A Fighter From Ronda Rousey's Gym Will Be Filling In For Canelo Against GGG On May 5th #PrayForHim

After Canelo Alvarez tested positive for Clenbuterol, cancelling his highly-awaited rematch with Gennady Golovkin, it looked as if my Cinco de Mayo was ruined. No GGG/Canelo 2?! Well then what the hell was I supposed to do? Go to an On The Border and appropriate culture WITHOUT the excuse of a boxing match going on? Doesn’t seem likely, pal.

Luckily, the day has been saved by Armenian boxer Vanes Martirosyan, who will now be stepping in to face GGG. Vanes is coming off a loss against Erislandy Lara…which happened two years ago, and uh, he trains out of Ronda Rousey’s old stomping grounds in Glendale with Coach Edmond Tarverdyan (and even kinda looks like him!). Soooooooo yeah. He makes utterly no sense as an opponent for Golovkin, and will get murdered on May 5th. But I guess we get to see GGG in the ring, so it’s better than nothing?

Also, if I understand this correctly, Golovkin has a mandatory title defense to complete against Serhiy Derevianchenko for the IBF, so why couldn’t they set that up for this date? Possibly too little time where not enough promotion could be done for a fight actually deserving of it? I’m not really sure, but I know that’s a fight I’d like to see more than the one we got. At least there’s gonna be boxing on Cinco de Mayo still, even if there’s no Mexican in the fight.

Related: Golden Boy Promotions just announced Canelo will return in September for a bout during Mexican Independence Day weekend. Even if he is a roidhead (alleged, possibly just ate some bad meat even though evidence would suggest he didn’t and actually just did a bunch of steroids, but still, alleged) I’m looking forward to that because god damn he’s entertaining in that squared circle.

Also related: pretty savage new Jumpman commercial outta Golovkin’s camp…