Although most fighters with famous fathers appear poor and average there is one fighter who has a famous father and seems to be going places is 22 year old hard punching John Jackson (9-0, 8), the son of the legendary banger Julian Jackson. John, and older brother Julius (10-0, 6) are both pencilled in to fight on Tuesday in an obscure card in Uruguay though both have been somewhat forgotten fighters in the ranks of “jr's”.
John is a light middleweight fighting in the same division where his father made a name for himself. Julian won the WBA title in the division in 1987 by beating In Chul Baek for the title and John will have that the achievement of his father to aspire too (who would also become the WBC Middleweight champion on 2 separate occasions). Though comparisons to his dad are currently somewhat unfair, so lets look at John for who John is.
Born in January 1989, just 17 months after brother Julian, John made his first major mark on the boxing word by defeating Pan-Am champion Pedro Lima (from Brazil) in an Olympic qualifier prior to the 2008 games in Beijing. Although Jackson was defeated in the 2nd round at the Olympic games the 19 year old had caught the eye of some promoters. A 10-0 loss to eventual bronze medal winner Kim Jung-Joo of South Korea was nothing to be ashamed of.
Rather than remain an amateur John would turn professional and alongside his older brother make his debut on 30th January 2009, just 2 weeks after turning 20. John would beat fellow debutant Alphonso Alexander in the 2nd round to start his career as a professional on a high note. (video of the fight can be found at the bottom of this blog). Despite an obvious blow after the bell to end the opening round the youngster looked rather good, he showed good power in his right hand and hurt Alexander numerous times with shots to the head.
John's first few opponents were incredibly raw novices, his first 4 opponents had a combined 1 fight (a 4 round draw) to their name and Jackson needed just 6 rounds to get rid of all 4 of them. His first opponent with any true experience was Rafael de la Cruz (2-34, 1) an opponent who was there to try and get a few rounds of experience out of the young Jackson. De la Cruz managed to survive into the 3rd round though didn't have enough to stave off the Jackson attack and was stopped like the previous 4 men.
2009 had been an easy year for Jackson, a year for him to get used to the pressures of the professional sport. 2010 was however a whole different ball game, this time Jackson was going to tested. His first bout of the year was against Mexican Alvaro Clinton Ayala who entered with a respectable 19-8 (10) record. Ayala's record although respectable for a 5 fight novice to face did include a 6 fight losing streak going in including 3 by knockout. Jackson would need just 3 rounds to extend his own record to 5-0 (5). This was swiftly followed by a 43 second blow out of the then 6-10 Valerio Marte. To end 2010 Jackson faced the 24 year old 9-0 (5) Manuel Martinez and was taken into the 4th round for the first time in his career. Jackson would keep his KO streak alive by stopping Martinez in the 4th as he extend his KO streak to 8 and his record still stood at a perfect 8-0 (8).
In his only fight of 2011 so far Jackson would be extended the distance for the first time as Carlos Argentinian Andres Araya (7-4 entering) took Jackson to the end of the scheduled 6 round contest. Jackson may not have managed to stop Araya though he had managed to win every round of the fight and proved he could fight for 6 rounds. On Tuesday Jackson faces his stiffest test to date when he meets Brazilian puncher Welson Alves de Oliveira (14-4, 12). Oliveira sports an impressive record “on paper” though his record is somewhat padded and his most notable fight to date was a 3rd round loss to Britain's Denton Vassell in December 2010. A victory for Jackson is expected and the result should be compared directly to that of Vassell who is the current Commonwealth Welterweight champion.
Whether John will ever get close to the achievements of his 3-time, 2 weight world champion father isn't really something that we should concern ourselves with quite yet, the 22 year old still has a lot of developing to do, though we should be more than a little excited about him.
Video courtesy of rockcity45
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