Wladimir Klitschko handed Bryant Jennings his first loss tonight in New York City. The final scores were 116-111 twice and 118-109?
Saturday night at New York?s Madison Square Garden, in a fight televised live on HBO, WBA/WBO/IBF/IBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko (64-3, 53 KOs), from Kiev, Ukraine, by way of Zhangiztobe, Kazakhstan, handed Bryant ?By-By? Jennings (19-1, 10 KOs), from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, his first loss. It went to the scorecards after 12 rounds. The judges had it 116-111 twice and 118-109.
The fight was Klitschko?s first appearance in the US since 2008 and expectations ran high. Klitschko defeated Jennings, but not without difficulty, and didn?t look good doing it.
Fighting out of the red corner in red trunks with gold trim, Klitschko is bigger than Jennings. He?s more experienced than Jennings. He?s more talented than Jennings. He?s also as used to the big stage and Jennings is used to Philadelphia.
But Jennings, fighting out of the blue corner in black and purple trunks, had something that Klitschko did not. It might be a chin. It might be enthusiasm.
With his late start and limited skills, Jennings had a snowball?s chance in hell of winning. So he brought the fight to Klitschko. He may have come up short. He may have failed where other men had failed before him. But he threw caution to the wind, dove head-first into Steelhammer, and wailed away at everything within his vicinity. Sometimes he hit Klitschko. Sometimes he hit molecules. If if it moved it was all the same to Bryant Jennings.
Jennings? reach exceeded his grasp. Klitschko?s long arms, firepower, his other-worldly athleticism was too much for the whirling dervish. Jennings ate punches, a dozen rights and a zillion boring jabs. He absorbed everything Klitschko had to offer. He shook off punches the way a tank shakes off bullets.
Klitschko?s performance was a less than exemplary Klitschko performance. Unlike the defeatist European heavyweights Klitschko?s been beating, Bryant Jennings came to fight, and if necessary to die. Klitschko danced. He grabbed Jennings so many times that the referee finally deducted a point. Klitschko refused to engage. He did enough to win. He always does enough to win. It was a dominant but mediocre performance by the greatest heavyweight alive.
Boxing can?t escape the ghosts of its past. Tonight at Madison Square Garden we saw the ghost of the of the future. That future doesn?t involve Wladimir Klitschko. It?s about Deontay Wilder. It?s about Tyson Fury.
