Can Taylor climb back to the top?
No one is ever going to confuse Jermain Taylor with the greatest middleweights of all-time.
Rarely, though, has a fighter of Taylor's caliber fallen so resoundingly from grace the way Taylor did after he suffered back-to-back losses to Kelly Pavlik in 2007 and 2008.
A full 14 months after the second of those two defeats, Taylor is still plugging away in the shadows. He's all but an afterthought in the pound-for-pound circles. His name is used in the past tense, as in: Jermain used to be champion. Jermain used to be a good fighter. Jermain used to be a badass.
He'll fight for a world title on Saturday at the Foxwoods Resort in Ledyard, Conn., when he meets Carl Froch for the WBC super middleweight title in a fight aired in the U.S. on Showtime.
Outside of Taylor's home state of Arkansas, precious few seem to have noticed. Those who have noticed don't seem to care.
He's 30 now, and should be in the prime of his career. Yet there are more than a few who wonder if he was at his best when he was 27 and is already on the inevitable downhill slide.
"He fights with the frequency of Haley's Comet," boxing historian Burt Sugar said. "His win over Jeff Lacy, while good, was hardly one that made anyone want to stop the presses. In my book, that's not one of the great fights.
"It might be his prime is past him. Everyone has a peak. Have we seen his already? As Peggy Lee sang, 'Is that all there is?' "
Taylor's not the kind of guy who is going to build a case for himself. Boxing is a job and a means to an end for him, not a way of life. Taylor is polite to a fault, but not only does he not care what the media and the fans may think, he's not even aware.
You don't see Taylor at ringside at someone else's fight. You don't see him in the media center working the room, building relationships with those who chronicle his career.
He fights every six months, usually against an elite-level talent, does his job and then goes home, only to reemerge when it's time to fight again. His last eight opponents — Bernard Hopkins twice, Winky Wright, Kassim Ouma, Cory Spinks, Pavlik twice and Lacy — have all held or were holding world titles when he's fought them. You'd have to go back more than four years to find the last time Taylor fought an opponent who has never held a major world championship.
His promoter, Lou DiBella, concedes it's an important fight but notes that Taylor has never gotten the credit he's deserved for his accomplishments.
And while Oscar De La Hoya deservedly received oodles of accolades for the caliber of his opposition, don't overlook the fact that Taylor's opponents had a combined record of 694-109-26 when he fought them, an astounding 83.7 winning percentage.
Taylor was leading on all three scorecards when he was knocked out by Pavlik in their middleweight title fight on Sept. 29, 2007, in Atlantic City, N.J. Pavlik won the rematch by a unanimous decision in a non-title, over-the-weight bout, but DiBella isn't about to give Taylor much grief for that loss.
"If Jermain had been the champion, there's not a doubt in my mind he would have won the fight," DiBella said. "I'm taking nothing away from Kelly. It was a close fight and Kelly was the champion and he got the decision [even though it was a non-title fight]. I have no argument with Pavlik winning, because he was the champion and Jermain didn't 'take' the belt.
"And in the first fight, I thought Jermain was beating the [heck] out of him before he got caught."
Regardless, Taylor's star has dimmed considerably since the heady days of 2005, when he defeated Hopkins in back-to-back fights and seemed ready to become one of the elite athletes in the game.
Taylor isn't one for long explanations, but you get the sense after talking to him that he wants this fight more than he has any he's fought since he first stepped into the ring with Hopkins almost four years ago.
"The thing that means the most to me," he says, "is being No. 1 again. Sitting back on top."
Being No. 1 at super middleweight these days might be like being the MVP of the Los Angeles Clippers, but Taylor misses the feeling of being on top and finally seems to have the desperation that he may have lost for a while.
He struggled badly to make the 160-pound weight limit near the end of his reign and spent much of his training camp worker harder to shed pounds than improve his boxing skills. Taylor insists he's stronger, quicker and more comfortable at 168 pounds and said he's worked as hard as he ever has on his game in preparation for Froch because he could eat and not have to worry about making weight.
It's a good thing, because while the unbeaten Froch (24-0, 19 KOs) may not be the toughest opponent he's faced, Froch himself is highly motivated. It's the fight of his life and a win would put him into the sport's upper echelon.
"This is a very important fight for Jermain and he has the ability to establish himself again as one of the top five or six guys in the world," DiBella said. "Clearly, he has the ability to do that."
Taylor says he wants to do just that, but he is such an agreeable sort that he often says what he thinks you want to hear. And how many fighters have ever said they weren't ready or weren't motivated or weren't in the best shape of their lives?
It's time for Taylor to get back to the guy who earned the nickname "Bad Intentions," or he's going to simply fade into oblivion and be remembered as a guy who was almost great.
