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Will Daniel Geale’s title opportunity be worth the weight?

Fighters Network
03
Jun
The catchweight issue was still in the air, which was properly humid, if not summer-level nostril-snapping, at Gleason’s Gym in DUMBO on Wednesday.
Daniel Geale, the amiable Aussie challenger who is tasked with taking Miguel Cotto’s RING and WBC 160-pound crowns on a Roc Nation Sports card, though he must be 157 pounds or less on Friday, told media he’s planning on making 157. ProbablyÔǪ

“Whatever my team recommends for me, I’ll do,” he said, while promoter Gary Shaw sat next to him, before Cotto arrived for his workout and press chat.

Geale was asked if maybe Cotto is looking past him toward Canelo Alvarez and he said he’s assuming that isn’t the case. But he is there to do the job from his POV, and that’s win the title.

Shaw told me Geale is 166 right now and will be on message, weight-wise, come Friday. The fighter’s mind seems right as well; he told me he isn’t reading into Cotto having a rematch clause in their contract, that he isn’t pondering maybe the Puerto Rican isn’t fully sure of himself.

Geale deftly handled questions about WBA titleholder Gennady Golovkin, the man who stopped him in round three of their fight last year. “He caught me but I learned from it and I didn’t absorb many rounds of punishment,” he told us.



“He’s very powerful, very damaging,” Geale said of “Triple G,” lauding his total skills-package. No, he won’t be weirded out because Golovkin will be ringside, scouting Cotto, whose WBC crown the Kazakh covets.

Geale’s softer side came through as well; his wife had a new baby seven weeks ago. He’s been away training for more than three weeks and he can’t wait to get home and reacquaint himself with them.

Geale wasn’t overly tight; he cracked up when Shaw suggested he would be Grand Marshal in the Puerto Rican Day Parade on June 14 if he were to beat the Puerto Rican icon.

Unflapabble, ready to rock and roll, betraying no hints that he believes the validity of those tall odds against himDaniel Geale seems on message heading to his Saturday night tangle, which will unfold at Barclays Center and on HBO.

 

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