September 29, 2007: Kelly Pavlik roars back to stop Jermain Taylor

It’s hard to believe this month marks 16 years since Youngstown, Ohio’s Kelly “The Ghost” Pavlik stormed back from the brink of defeat to stop unbeaten WBC, WBO middleweight champion Jermain Taylor.

Pavlik turned pro under Top Rank Promotions, and they had high hopes for the tall, powerful middleweight. Pavlik wasn’t put in soft on his way to a title facing world title challenger Bronco McKart, rugged bangers Lenord Pierre and Jose Luis Zertiuche, and power-punching, world title challenger Edison Miranda, all before his title shot. 

This was a fighter that Top Rank was testing, and he passed all of them with flying colors.

In 2007, Pavlik and Taylor, both undefeated, fought at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City. Taylor was defending his titles won from Bernard Hopkins two years prior. (His only blemish was a 12-round draw with awkward spoiler Ronald “Winky” Wright a year before). 

While Pavlik appeared to have a size and reach advantage, Taylor, who had beaten Hopkins twice, soon found his timing and started to unload on Pavlik who seemed to be struggling to get into his rhythm early in the fight. By round 2, Taylor had Pavlik down and looking like he had met his match in his first title bout. While Pavlik survived the round, he didn’t look good and went back to his corner to regroup.

And regroup he did.

Over the next 5 rounds, Pavlik established his jab, started to back up the champion, and landed powerful shots to the head and body that were taking a toll on Arkansas’ Taylor. 

Finally, after going from surviving some early tough spots to taking control of the fight, Pavlik finished the job. In the 7th round, he rocked Taylor with a hard right, clearly hurting a retreating soon-to-be former champ. Pavlik backed him into a corner and proceeded to unload lefts and rights to the head that saw the champ sag into the corner in a heap as (late) referee Steve Smoger jumped in to wave it off.

The final flurry that finished the former champion allowed Pavlik to wrap a world title around his waist as the culmination of one of the great comebacks in boxing.

A couple of years ago, when I interviewed Kelly, we chatted about the fight. He said that even though he was down, and hit with some clean shots, he always had his wits about him, and at no time did he feel like he was not going to be able to continue in the 2nd round assault.

“My legs were gone for a second, but my head was clear all the time. I could hear specific people in the crowd yelling. I was trying to get my legs under me again, but my head was100% clear”, he said. “I got up, shook it off and survived the round. Then, I knew as the rounds went on I knew my power would catch up and we’d get him later and that is what happened”, he said. 

The friendly, well-spoken Pavlik went on to fight for 4 more years. In that time, he went an impressive 7-2 and faced Bernard Hopkins and Sergio Martinez among others.

Pavlik, despite being 4-0 in his last year in the sport, didn’t secure a couple of the marquee names he was hoping to land before retiring so decided to say goodbye to boxing in the summer of 2012.

An outstanding career that featured one of the most exciting comebacks and (title-winning) victories you could hope to see. A great fight in a career of great, and exciting, fights.

Thanks for the memories, Champ!