Jermain Taylor looks to rebound and gain revenge

Jermain Taylor should be given credit for going right back into the fire that is Kelly Pavlik, who beat down Taylor last Sept. 29 on his way to a seventh-round knockout, taking Taylor’s two middleweight titles.

Often when a fighter gets stopped in alarming fashion, he is wise to take a fight with someone who isn’t a killer so as to regain his confidence.

But Taylor and his promoter, Lou DiBella, both said Monday during a Beverly Hills news conference promoting Saturday’s rematch in Las Vegas that they are not interested in so-called tune-up fights. Again, Taylor is to be commended. We don’t want to lose sight of that.
However, what is not so commendable is Taylor trying to say that he was not mentally and physically prepared to fight Pavlik the first time. He said he “got comfortable.” How, Taylor was asked, do you become comfortable knowing you are about to fight Pavlik, who had just knocked out fellow knockout artist Edison Miranda in the seventh round four months earlier?
“Because you haven’t lost,” said Taylor, who was 27-0-1 going into the first fight with Pavlik. “Because you haven’t lost and you beat the best, the man (Bernard Hopkins) who’s supposed to be the best. Because I never seen Pavlik fight. I didn’t watch the Edison Miranda fight. I don’t really watch boxing period. If they put a guy in front of me and say he’s the best, that’s who I fight. That’s the way I’ve always been. That’s just the way it is.

“As far as overlooking … I’m not going to say I overlooked Kelly, but I didn’t do what I was supposed to do in the gym. How I used to train and the things I used to do, I didn’t do it. It’s a shame for me to get up here and say that because I was middleweight champ of the world. So you say how can I say that? That’s what happened.”

Trainer Emanuel Steward was in Taylor’s corner for the loss to Pavlik. Taylor was asked Monday if Steward let him get away with slacking off during preparation for that fight. Taylor would not go there, and instead blamed himself.

“I’ll put that on me because I know what it takes to climb to the top and I kind of let it slide,” said Taylor, who parted ways with Steward after the loss to Pavlik.

Speaking of Steward, he was quoted in this space a couple of weeks ago as saying that he was not able to develop Taylor the way he might have because Taylor was given too many tough opponents in succession. Taylor has taken on Hopkins twice, Winky Wright, Kassim Ouma, Cory Spinks and Pavlik in his past six fights. All were either champions or former champions.

“I don’t know,” Taylor said. “I’ve had some great opponents, I’ve had some wierd opponents. Now I’m facing a strong opponent who comes to fight. But as far as it hindering me, I’m going to say that the way I feel right now, it made me better.

“Everything happens for a reason. I got my butt kicked for a reason, because I wasn’t doing what I was supposed to be doing in that ring. Now look at me. I feel like I’m at the top of my game right now.”

Then again, perhaps Taylor, 29, already hit the high note of his career. One of the biggest knocks on him is that he is a hyper, or nervous, fighter. Not scared, mind you, but nervous to the point that he can’t be all that he can be thanks to a personality that doesn’t allow him to retain a calm and a patience that can be tremendously beneficial to a fighter.

Certainly that seemed to be the case when he threw punches without rhyme or reason after decking Pavlik in the second round in September. His antsy nature seemed to prevent him from landing more devastating punches and Pavlik (32-0, 29 KOs) was let off the hook.

But again, Taylor (27-1-1, 17 KOs) is stepping back up to the plate in an effort to restore the good feeling he got from winning the middleweight championship from Hopkins in July 2005. Taylor won’t be able to get back his belts with a victory because Saturday’s rematch is being contested at a catch-weight of 166 pounds, six over the middleweight limit. But there was no way he was going to wait any longer to try and get back the rest of what he lost that night.

“Jermain is not an interim-fight kind of guy. He’s not a tune-up fight kind of guy,” DiBella said. “Since he turned pro, it’s been about fighting the biggest and the best. And I knew in my heart that when he walked out of that ring (in September) … that the champion in him was not going to let him do anything else other than try to regain what he had worked so hard for because he wanted to regain his dignity and his legacy.

“And I wasn’t surprised at all when he made this decision and I support him in this decision. And I think Feb. 16 he is going to prove he made the right decision.”

Taylor apparently didn’t even consider not invoking the rematch clause written into the contract of the first fight.

“A lot of people have said to me, ‘Why don’t you take a tune-up and get your confidence back?’ ” Taylor said. “I don’t need a tune-up fight to get my confidence back. I never lost my confidence. I can beat Kelly Pavlik.”

Besides, Taylor said, “I hate when boxers do that, take a tune-up fight. What does that prove?”

Absolutely nothing.