By Jeff Aranow: IBF junior middleweight champion Jarrett ‘Swift’ Hurd (22-0, 15 KOs) won an exciting 12 round split decision win over WBA Super World junior middleweight champion Erislandy ‘The American Dream’ Lara (25-3-2, 14 KOs) on Saturday night in their unification fight at the Hard Rock Hotel & Las Vegas, Nevada.
With the fight in the balance, the 27-year-old Hurd knocked Lara down with a short left hook in the 12th round. Lara was hurt from the knockdown, but he was able to get up and still throw some nice shots. Hurd dominated the final 27 seconds in the round after the knockdown. Lara at least fought hard until the end of the grueling fight.
The knockdown was the deciding factor in the fight. The judges scored it 114-113, 114-113 for Hurd, and 114-113 for Lara. Boxing News 24 scored it 114-113 for Hurd. He clearly won the fight with his late rally in the championship rounds 8 through 12.
The size difference between the two fighters was significant. That’s what did the job for Hurd. He was stalking Lara and landing monstrous shots one after another. Lara was getting nailed with so many uppercuts on the inside. Hurd wasn’t loading up on everything he threw, but his size and heavy hands made those punches powerful, and Lara was just soaking up the shots like a sponge. You’ve got to give Lara a lot of credit for being able to take as many punches as he did, because he was hit with just as many punches as Hurd’s last two opponents Austin Trout and Tony Harrison, but he was able to land the shots and fire back with his punches. Lara’s shots weren’t as hard, but he was getting the attention of Hurd at times.
At the start of the 12th, Hurd suddenly started loading up with tremendous bombs with both hands. Lara took the shots, but he was taking horrible punishment from the heavy shots that he was getting nailed with by Hurd. It was clear that if Hurd was able to keep hitting Lara, he was going to go down at some point in the round. Sure enough, Hurd backed Lara up against the ropes and landed a short, powerful left hook to the head of Lara that put him on his hands and knees. Lara stayed down for a long time before he finally got back. The referee Kenny Bayless used a lot of time repeatedly asking Lara if he was OK after he got back to his feet. The time spent checking Lara over might have saved him from getting knocked out in the fight.
Lara suffered a cut over his right eye in the 12th round. The swelling on the eye had been for Lara since the 7th round. The swelling got worse with each progressing round until finally the cut opened for Lara in the 12th.
Lara landed 176 of 522 shots for a 31 percent connect percentage. Hurd connected on 217 of 827 punches. Hurd was the much busier fighter of the two, and he took command of the fight with his high work rate to punish and get the better of the 34-year-old Lara in rounds 8 through 12.
”I was in control the whole fight. I got the knockdown,” Hurd said after the fight.
Hurd wasn’t in control in the entire fight. Hurd started slowly in the first two rounds, not putting enough pressure on Lara to win any of those rounds. However, Hurd started to land big shots beginning in round 3, and he focused a lot of attention to shots to Lara’s body. The punches to the midsection that Hurd landed in the first three rounds seemed to take the legs away from Lara, as he wasn’t able to move around the ring like he normally does. It didn’t matter though, as even when Lara was moving, the towering 6’1” Hurd was able to quickly cut off the ring on him and land big punches to the body and head. Hurd’s reach advantage was crucial in the fight. When Hurd was on the outside, he was able to reach Lara with his punches and land with more power. That might be one of the reasons why Lara chose to stay in close, so that he wouldn’t get hit with as hard of shots.
”Besides falling in the last round, I felt I was winning the fight easy,” Lara said afterwards. ”That [one punch] didn’t decide the fight. I was winning the fight. 100%, I want the rematch. The problem was the eye. I couldn’t see,” Lara said.
In the 11th round, Lara was getting worked over most of the three minute round, but in the final seconds, he landed a hard left to the head of Hurd that snapped his head back. It was a good enough shot to give Lara the round.
In the final round, Hurd looked like a man possessed the way he stormed out of the gates, nailing Lara with very hard punches to the head and body. Lara’s head whiplashing with each big punch that Hurd was hitting and his face was swelling even worse. Lara took some major shots in the round, and it was a miracle that he was able to keep from getting knocked out.
Lara says he wants a rematch with Hurd, but the fight likely won’t happen next. Hurd could face WBC junior middleweight champion Jermell Charlo in his next fight as part of Showtime unification tourney. Hurd is now the IBF/WBA junior middleweight champion. The only titles not in Hurd’s possession are Charlo’s WBC belt and Sadam Ali’s WBO strap. Getting the fight against Charlo will be easy, but Hurd likely won’t get a chance to fight for the WBO title unless another fighter like Kell Brook defeats him to win the belt. Lara would likely be better off going in the direction of WBO champion Sadam Ali for his next fight, because the 27-year-old Hurd has too much power, too much size and too much youth for him. I think the rematch will be more one-sided in favor of Hurd than the first fight, because he knows how to beat Lara now. Hurd as too much size.
