An evenly matched fight, rare even in the best of times, between two champions no less, is in fact exactly what boxing needs?
Saturday night at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York, in a fight televised live on Showtime, IBF World super middleweight champion Badou Jack (20-1-3, 12 KOs), from Las Vegas, Nevada, by way of Stockholm, Sweden, fought WBC World super middleweight champion James DeGale (23-1-1, 14 KOs), the southpaw from Harlesden, London, United Kingdom, to a majority draw after 12 rounds of action.
It was the third defense for both men. The final scores were 114-112 (DeGale) and 113-113 twice.
Fighting out of the blue corner in white trunks trimmed in orange and black, DeGale established to bona fides at the opening bell by dropping his opponent with a straight left 30 seconds into the fight.
Jack, fighting out of the red corner in camouflage trunks with gold trim, came into his own in round three. Although he failed to cut off the ring, he landed several body shots and uppercuts to close the gap.
DeGale won the fourth, according to our card, but Jack opened up in round five, even managing to nail the referee, Arthur Mercante Jr., with an errant left hook at the bell, as if to thank him for a lifetime of so-so refereeing.
DeGale and Jack traded rounds six and seven, with the latter having a huge eighth round and a not-so-huge ninth.
Rounds 10 and 11 were back-and-forth, with the advantage shifting between the two fighters.
Jack evened the score, and perhaps won the fight, in the 12th and final round when he dropped DeGale with a left hook/right hand to the temple.
Jack landed 231 of 743 total punches thrown (31%) to 174 of 617 (28%) for DeGale.
?I thought I won the fight,? said Jack after the bout. ?I finished stronger. He was doing a lot of running. His knockdown was a flash knockdown. I won the fight. He was throwing a lot of shit at my guard.?
Not surprisingly, DeGale did not agree.
?I?ve got huge respect for this man, but I thought I won that,? he said. ?I landed the cleanest shots. He hit me (in the 12th), but I was more off balance. I respect him. He?s a good, all-around fighter. Let?s go again. Let?s do it again in London.?
If ever a fight deserved a rematch it was Badou Jack vs. James DeGale. But Jack has outgrown the 168-pound division and intends to move up in weight.
Jack?s promoter, the omnipresent Floyd Mayweather, seemed especially unhappy at the decision.
?We don?t need to figure it out,? he told Jim Gray after the bout. ?I?m the promoter. This is my fighter. Badou Jack has got too big for 168 pounds. We have plans after this fight to move up to light heavyweight.
?This [result] is bad for boxing. When it?s all said and done, this is really bad for boxing.?
The fight was close and could have gone either way. The fight was many things, but the one thing it was not was ?really bad for boxing.? When Mayweather sucker punched Victor Ortiz, whether it was legal or not, now that was bad for boxing. An evenly matched fight, rare even in the best of times, between two champions no less, is in fact exactly what boxing needs.
