing welterweight titlist Kell Brook in September on Brook's turf in London and broke his face, literally, in a fifth-round knockout victory. On March 18, GGG returned for his mandatory defense against secondary titlist Daniel Jacobs in an HBO PPV headliner and they put on an excellent fight. Golovkin retained his title for the 18th time by close decision but his 23-fight knockout streak came to an end. Next up, Saunders may actually face him in June in Kazakhstan to unify all four major titles.
Next: TBA
2. Daniel Jacobs (32-2)雅各布斯
After suffering his only loss in 2010 by knockout against Dmitry Pirog in a vacant title bout, Jacobs won 12 fights in a row -- all by knockout -- overcome cancer and won a secondary title. Jacobs defended it four times before he squared off with unified champion Gennady Golovkin in a much-anticipated mandatory fight on March 18. Jacobs was a huge underdog, but did himself proud. Although he lost a decision in a very good fight, it was very close and he ended Golovkin's 23-fight knockout streak to prove he belongs among the elite fighters in the world. If ever a fighter can win by losing, Jacobs did just that.
Next: TBA
3. David Lemieux (37-3)列米欧
Lemieux, a big slugger from Montreal, met fellow big hitter Gennady Golovkin on HBO PPV in October 2015 in a title unification fight and it did not work out well for Lemieux, who took a thrashing en route to a one-sided eighth-round knockout loss. Since then he has won three fights in a row, including scoring an absolutely crushing third-round knockout of Curtis Stevens on March 11 in an HBO main event. It was the kind of finish that should vault Lemieux back into another major fight.
Next: TBA
4. Miguel Cotto (40-5)库托
Cotto, Puerto Rico's only four-division champion and a lock future Hall of Famer, has not fought since losing the lineal middleweight title to Canelo Alvarez in November 2015. He was due to return on Feb. 25 in a junior middleweight fight against inactive James Kirkland (32-2) in the main event of a laughable HBO PPV event, but the show was canceled when Kirkland suffered a fractured nose in sparring. Now there are supposedly renewed talks for Cotto to fight Juan Manuel Marquez, a fight that didn't materialize in the first place because of issues over the weight. A fight with Timothy Bradley Jr. would also be attractive.
Next: TBA
5. Billy Joe Saunders (24-0)桑德斯
England's Saunders won a title in December 2015 by debatable decision over Andy Lee and spent the next year avoiding fights with Gennady Golovkin and Canelo Alvarez or pulling out of or postponing other fights until finally ** his first defense Dec. 3 against hand-picked Russian opponent Artur Akavov. Although Saunders won a debatable decision, he looked awful. With Golovkin having defeated Jacobs on March 18, Saunders could face Golovkin in June to unify the four major belts.
Next: TBA
6. Andy Lee (35-3-1)安迪.李
Ireland's Lee, a former titleholder, lost his belt to Billy Joe Saunders by majority decision in December 2015 and decided to take a break during 2016. But Lee returned March 18 on the Gennady Golovkin-Daniel Jacobs undercard and shook off the rust with a one-sided decision win against KeAndrae Leatherwood.
Next: TBA
7. Chris Eubank Jr. (24-1)小尤班克
England's Eubank Jr., son of the former two-division world titleholder, walked away from a huge opportunity and career-high payday to challenge unified titleholder Gennady Golovkin in September and instead agreed to have a small-time British title defense against Tommy Langford on Oct. 22 but pulled out with a supposed elbow injury. Then in another bizarre decision, Eubank accepted a fight at super middleweight to face Australia's unknown Renold Quinlan in an utterly meaningless fight on Feb. 4 that headlined a small pay-per-view in the United Kingdom. As expected, Eubank won easily, stopping Quinlan in the 10th round.
Next: TBA
8. Hassan N'Dam (35-2)哈桑
N'Dam, a former titleholder, was one of the few pros to compete in the Rio Olympics but surprisingly was eliminated in his opening-round bout. In his first bout since the Olympics, he challenged Alfonso Blanco for an interim title on Dec. 17 and scored a massive first-round knockout in just 22 seconds for the2016 ESPN.com knockout of the year.
Next: TBA
9. Avtandil Khurtsidze (32-2-2)艾维坦蒂.库尔西泽
New York-based Khurtsidze, who is from the Republic of Georgia, knocked out then-undefeated Antoine Douglas in the 10th round in his last fight, which was in March 2016. Though he was the mandatory challenger for titlist Billy Joe Saunders (24-0), Khurtsidze will instead fight for the vacant interim belt against England's Tommy Langford (18-0) while Saunders pursues other business.
Next: April 22 vs. Langford
10. Maciej Sulecki (23-0)马切伊·苏莱克
Poland's Sulecki, who has had his last four fights in a row in the United States, has notched five consecutive knockouts including against decent opponents such as Hugo Centeno Jr. in his last fight in June and Grzegorz Proksa.
Next: TBA | 
2023-10-18 07:53:31
