Gennady "Triple G" Golovkin and his camp will have to look for another boxer to fight this April with word that mandatory challenger Tureano Johnson will be unable to take the ring on account of a shoulder injury.
Johnson was the International Boxing Federation (IBF) mandatory challenger to Golovkin's middleweight title but has begged off due to continued discomfort on his right shoulder. It was revealed that Johnson has an injured right rotator cuff and may require surgery to repair it.
Golden Boy Promotions Vice President Eric Gomez added that even if Johnson would not undergo surgery to repair his rotator cuff, they would not be pushing him to fight since he was not 100%, according to ESPN.
With that said, Golovkin is left with no choice but to look for another opponent. Aside from Johnson, there were talks about the Kazakh boxer facing Billy Joe Saunders.
Saunders, the recently crowned World Boxing Organization (WBO) middleweight champion after conquering Andy Lee, has been taken out of the mix as well. The Briton was asking Golovkin and company to perk up their offer seeing that Golovkin had more reason to take on the fight, considering he wanted to unify all the belts.
Golovkin and Saunders eventually went separate ways but now, Triple G will have to skim through the list once again for a possible opponent this April.
The voluntary fight has been granted by the World Boxing Council (WBC) before he and Saúl "Canelo" Alvarez possibly face off in the fall. Ironically, Alvarez is also still without an opponent so the easy solution would be to have the two face off instead.
Alvarez, however, reiterated his stance on fighting only at 155 pounds, a snag that puts their possible clash in jeopardy.
A fight can only take place if Golovkin agrees to go down to 155 pounds, although the WBC will likely keep its hands off it. The WBC is unlikely to recognize Alvarez' catchweight stipulation of 155 pounds and all the debate on that is reserved until after the May 7 fight of the lineal WBC middleweight champion.
