Just a few weeks removed from his upset victory over Manny Pacquiao in his native Australia, unbeaten welterweight titleholder Jeff Horn doesn’t have much time for those who believe his unanimous decision win was controversial.
“Everyone keeps coming up with excuses for Manny but the truth is I beat him in the middle of the day,” Horn told CBS Sports during an appearance on the “In This Corner with Brian Campbell” podcast.
Horn (17-0-1, 11 KOs) relied on pressure to frustrate and outpoint Pacquiao (59-7-2, 38 KOs) by judges scores of 117-111 and 115-113 (twice) at Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane.
A storm of outrage by critics over the decision immediately followed (including a formal appeal filed by Pacquiao) which forced the WBO to set up an independent investigation. In the end, a panel of five anonymous judges from around the world rescored the fight and agreed with the original ruling (by an accumulative score of 115-113).
The loudest of said critics came from the ESPN broadcast in the United States, specifically from lead analyst Teddy Atlas and studio personality Stephen A. Smith. Although other commentating teams from around the globe scored the fight close, Atlas and Smith continued to push the narrative that the fight was a robbery.
“It was a bit disappointing how those guys have commentated about the fight, but there’s nothing I can do about it or go back and change,” Horn said. “Hopefully they can be a bit more two-sided when it comes to a possible rematch.
“I don’t know [what they were watching]. Maybe they were just watching Pacquiao and not watching me. It’s not really something I sort of looked much into. I just kind of let them have their opinions.”
Atlas took his opinion one step further. During a post-fight interview outside the ring with Horn, the legendary trainer told “The Hornet” to his face that he didn’t win the fight.
“I was just thinking, ‘Is this guy for real,'” Horn remembered. “I don’t know, it just came out of left field for him to say that but I wasn’t going to let him bring me down at that time.”
