Spence stops Brook to earn his hype and title
Despite being undefeated with most of his victories being by knockout there were always just a few lingering questions about Errol Spence Jr. and whether he could go from the great class to the elite class in boxing. On Saturday in Sheffield, England, he answered all those questions and won his first world championship by beating hometown favorite Kell Brook for the IBF welterweight title with an 11th-round TKO.
Spencer (22-0, 19 KOs) pummeled Brook, who was viewed as one of the very elite welterweights in the world. After 11 rounds, Brook’s eye was nearly swollen shut and he could not continue the fight.
The fight joined a growing list of tremendous boxing clashed in 2017 as both fighters put it all out there and never shied away from any moment to not only throw some heavy punches, but also take a few shots. The 27-year-old Spence certainly did take some of Brooks’ best punches, but he was never phased by them and out-landed Brook 246-136, according to CompuBox.
Early in the fight, it was about as even as it could be, but after the eighth round, when all the damage finally started to show in Brook’s eye, Spence was pulling away. His speed and accuracy at both distance and inside were way too much for Brook, who was struggling to locate his opponent anyway.
In the ninth round, Spencer hit Brook with a hard body shot that forced the former champion to back up and make some space to recover. At the start of the next round, Spencer was in full attack mode. He put Brook up against the ropes, swamped him with a barrage of punches and sent him to the floor.
Brook got back up and rallied to make for one of the best rounds of the year so far, but there was no great recovery. Spence continued marching toward Brook in the 11th round. Brook willingly took a knee and allowed referee Howard Foster to count him out.
Spencer was winning on all three scorecards to that point (97-92, 96-93, 95-94).
Brook claimed he simply could not see and was stuck with double vision in the 11th round so he was forced to stop.
For Brook, this is his first loss at welterweight. Before he moved up to middleweight to take on Gennady Golovkin last September, Brook was 36-0. After losing in his return to welterweight Brook said it could be possible to see him move up to super welterweight to finally fight countryman Amir Khan in a highly-anticipated showdown.
But for Spence, this is just the beginning of great things for him. He is on a mission to unify the welterweight champions. he’s long called out Keith Thurman, but now with a belt around his waist, he has something to offer the WBA and WBC welterweight champion. And of course, WBO welterweight champion Manny Pacquaio was brought up as an option. The Filipino champion is scheduled to defend his title against Jeff Horn in Australia on July 2.
Corey Johns
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