By Nate Anderson: In the latest boxing news, WBC super middleweight champion Joe Calzaghe has decided to vacate his WBC title, leaving it open for the next available contenders, in this case Carl Froch (23-0, 19 KOs) and former middleweight champion Jermain Taylor (27-2-1, 17 KOs), now fighting as a super middleweight. However, it’s unclear whether Taylor, 29, whom has lost back to back fights against Kelly Pavlik, would be interested in facing the hard-hitting but largely unknown Froch, as Taylor has been reportedly showing interest in fighting former IBF super middleweight champion Jeff Lacy instead. A fight against the still popular Lacy, though greatly diminished since his loss to Calzaghe in 2006, would likely be a much more appealing fight in terms of the media than a bout against Froch, even without a title on the line.
Froch, 30, has been waiting in the wings for a title shot for more than a year, hoping either Calzaghe or Mikkel Kessler would give him a shot at their titles. However, neither fighter has shown any inclination of wanting to give him a chance at their titles, perhaps in part because of his tremendous power in either than which makes him too dangerous to take on unless they would absolutely have to at the threat of being stripped. In this case, Calzaghe never did give him a shot at the title, choosing instead to fight around him against softer punchers like Hopkins and Kessler. Now Froch may find himself bypassed once again, if Taylor chooses instead to fight the seemingly easier Lacy, who for his part hasn’t been nearly the same fighter he once was since losing by a landslide 12-round unanimous decision to Calzaghe in their 2006 fight.
In hindsight, Lacy wasn’t nearly ready for such an advanced and highly skilled fighter as Calzaghe at this early point in his career, and ended up taking a vicious beating. The worse part, however, was what it appeared to do to Lacy’s self-confidence, for he seemed to lose more in that area than he did from the actual defeat. Since that time, Lacy has experienced a traumatic injury to his rotator cuff on his left throwing shoulder, an injury which has taken a lot of the tremendous power that Lacy once had with his left hook.
Still, as previously mentioned, Lacy remains a very popular fighter, albeit with much less power than he had earlier in his career before suffering the shoulder injury. It will be no wonder, then, if Taylor chooses to fight Lacy instead of Froch, because this would be an easy payday for Taylor, who probably could use a shot of confidence after his two consecutive losses to Pavlik. Even before the fights against Pavlik, however, Taylor hadn’t looked good in some time, struggling against Kassim Ouma, Cory Spinks, Winky Wright and Bernard Hopkins.
Indeed, Taylor arguably hasn’t looked good in fight dating back three years to his fight against Daniel Edouard, whom he stopped in the 3rd round in February 2005. Whether his poor performances were to the natural aging process, bad technique or poor training, is still unclear at this juncture, but what is clear, though, is that Taylor has looked nothing like the promising fighter that he was three years ago. Changing trainers hasn’t made any difference, either. This is perhaps why Taylor will skip over fighting the dangerous Froch, and choose something more easy, like Lacy.