Daniel Jacobs (34-2, 29 KOs) had to battle harder than expected to defeat previously unbeaten junior middleweight Maciej Sulecki (26-1, 10 KOs) in a WBA middleweight title eliminator match on Saturday night at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.
The scores were ridiculously bad by the 3 judges that worked the fight, as Jacobs appeared to just barely win the fight by pulling out the victory by scoring a knockdown in round 12. The judges scored it 116-111, 117-110 and 115-112, all for Jacobs. The 117-110 score was especially bad. Boxing News 24 gave it to Jacobs by 7 rounds to 5 score.
The performance by Jacobs tonight suggests that he’s NOT the best middleweight in the division, as he and his promoter Eddie Hearn have been repeatedly saying for months. When you’re the best fighter in the 160 lb. division, you need to be able to easily defeat fighters that have been hand-picked from the 154lb weight class like Sulecki. Jacobs wasn’t fighting one of the talented contenders tonight at middleweight like Sergiy Derevyanchenko or Jermall Charlo. Had Jacobs been in with either of those fighters, he would have lost. Jacobs is a good fighter, but he’s more like a No.5 or No.6 middleweight, behind Gennady Golovkin, Jermall Charlo, Saul Canelo Alvarez, Derevyanchenko and Billy Joe Saunders.
The win for Jacobs tonight makes him the WBA mandatory challenger to WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin. Jacobs already lost to GGG last year, so hopefully that fight doesn’t have too soon. It’ll look bad if Jacobs keeps getting shots at Golovkin while other contenders are frozen out. Jacobs says he wants to fight Jermall Charlo. Now is a good time for him to prove that by facing him. Frankly, I’d be very surprised if Jacobs gets anywhere near Jermall. Now that Jacobs has a guaranteed title shot against Golovkin as his WBA mandatory, I suspect that his promoter Eddie Hearn will spoon feed him the most beatable recognizable fighters available until he gets his title shot against GGG. Jacobs can’t fight just a stiff though, as he’s under contract with HBO still. They’re going to expect Jacobs to at least fight contenders while he waits for GGG to fight him again. Hopefully, Hearn doesn’t keep picking out 154 lb. fighters for Jacobs to fight like he did tonight in selecting junior middleweight contender Sulecki. Jacobs needs to at least be fighting guys from the middleweight division. As big as Jacobs is, he shouldn’t have to fight guys from the 154 lb. weight class, especially with him saying he’s the best fighter in the 160 lb. division. If Jacobs is the best, then he should be able to fight the best contenders at 160.
The 28-year-old Sulecki looked like the better fighter of the two during the first 8 rounds. What gave Jacobs the edge in the fight was his superior power. Jacobs was able to take over.
Size-wise, Jacobs is more of a super middleweight, but he’s able to still melt down to 160 so fair is fair.
You can understand why Jacobs wouldn’t want to fight at his natural weight of 168 though, as he would come apart at the seams getting hit by the heavy-handed super middleweights like George Groves and David Benavidez. Those guys can hit, and Jacobs has shown a weakness with his punch resistance in the past.
Sulecki was picked out by Jacobs’ promoter Eddie Hearn from the 154lb. weigh class. The fight wasn’t supposed to be this close, but Jacobs showed that he’s not as good as many boxing fans thought he was. Jacobs is lucky that he wasn’t fighting Jermall Charlo tonight, as he would have likely been knocked out quickly.