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HBO Championship Boxing Recap

September 29, 2007

Boardwalk Hall-Atlantic City, New Jersey

Ring/WBC/WBO Middleweight (160 pounds) 12 Round Championship Match:

Jermain Taylor (27-0-1, 17 KO's, 159 pounds) (c) vs. Kelly Pavlik (31-0, 28 KO's, 159.5 pounds)

Taylor won these championships over Bernard Hopkins via split decision on July 16, 2005, at the MGM Grand Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Taylor had a highly decorated amateur boxing career.  It included the 1996 Under-19 championship, 2 PAL and National Golden Gloves Championships.  The highlight of his amateur career was winning a bronze medal for the United States in boxing at 156.2 pounds at the 2000 Sydney Summer Olympiad.

The champion was labeled as the heir apparent to Bernard Hopkins coming out of the Olympics and after several strong early showings as a pro.  After defeating Hopkins to win these titles, plus the IBF and WBA that had to be forfeited to create quality matches, Taylor has been accused of under performing.  Taylor would narrowly win a rematch with Hopkins by unanimous decision (115-113 on all 3 official scorecards).  Then he went to a 12 round draw with Winky Wright, where Taylor lost every round he ignored the advice of his new trainer, Boxing Hall-of-Famer, Emanuel Steward.  The performances were still good enough to keep him very popular in his native Arkansas.  Taylor had received a parade in the state capital of Little Rock, and a meeting with former Arkansas Governor and President of the United States, Bill Clinton, after the first Hopkins match.

Then he faced Kassim Ouma, and despite winning handily on two of the official scorecards was unimpressive against a much smaller opponent.  Taylor's last match was a 12 round split decision victory over Cory Spinks at the FedEx Forum in Memphis, Tennessee.  In the match, Taylor looked awful.  He landed the fewest punches in winning a 12 round match in any recap I have done, 101 total connects.  Taylor was an 8 to 1 favorite for that match.  During the match on color commentary for HBO, Larry Merchant called the match boxing's version of flag football.  Steward, resorted to yelling at his unresponsive boxer between rounds to try and get something out of him.  The champion ignored his corner's instructions the entire night.  Steward told Taylor during the match that he (Steward) would rather Taylor had faced Pavlik's, who competed earlier on the card, opponent Edison Miranda, because Taylor was not mentally prepared for the match he was in.  Taylor's first comments after the match were about how overrated Miranda was, and not about his own match.  That spoke volumes as to how prepared Taylor was for that match.

Now sports talk radio in Arkansas which had been throwing parties for Taylor, has turned on him harshly.  Taylor said in a press conference that his wife is being heckled in public by his former fans.  Taylor says that the father figure in his life has had things thrown at while shopping at the grocery store in Arkansas, because of their association (that part is even harsh for people in SEC country).  Taylor's family says stated that he boxed for money.  However, Taylor has money now, lots of it.  He has bought his parents a house and is rich.  All of the criticism has motivated Taylor to take training for this match more seriously, and go to Steward's secluded boxing training compound in Florida.  Among the boxers Taylor is in the ring with in Florida is IBF Champion at 147 pounds, Cintron.  No boxer has lost after Steward has taken them to train at his Florida compound.  There Taylor can only train, watch boxing videos, fish and the champion flies in his friends from Arkansas to hang out with him and play XBOX 360 (I do not know why Taylor does not use XBOX Live).

Despite all of the public negativity towards Taylor a surge of late betting has made him an 8 to 5 favorite in this match.

Taylor is the Ring Magazine Champion at 160 pounds.

Pavlik did well as an amateur winning the 1998 National Jr. PAL, National Jr. Golden Gloves, and 1999 United States National Under-19 Championship, all at 147 pounds.  He tried out for the 2000 United States Olympic boxing team, eventually losing to Jermain Taylor.  However, that should not have any indications on this match, because Pavlik was a 17-year-old high school student, and Taylor was legally able to buy alcohol, when that match took place.

