The Best Bet You Can Make on Gennady Golovkin vs. Canelo Alvarez
By Loot, Boxing Handicapper, Lootmeister.com
The September 16 Gennady Golovkin vs. Canelo Alvarez fight is a massive event. While the Mayweather-McGregor fight will do bigger numbers, in terms of merit, the GGG vs. Canelo matchup is the fight of the year. We have a long-percolating fight for supremacy in the middleweight division, with the title of "boxing's best fighter" possibly at stake, as well. In fights that are this big, the betting interest is massive. And the book accommodates by putting out a mind-numbing amount of bets. The rule of thumb in fights of this magnitude is that if your mind can conceive it, the book offers it.
Variety is the spice of life. Being able to find a bet that suits your sensibilities of the fight is a good thing. But some bettors look at the sheer number of different available bets and can start to feel a little overwhelmed. It's a massive landscape to navigate and it can be hard to pinpoint exactly what is your best angle to take. There is nothing wrong with making a handful of different bets on a fight like this, but sometimes it's best to have a best bet, a position that you weigh more-heavily.
With fights like these, you can take any imaginable angle. You can be downright specific, betting on exactly when or how a fighter will win. You can bet on the fighters, as well as betting on just the fight itself where you don't even need to pick who will win the fight. The odds are all over the place, with big payouts for more specific wagers and more chalky bets where you can bet on things that seem highly likely. With this bet, we want a winner. Our choices will fall into one of these categories:
Who will Win
How Long the Fight will Last
How the Fight will End
How Each Fighter will Win
What Round the Fight will End
Will the Fight End with a Knockout or Decision
Specific Round Picks
Will Different Things (Knockdowns, Point Deductions, etc.) Occur in the Fight
Round-Ranges of When the Fight will End
Note: Within the different types of bets listed above are many different variations. These are just general areas of betting interest for the fight, but within this framework are many different types of bets. Again, the sheer variety offered for fights of this nature are many and you should look at the betting board to get a lay of the land.
CHECK OUT THE ODDS FOR ALL BETS ON GGG VS. CANELO AND BET ON THE FIGHT AT DISCOUNTED ODDS TODAY AT 5DIMES
Going through the Process: What we want to do now is start eliminating bets from the landscape to narrow the field. A variety of different things could cause us to do this. Perhaps the bet is forcing us to be too exact. Or maybe we just don't see any betting value with a certain wager. At Lootmeister, we love straight boxing betting—just picking the winner. This fight, however, is a toughie. First, it's not easy to pick a winner and if you do, the lines are pretty tight with GGG being a slight favorite at -160 and Canelo at +140. We think those lines are pretty tight.
That brings us to how long the fight will last and again, a toss-up scenario presents itself. The fight going the distance is -140 and it's +120 that it doesn't go the distance. While we feel +120 on it not going 12 rounds has more value, we also realize how often fights between two stars like this goes the distance, as the participants are more careful than normal with more menace in the opposite corner. For every Hagler-Hearns type of fight are dozens of fencing matches where a KO is never close to occurring.
We also want to eschew any bets that force us to be too good. While we might have an inkling, picking what round a fight will end or even a range of 3-4 rounds qualifies as a stab in the dark. Bets on whether the fight will be a draw, whether the decision will be unanimous or split, and wagers of that kind are also speculative endeavors where it's hard to really get a solid read on it. We decided to bet on the fight itself. We chose a bet that doesn't force us to pick a winner.
Our Best Bet:
Alvarez vs. Golovkin Goes 1:30 into the 8th Round -354
Fight Won't Go 1:30 into the 8th Round +294
OK, here we are betting an alternative total, a modified wager on how long the fight will last. We are betting the fight will go 1:30 into the 8th round. The straight total is 1:30 into the 10th round, so we peeled a few rounds off that. At -354, it's a little chalky, but we like it for a variety of reasons, despite the fact that the fighters have 67 combined KO wins. GGG just saw a 9-year KO streak end, while Canelo has been increasingly adept at scoring one-punch knockouts.
We feel the fight will go halfway into the 8th round based on several key factors. One is what we touched on before, where fighters in big fights like this have so much at stake and are facing such a dangerous opponent that it tempers their approach. It's not uncommon for the first several rounds to serve as an extended feeling-out process. And even when the fighters start letting their offenses flow more freely, it's never with the same reckless abandon they may have shown against less-dangerous foes.
Both men are exceptionally durable. Granted, they might each be facing their most offensively-gifted opponents to date, but nothing in either of their pasts indicates anything other than an ultra-solid chin. Both men have tangled with some hard-hitters and it's hard to remember more than a tiny wobble from either guy. In other words, it's going to take something major for a KO to occur, especially inside of 9 rounds.
We feel fireworks will ensue in this fight, but more likely in the last third of the fight or in the championship rounds. We see the first 8-9 rounds serving as window dressing for the final stretch where a winner will likely be determined. The first 9 rounds might be more of a staging area for the final 3-4 heats. Granted, with fighters who pack this much power, you can only be so sure. But we believe the very fact that they both are so dangerous will have each man minding their Ps and Qs. We see this one getting out of at least the 8th round.
Lootmeister's Best Bet for Canelo vs. GGG: We are betting that the fight will go 1:30 of the 8th round at -354. Tired of your credit card not working for sportsbook deposit? End that problem today and bet the GGG vs. Canelo fight by signing up at Bovada Sportsbook where your credit card WILL work and where you'll receive a generous 50% sign-up bonus!
