When Gennady Golovkin vs. Canelo Alvarez 2 was cancelled in April, there was initial talk of keeping Golovkin on HBO pay-per-view, provided they could find a suitable opponent. A change of plans was made, as Golovkin was placed on regular HBO, just as Top Rank inquired about broadcasting Golovkin’s next fight on ESPN.
If Golovkin vs. Vanes Martirosyan was (rightfully) derided as being a mismatch between the best middleweight in the world and a junior middleweight contender who’d never won a world title or indeed fought since 2016, the fans evidently didn’t really care about that.