Pavlik is a creature of habit in preparing for his matches.  He has the same boxing coach in the same gym, since he started at 9-years-old in Youngstown, Ohio.  He moves back in with his parents to the room he grew up in to train for matches.  It allows him to focus on training completely, and has gotten the best results for him.  Attempting to move training camps out of his industrial hometown have proved counter-productive.  Continuing to stay in touch with where he began has made him a popular sports figure in the city.  There was a 500 person pep-rally to see him off when he left for Atlantic City, and reportedly nearly 5,000 friends, family and general supporters from Youngstown have made the trip to Atlantic City for this match.  Former lightweight champion and Youngstown boxer Ray "Boom Boom" Mancini traveled out from California to watch this match.

Pavlik has never been past 9 rounds.  Although he has already participated in 3 matches scheduled for 12 rounds and 3 scheduled for 10 rounds, only 1 opponent was able to make it to round 9 against Pavlik's power, before being knocked out.

The challenger's last match was an exciting win over heavily touted prospect Miranda on the undercard of Taylor-Spinks.  Miranda is the best opponent Pavlik has faced and Pavlik defeated the Colombian native by technical knockout 1:54 into round 7.  Pavlik knocked Miranda down 3 times during the match.  On the same night where Taylor landed 101 total punches in a 12 round victory, landed 193 power punches in less then 7 full rounds.

Pavlik is ranked as the number 3 contender by The Ring Magazine to Taylor's Championship at 160 pounds.

Pavlik holds the age advantage at 25-years-old, while the champion is 29-years-old.  Pavlik is the taller boxer standing 6' 2" tall, while Taylor is 6' 1" tall.  This will be Taylor's first time as a professional facing an opponent taller then himself.  The challenger has the reach advantage with an arm length of 24.5" measured from the armpit to the end of the fist, Taylor's arm length is 23.5" measured the same way.  Pavlik, also has the weight advantage on the unofficial scales on the night of the match at 168 pounds to 166 pounds for Taylor.  Both boxers will employ the orthodox stance.

The unified rules of boxing are in effect for this match.  Two of the judges are from the United States (no state given) and the other one is from Italy.  The referee is Steve Smoger.  Lederman is keeping unofficial score for HBO.

Pavlik gets a superstar reaction coming to the ring.  He has a Randy Couture T-shirt under his ring jacket.  Conversely, Jermain Taylor receives a chorus of boos entering the ring.  Steward and Taylor look angry entering the ring with that reaction.  According to the promoter the ticket breakdown was 50% to Youngstown, 25% to Arkansas, and 25% to general boxing fans.  Based on the crowd reaction, it appears the 25% from Arkansas are the ones throwing eggs at Taylor's surrogate father in the grocery store.

Taylor's speed wins round 1, 10-9.  The challenger landed Taylor is holding his left hand low and Pavlik can land his straight right easily.  Lederman scores round 1 for Pavlik, 10-9.  Pavlik landed 43 total punches in round 1 to 26 total punches landed for Taylor in the round.  A huge barrage of punches in the center of the ring has Pavlik grabbing on to Taylor's left arm in an attempt to stay vertical, but with 1:39 to go in round 2, Pavlik goes down to all four's on the mat.  The challenger is up quickly, and looks in a hurry to get back to action.  Action is resumed with 1:25 to go in round 2.  Pavlik is rocked by another Taylor right hand and begins to stagger around the ring, with 1:09 to go in round 2.  Smoger is a referee known for letting the action go for a while to ensure a conclusive finish, and not call for a quick stoppage.  Some referees may have stopped this contest already, or at least be close to doing it.  Taylor punched himself out, and was unable to finish Pavlik in round 2.  Taylor wins round 2 on Lederman and my scorecard, 10-8.  Pavlik's nose is bleeding after round 2.  Taylor leads after 2 rounds on Lederman and my scorecard, 20-17.  Taylor landed 52 total punches in round 2 and, 42 of them were power connects.

