Jermain Taylor

This article is about the boxer Jermain Taylor. For other people, see Jermaine Taylor .

Jermain Taylor
Data
Birth Name	Jermain Taylor
Fight name	Bad intentions
Weight class	medium weight
nationality	US-american
birthday	August 11, 1978
place of birth	Little rock
style	Left delivery
size	1.85 m
Combat Statistics
Struggles	38
Victories	33
Knockout victories	20th
Defeats	4th
draw	1

Jermain Taylor (born August 11, 1978 in Little Rock , Arkansas ) is a retired American boxer and former WBA , WBC , IBF and WBO middleweight champion. He was only the second boxer after Bernard Hopkins to combine the four recognized world titles in a weight class.

Amateur career

Taylor won the prestigious Golden Gloves tournament in 1998 and 1999 , he finished the Goodwill Games in 1998 on a third place, he lost in the semifinals against Gaidarbek Gaidarbekow .

In 2000 he qualified for the Olympic Games in Sydney and achieved a bronze medal there in the light middleweight division. He beat Felix Sturm , Germany (19:14), who was still boxing under his maiden name Adnan Ćatić, and lost in the semifinals against Jermachan Ibraimow , Kazakhstan (RSC 4th).

• 1996: 1st place in the light middleweight division at the US Junior Championships in Gulfport
• 1997: 2nd place in the light middleweight division at the National Golden Gloves in Denver
• 1998: 1st place in the light middleweight division at the American Boxing Classic in Milwaukee
• 1998: 2nd place in the light middleweight division at the US Challenge in Colorado Springs
• 1998: 3rd place in the light middleweight division at the US Championships in Colorado Springs
• 1998: 3rd place in the light middleweight division at the Goodwill Games in New York City
• 1998: 1st place in the light middleweight division at the National Golden Gloves in Biloxi
• 1999: 1st place in the light middleweight division at the National Golden Gloves in Syracuse
• 1999: 1st place in the light middleweight division at the José Cheo Aponte Tournament in Caguas
• 2000: 1st place in the light middleweight division at the US Olympic Trials in Tampa
• 2000: 1st place in the light middleweight division at the American Olympic elimination in Tampa
• 2000: 3rd place in the light middleweight division at the Summer Olympics in Sydney

Professional career

As a professional, he boxed in the middleweight division. His debut took place under Lou DiBella on January 27, 2001. In 2003 he won the continental title of the WBC and defended it three times, including against the former light middleweight title holder Raúl Márquez and the former WBA middleweight title holder William Joppy .

On July 16, 2005 he won against middleweight world champion Bernard Hopkins narrowly and controversially on points and thus secured the belts of the WBC, WBA, IBF and WBO. In October 2005, however, he was stripped of the IBF title because he did not take on the association's mandatory challenger, but instead gave Hopkins the chance for a rematch on December 3, 2005. Taylor won it again very close on points.

On June 17, 2006 he fought against southpaw and official challenger Ronald "Winky" Wright , (who was previously considered the strongest light middleweight and had twice beaten Shane Mosley and Félix Trinidad ), a tie. For this fight, Taylor received his highest purse to date of around 5 million dollars.

In December 2006 he defeated Kassim Ouma from Uganda , another southpaw from the light middleweight division. Since these two fights were only sanctioned by the WBC and the WBO, but not by the WBA, the WBA then recognized his title from him. On May 19, 2007 he was able to defend the two remaining titles against Cory Spinks , the third southpaw in a row. As in the fights against Kassim Ouma and Wright, Taylor couldn't really convince and won just about points.

Jermain Taylor played his second compulsory defense on September 29, 2007 against his undefeated compatriot Kelly Pavlik . To everyone's surprise, Taylor acted very offensively and knocked Pavlik down with a combination in the second round. At this point, the challenger seemed about to be knocked out. However, in the seventh round, Pavlik managed to push Taylor into a corner of the ring with a series of hits and hit several direct hits, in which the defending champion fell to the ground. The referee jumped in at that moment and ended the fight with a TKO victory for Pavlik.

Jermain Taylor then made a contractually agreed rematch clause to be able to box directly against Pavlik again. However, since Taylor had announced in the run-up to the fight that he wanted to continue his super middleweight career in any case, they agreed on a weight limit above middleweight for this encounter, so that Pavlik would not win the WBC and WBO titles even in the event of a defeat would have lost. The duel on February 16 in Las Vegas was won again by Pavlik, who was able to prevail over the distance of twelve rounds on points and thus inflicted his second defeat as a professional boxer on Taylor.

On November 15, 2008 the important fight against Jeff Lacy took place. Both boxers have known each other since the 2000 Olympics and are good friends. In a well-run fight, Taylor was ultimately able to prevail unanimously on points. With that Taylor managed to report back for the two defeats against Kelly Pavlik.

On April 25, 2009 he challenged WBA world champion Carl Froch and initially took a clear lead on points. In the third round he knocked out Froch and dominated the fight in the first half. On the last lap he went down himself and was able to get up just before the count. Shortly before the end of the last round, the fight was broken off after further heavy hits in favor of Froch.

Despite the defeat, Taylor was invited to the prestigious " Super Six World Boxing Classic " and boxed in the opening fight of this tournament on October 17, 2009 in the Berlin O ₂  World Arena against Arthur Abraham, who had risen from the middleweight division . After another good start, Taylor got more and more problems in the further course of the fight, so that he was knocked out with difficulty a few seconds before the end of the fight in the twelfth round. In January 2010, Taylor announced that he would withdraw from the tournament.

