“Detract from what?”: Charlo Derails Williams

By Jimmy Tobin–

Saturday night, at the USC Galen Center in Los Angeles, California, Jermall Charlo defended his sliver of the super welterweight championship by fifth round TKO. The victory came at the expense of earnest but overmatched Julian Williams, who, provided the opportunity to make good on a year of bold proclamations, delivered a belligerent moment or two where it actually mattered, before leaving the ring with his head barely attached.

What Charlo-Williams offered, what aficionados are offered too infrequently, is an evenly matched prizefight on a premium network; a fight where the winner is in doubt both before the opening bell, and frequently enough during the fight to imbue not only the exchanges but those tense moments of inaction with a drama so often absent from the inevitable. Never mind that both fighters were undefeated—an undefeated record is as much a masking agent as an indicator of merit. And never mind that Charlo held a title, given that he won that belt over a man in his forties, and first defended it against someone named Wilky Campfort. What mattered is that within minutes of them keeping no company but each other, Charlo and Williams recognized the quality of opponent before them and were concerned but unbowed by that knowledge.

There is no moment in the fight more significant than the one that saw Charlo roll Williams’ right hand and counter it with an uppercut. That punch, the beginning of the end, set Williams’ head at an angle almost perpendicular to his neck and drove him so forcibly to the canvas he nearly bounced up to his knees and elbows. Williams played off its affect as best he could, bringing to mind fellow Philadelphian, Eric Harding, who, ruined by Antonio Tarver’s left hand, offered the utterance, “I’m from Philadelphia” as justification for fighting on. Fight on Williams would, but only until Charlo, swinging not to prompt the referee’s mercy but to leave Williams in a heap, tumbled him to the canvas once more.

Whatever blows they exchanged prior, including the Charlo jab that floored Williams with in the second round, and the counter crosses Williams chased Charlo’s jab back with, were evidence enough that both men understood what tools might serve them best against each other and that none of those tactics would come free of charge. It was a fight fought evenly until, in a flash, one man could fight no longer, and since what matters most always transpires between the ropes, Charlo’s landing his decapitator is the defining moment of the night.

And yet, it may not be what he is remembered for. At least not entirely.

In the aftermath, Charlo, still burning, refused to accept Williams’ congratulations, a move that drove the crowd to boo him for his lack of grace. Asked by foremost expert in classlessness, Jim Grey, whether his poor sportsmanship might detract from his victory, Charlo responded: “Detract from what? I knocked him out?”

It is a fair question to ask, however unpopular it may have been to a crowd that responded to Charlo’s asking it like it should have been issued a trigger warning.

Williams, who became Charlo’s mandatory in March, dogged him for nearly year, calling Charlo out and promising to take his title. His bandwagon—strangely full for a fighter who, beyond being accessible on social media and having an appealing moniker, had done little to justify many of the absurd claims made about his ability—also got in on the act from bathrooms, bus stops, and bar stools across the country. That ten-month keyboard assault fueled Charlo, who remained at 154 pounds only to shut Williams’ mouth. That he made good on that opportunity hardly means he need be friendly to his tormentor afterward, and if that does not fit into some romantic notion of how a man who is stripped near naked and sent out to leave another unconscious should act, so what?

The challenge the Charlo twins always faced, quite understandably, was that they were near indistinguishable from one another; a problem exacerbated by the absence of star power in their division and the fact that neither had a signature moment in the ring. But that is no longer the case. Jermall is now the Charlo brother who turned “J-Rock” to rubble and then reveled in it with zero regard for decorum.

Had Charlo responded more graciously people might have felt better about enjoying the spectacle of one man beating another to the ground with his fists. But if one of the goals a fighter has is to leave the crowd wanting to see him again, that approach would have done less for Charlo than his heel turn. And proof of that is that days later, people are not still talking about how Charlo planked Williams: they are talking about how Charlo planked Williams then acted like a goon, and whether such behavior did him a disservice or otherwise. True, Charlo will squander all that buzz if his next fight is unremarkable, but his behavior Saturday with fist and microphone in his face make that fight worthy of anticipation.

Sergey Kovalev can attribute much of his popularity to his maliciousness, so too can Terence Crawford, who interestingly enough, was considered a bore until his mean streak became an undeniable fixture in his performances. Perhaps Charlo too has this uncomfortable yet alluring quality about himself, and all that was needed was a night of genuine enmity to usher it forth. If so, may he harbor such ill will toward all of his coming opponents.