(Photo Credit: Craig Bennett/SHOWTIME) By Jim Dower: Former WBC/WBO middleweight champion Jermain Taylor (30-4-1, 18 KO’s) showed tonight in his second fight of his comeback that his chin hasn’t gotten any better during his two years out of the ring, as Taylor was knocked down int he 9th round against little known 2nd tier middleweight Caleb Truax (18-1-1, 10 KO’s) in winning a 10 round unanimous decision on Friday night at the Beau Rivage Resort & Casino, in Biloxi, Mississippi.

The final judges scores were 98-91, 97-92 and 97-94. Taylor was dominating the fight using mostly his jab against a really limited fighter without hand speed or a left hand. However, flattened Taylor with a big right hand in the 9th round, forcing him to get up off the deck and hold on to survive.

Taylor eventually was able to get his wits about him after getting tagged with a few more big shots, but it looked bad for him getting pummeled by a guy he should have been able to blow out without any trouble.

If this is how it’s going to be in Taylor’s comeback then he needs to consider retiring because he can’t be struggling against this level of opposition. He’s supposed to be making easy work of guys like Truax.

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Junior middleweight contender Erislandy Lara (16-1-1, 11 KO’s) completely blew out Ronald Hearns (26-3, 20 KO’s) in a getting a 1st round TKO win in a fight where Hearns tasted the canvas on three separate occasions before the bout was mercifully stopped at 1:34 of the round.

The first knockdown was probably the end for Hearns, because he was hit with a lethal left hand as he trying to land one of his own shots. The punch put Hearns down on his back. Hearns got up and was staggering and looked disoriented. Lara took advantage of that immediately when the action resumed by going after Hearns and burying him with punches causing Hearns to fly into the ropes. It was a scored a knockdown, however, because if the ropes hadn’t been there then Hearns would have hit the deck. Hearns was hardly ready to resume fighting after the second knockdown, but he briefly tried. Lara came right at him and landed two big left hands that sent Hearns down by the ropes. This time he was too badly hurt to get up, and the fight was immediately halted.

Hearns, the son of boxing great Tommy Hearns, just couldn’t handle Lara’s fast and powerful left hands to the head.

This is Hearns’ second TKO loss in a row. He was beaten in his last fight by WBA World middleweight champion Felix Sturm.