BoxRec

Two big punchers.Who ya got?

Pavlik was a tough and effective SOB when his head was right....strong at the weight, very heavy-handed and one of the best and most ruthless finishers in the business for a while. The horrible Hopkins schooling will always undercut Kelly's overall abilities and contribution as an entertaining, credible middleweight champ.

But I still think that Golvokin has too much all-round sharpness, especially in the footwork department, for Kelly and he'd get in close without getting tagged with the jab and breakdown Pavlik round-by-round.

GGG would not blow Kelly out of the water or early like he did with Macklin or Rubio, I see it as more of a systematic breakdown with Golvokin picking up some lumps as well.

The one thing that might put a spanner in the works is that Pavlik was a very tall 6'2 middleweight and GGG is said to be around 5'10. Might get interesting if Pavlik kept it long and did some holding/smothering work when they came together....he'd be going against his instincts but it could be effective.

Great fight BTW.

I was a huge Pavlick fan & he was probably my favorite fighter for a while there, but if he had nightmares with Hopkins & Martinez, plus two very tough wins over Taylor, that doesn't at all bode well for him against GGG. In fact, Taylor dropped him heavily & came close to stopping him in their first fight. Which makes it highly doubtful that he could have stood up to GGG's shots for very long.
My personal pick, GGG via KO4.