Pavlik spends round 3 coming forward on offense and wins round 3, 10-9.  Lederman scores the round the same.  Pavlik threw 99 punches in round 3, coming back from the knockdown.  With 1:55 to go in round 4, Taylor is warned about hitting low.  Taylor wins a close round 4, 10-9.  Pavlik is very effective going to the body of Taylor, but not throwing many body punches.  Lederman scores round 4 for Pavlik, 10-9.  Close round 5 that Taylor finishes strong to win, 10-9.  Taylor landed a punch after the bell, but Pavlik initiated a touch of the gloves to show there were no hard feelings.  Lederman scores round 5 for Taylor, 10-9.  After 5 rounds Taylor leads, 49-45 on my scorecard.  Lederman has the match scored even after 5 rounds, 47-47.

Close round 6, which Pavlik wins, 10-9.  Lederman scores round 6 for Pavlik, 10-9.  A straight right hand from Pavlik stuns Taylor with 55 seconds to go in round 7.  Pavlik follows up, pinning Taylor against the ropes.  The champion does not throw any punches in response and the referee steps in to end the contest with 47 seconds to go in round 7, while Taylor is falling to the mat.  It was a left hook that finished Taylor, and excellent job done by the referee in this match.

The official result as read by Michael Buffer, who calls this is one of the great middleweight championship bouts in boxing history:  At 2:14 of round number 7, the referee has called a stop to this contest.  Making the winner by technical knockout, still undefeated, new WBC Middleweight Champion of the World, new WBO Middleweight Champion of the World, Ring Magazine Middleweight Champion, Kelly "The Ghost" Pavlik.  The win moves Pavlik to 32-0, with 29 of those wins coming by way of knockout.

The final CompuBox numbers had Pavlik landing 180 of 460 total punches, for a 39% connect percentage.  Pavlik landed 100 of 210 power punches, for a 48% power connect percentage.  Taylor landed 182 of 369 total punches, for an astounding 49% connect percentage.  Taylor landed 105 of 162 power punches, for an again astonishing 65% power connect percentage.  The official score cards had Taylor winning after 6 rounds on all the cards: 59-54, 58-55, 58-55.  The only clear round win in my opinion for Pavlik was round 3, despite the fact he was coming forward the entire match.  Taylor was effective countering while going backwards.  Lederman had a score in favor of Pavlik, 57-56, and Merchant had a score in favor of Taylor, 57-56, at the time of the stoppage.  The only clear cut rounds were 2 and 3, any of the others could have gone either way with valid arguments.

Taylor left the ring quickly without comment, which the crowd booed when they saw.

In Pavlik's post match interview said his thoughts when he was knocked down were, "Shit! This is gonna be a long night."  That is a terrible place to be 1:21 into round 2 of a 12 round championship match against an undefeated champion.  Pavlik believes he scored the knockout based on an accumulation of punches rather then the one punch that stunned Taylor being the big factor.  Pavlik was surprised to find out he was losing the match at the time of the stoppage, and instead of getting angry said he needed to go back and look at the tape to figure out why.  There is a rematch clause in the contract for a match to take place over the 160 pound limit.  Pavlik said he hopes Taylor invokes it, and that way he gets to eat more food.  Very good post match interview.  He came across as humble and very likable.  Pavlik was able to mention Youngstown several times, and come across entertaining.

Back in the locker room area Taylor does give a post match interview for television, where the crowd will not be able to impact it.  Taylor said he believed he was losing the match on the judges scorecards.  The former champion believes he wasted a lot of energy throwing unnecessary punches in round 2, and not being under control.  Taylor intends to invoke his rematch clause immediately.  Taylor's post match comments hinted that he may be looking at changing trainers, because Steward had him wrongly believing he was behind.  The belief that he (Taylor) was trailing caused him to expend extra energy to try and come from behind.  Taylor believes the wasted energy is what caused him to be knocked out, and may be looking for someone to blame.

The contracted rematch is to take place at 166 pounds, unless Taylor chooses to hold the contest at 160 pounds and have all of the titles on the line.  Otherwise, it will not have any title belts at stake, but still be very interesting.  To do anything, but that match next for either boxer seems unlikely.  Pavlik is unlikely to find a bigger payday, and Taylor should want a rematch.

Both boxers are young, have defensive liabilities, and the potential to be even better.  Until the rematch though their future is each other.

The main event was very entertaining.  This entire card featured boxers wholly lacking in an ability to get out of the way of punches.  It is worth finding a replay.