Taylor rises for decision

BILOXI, Miss. — Thirty seconds into the ninth round of the middleweight bout Friday night, Caleb Truax fired a right hook that sent Jermain Taylor to the mat at the Beau Rivage Casino and Resort.

Staggering to his feet and surviving the standing eight count, the 33-year-old Little Rock native’s comeback after a 26-month layoff looked doomed to the same thing that started the hiatus - a late round knockout.

But Taylor repeatedly tied up Truex, survived the round and went to claim a 10-round unanimous decision.

“I don’t care if I get knocked down,” said Taylor, a former middleweight world champion who had lost 4 of 5 fights before returning to the ring in December. “Who gives a damn? They’ve got to get me out of there or I’m beating them.”

Judge Keith Hughes scored the fight 98-91, Terry Larry Engel 97-92 and David Toronto 97-94, all in favor of Taylor.

Against a conservative Truax, Taylor ( 30-4-1) connected on only 30.2 percent (146 of 282) of his punches, despite throwing twice as many as jabs and landed 10 fewer body punches than his foe from Minnesota.

Entering the fight, Truax (19-1-1) said his plan was to test Taylor’s stamina and try to step inside his jab for combinations.

But working at a higher tempo, Taylor landed enough punches early to build a solid enough lead by the fifth round that trainer Pat Burns advised his fighter not to take absurd risks.

“You don’t need to trade with this guy,” Burns said in the corner between the fifth and sixth rounds.

Outside of the occasional jab, Taylor was content to tie up Truax when he stepped in.

But Taylor, who has faced criticism for wearing down in later rounds, let his left hand drop after throwing a jab to open the ninth round.

Truax, who landed just 29.7 percent of his punches, snapped a right hook to Taylor’s chin, and Taylor dropped to his rear. As Taylor got to his feet, the fight seemed reminiscent of his final round knockout losses to of Carl Froch and Arthur Abraham, both in 2009.

But Taylor pulled himself together, went into survival mode and held on. Afterward, he said it was fine for critics to point out how history was almost repeated.

“Talk about it. I got back up and did my thing,” Taylor said.

He did say he made a fundamental mistake by dropping his hand and allowing Truax to capitalize.

“Hand down. Yep. But we’ll work on that,” Taylor said, watching a television replay of the knockdown. “That’s all I’ve been thinking about is how I’m going to act when I get knocked down.”