If Jermain Taylor wasn't such a nice guy...

I rarely hear anyone saying he is or was anything more than a very talented fighter at his best, which he was, so I don't know what the problem is. :conf Yeah, HBO wanted him to be one of their stars and talked him up, but he was in the position to be hyped on his own merit too. It's not like we're getting Taylor VS Hagler threads popping up or anything.

 

Exactly. The fact that the boxing establishment robbed Hopkins and Wright to build this guy's record is an injustice that should receive more attention in this sport. Two ATGs were shafted, Hopkins TWICE!atsch

 

Yup, I have a page long explanation somewhere that HBO needed a fresh American money maker and thus milked the crap out of Taylor, blowing him up to the moon.

 

The wins over Hopkins and draw with Winky were hardly robberies. You could make a case for Taylor winning all three, and given his opponents styles, it's not hard to see why the fans and judges would favour Taylor. I had Winky winning their fight but I don't see it as a robbery or anything like that.

Regardless of what HBO said or did, Taylor fought Hopkins and Winky, two excellent fighters, and did very well against both. You could argue what he deserved and even if you think he lost three close fights, that's enough to mean he wasn't just a HBO hypejob. A true hypejob would have been schooled by Hopkins and Winky.

 

You may add Spinks decision there too

 

Exactly this :deal

I had Taylor winning all 3 as well.

 

All you do is troll and type ****.

Can't remember the last time I read a post from you on boxing that made sense. :tired

 

I thought wright beat Taylor. However, Hopkins MAY have scrapped a draw in the first fight but he was clearly beaten in the rematch

 

upon last watch I had Hopkins win the first but get dominated in the second and Wright was a point or 2 either way its that close

Taylor reigned quite a while and never lived up to the expectations put on him......then he got beat by the next big thing Pavlik

and then Pavlik amounted to about the same as Taylor reigned a decent amount of time never lived up to what we expected and then he got beat by the next big thing

then they both hit lay offs and are fighting similar levels of comp debating going back to 160 or being 168

 

I don't have a problem with networks hyping up a guy that beat Hopkins twice. That's smart business.

 

Jermain Taylor was manufactured by HBO and some very powerful people in Boxing.

Roy Jones has fallen.
De La Hoya is a part time fighter who's just gone more seriously into promotion.
Shane Mosley is aging.
Bernard Hopkins is considered old.

Floyd Mayweather wasn't yet the huge star he would become.

America needed to create a new face, to keep/put Boxing into relevance in the United States. So they picked a guy who won an Olympic medal, had a good back story (his father walks out, he chooses Boxing over being in a gang etc.) Taylor had a certain charm, he's a nice guy.

They match him VERY carefully, with guys like Joppy, and Edouard before putting him in the ring with the afformentioned aged Hopkins. (Bear in mind almost ALL of JT's fights have been on HBO, so he has started a following and gained mass publicity.)

Regardless of how you scored the fights, he was given BOTH of them. Jim Lampley says something along the lines of 'We have a new star in Boxing.'

Taylor fights Winky Wright, who was considered a smaller guy than JT. Winky was getting recognition after his domination of Tito who it must be noted was an even smaller guy than Wink. It looked like very good matchmaking by DiBella/HBO.
Jermain Taylor does not impress and lost that fight in alot of peoples eyes.

They cut the hype machine back a little and he defends against Spinks and Ouma, 2 fighters who he should of KO'd, thus restoring his aura of dominance, he looks poor in both fights.

Jermain Taylor was a B+ Boxer who achived what he did through politics, IMO.

 

BHop got beat, twice - close but clear

 

Jt had the raw abilities to be special. Hbo had no idea Jt would be this flawed and "dumb" in the sense that he didn't think his way through a fight. And the 3 fights you mentioned were all really close. Hardly robberies.

 

Flopkins clearly lost both fights...I scored the Wright fight for Taylor, but it was razor thin.

and he was a very good fighter. Was clearly beating both Pavlik and Froch before the KOs