Between them, boxing greats Mike McCallum and Julian Jackson scored a number of memorable KO’s. And as we know, both men won, between them, a handful of world titles. Yet it is often forgotten how KO monster Jackson, known as “The Hawk,” was taken out in just two rounds when he met “Bodysnatcher” McCallum in August of 1986.
And it wasn’t just the Jamaican’s feared body shots that took out the lethal banger from The Virgin Islands.
The two met, as unbeatens, on August 23rd, the fight going down at the Convention Center in Miami Beech. McCallum, perfect at 26-0, was making the third defence of his WBA 154 pound belt. Jackson was also spotless at 29-0, and he was making his first assault on a world title.
In a short but sweet battle, Jackson came out blazing, his punches visibly troubling, indeed shaking McCallum – Jackson’s bomb of a left hook scoring and doing noticeable harm. But McCallum was made of super-stern stuff, and he managed to remain cool, calm and collected as the fireworks exploded. And, in round two, McCallum, by far more seasoned and experienced operator of the two, went to work, on both the head and body of his challenger.
And McCallum’s precision punching sent Jackson to the canvas, on one knee. Jackson got up, but he was soon rammed into the ropes, this from some of the best combos ever let loose by one of the best combination punchers in the business. Jackson, under fire, was looking to land a fight-equaliser of a counter, but McCallum instead closed the show with his blistering shots to head and body. After a nasty, but at the same time, quite beautiful to watch sequence of punches that had Jackson’s head rolling around, the referee had seen enough and he dived in. The fight, between two genuine greats, was all over after less than six minutes.
McCallum would score a famously celebrated, one-punch KO over Don Curry in 1987, while Jackson would go on to score a whole bunch of highlight reel KO’s over the coming years. But on the evening of August 23 in 1986, McCallum’s educated blows won the day, this as he dealt with a savage puncher who was taken out mere seconds after he had shown just how dangerous he was.
For the record, McCallum was never once stopped in a fight, while Jackson was stopped in each of his six losses.
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