After a two-year hiatus, Taylor returned to the ring in 2011 with an eight-round TKO win over Jessie Nicklow. In 2012 he won another fight against the previously undefeated Caleb Truax on points, but went down in the ninth round.

List of professional fights

30 wins (18 knockout wins), 4 losses (3 knockout losses), 1 draw
year	Day	place	opponent	Result for Taylor
2001	January 27th	Madison Square Garden , New York, New York, United States	Chris Walsh	Victory / TKO 4th round
	7th of April	MGM Grand , Las Vegas, Nevada, United States	Kenny Stubbs	Victory / TKO 2nd round
	8th of May	IC Light Amphitheater, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States	Antonio Baker	Points victory (unanimously) / 4 rounds
	23rd June	MGM Grand, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States	Marvin Smith	Points victory (unanimously) / 4 rounds
	August 11th	Alltel Arena, Little Rock, Arkansas, United States	Efrain Garcia	Victory / TKO 5th round
	November 2	Foxwoods Resort, Mashantucket, Connecticut, United States	Dave Hamilton	Victory / TKO 2nd round
	November 23	Roseland Ballroom, New York, New York, United States	Undra White	Victory / TKO 4th round
2002	March, 15	Creek Nation Tulsa Bingo, Tulsa, Oklahoma, United States	Ron Carnell	Victory / TKO 3rd round
	April 27	Madison Square Garden, New York, New York, United States	Joe Garcia	Victory / TKO 6th round
	15th June	Miccosukee Indian Gaming Resort, Miami, Florida, United States	Grady Brewer	Points victory (unanimous) / 8 rounds
	17th August	Trump Taj Mahal, Atlantic City, New Jersey, United States	Sam Hill	Points victory (unanimously) / 10 rounds
	November 9th	Mountaineer Race Track, Chester, West Virginia, United States	Johnny Rivera	Victory / TKO 4th round
	20th of December	Creek Nation Gaming Center, Tulsa, Oklahoma, United States	Keith Sims	Victory / TKO 1st round
2003	January 30th	American Airlines Arena, Miami, Florida, United States	Lionel Ortiz	Victory / TKO 2nd round
	March 31	Statehouse Convention Center, Little Rock, Arkansas, United States	Marcos Primera	Victory / TKO 5th round
	17th of May	Petersen Center, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States	Nicolas Cervera	Victory / TKO 4th round
	8th August	Alltel Arena, Little Rock, Arkansas, United States	Alfredo Cuevas	Points victory (unanimous) / 12 rounds
	November 8th	Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States	Rogelio Martinez	Victory / TKO 7th round
2004	January 9th	Mohegan Sun Casino, Uncasville, Connecticut, United States	Alex Rios	Victory / TKO 1st round
	27th of March	Alltell Arena, Little Rock, Arkansas, United States	Alex Bunema	Victory / TKO 7th round
	June 19th	Home Depot Center, Carson, California, United States	Raul Marquez	Victory / TKO 9th round
	December 4th	Barton Coliseum, Little Rock, Arkansas, United States	William Joppy	Points victory (unanimous) / 12 rounds
2005	19th of February	Staples Center , Los Angeles, California, United States	Daniel Edouard	Victory / TKO 3rd round
	16th of July	MGM Grand, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States	Bernard Hopkins	Points win (split decision) / 12 rounds
	3rd of December	Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States	Bernard Hopkins	Points victory (unanimous) / 12 rounds
2006	17th of June	FedEx Forum, Memphis, Tennessee, New York, United States	Ronald Wright	draw
	9th of December	Alltel Arena, North Little Rock, Arkansas, United States	Kassim Ouma	Points victory (unanimous) / 12 rounds
2007	May 19th	FedEx Forum, Memphis, Tennessee, United States	Cory Spinks	Points win (split decision) / 12 rounds
	September 29th	Boardwalk Hall, Atlantic City, New Jersey, United States	Kelly Pavlik	Loss / TKO 7th round
2008	February 16	MGM Grand, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States	Kelly Pavlik	Loss of points (unanimously) / 12 rounds
	15th of November	Vanderbilt University Memorial High School, Nashville, Tennessee, United States	Jeff Lacy	Points victory (unanimous) / 12 rounds
2009	April 25	Foxwoods Resort, Mashantucket, Connecticut, United States	Carl Froch	Loss / TKO 12th round
	October 17th	O 2  World , Berlin, Germany	Arthur Abraham	Loss / KO 12th round
2011	30th of December	Morongo Casino Resort & Spa, Cabazon, California, United States	Jessie Nicklow	Victory / TKO 8th round
2012	20th of April	Beau Rivage Resort & Casino, Biloxi, Mississippi, United States	Caleb Truax	Points victory (unanimously) / 10 rounds
(Source: BoxRec database )

Web links

• Jermain Taylor in the BoxRec database
• Jermain Taylor's website
• Jermain Taylor in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )

See also

• List of world middleweight boxing champions

predecessor	Office	successor
Bernard Hopkins	World Middleweight Boxing Champion ( WBA ) July 16, 2005 - December 14, 2006	Vacant Next title holder : Javier Castillejo
Bernard Hopkins	World Middleweight Boxing Champion ( WBC ) July 16, 2005 - September 29, 2007	Kelly Pavlik
Bernard Hopkins	World Middleweight Boxing Champion ( IBF ) July 16, 2005 - October 11, 2005	Vacant Next title holder : Arthur Abraham
Bernard Hopkins	World Middleweight Boxing Champion ( WBO ) July 16, 2005 - September 29, 2007	Kelly Pavlik