Charlo brothers have twin titles after a historic night
Jermall Charlo lands a left against Austin Trout during their IBF super-welterweight title fight in Las Vegas on Saturday.
Reporting from Las Vegas — Boxing’s 154-pound division is now twin-sized.
Unbeaten identical twins Jermall and Jermell Charlo of Houston each won super-welterweight title fights Saturday at the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas, marking the first time in the sport’s annals that such a feat has happened.
Jermall retained his International Boxing Federation belt by defeating veteran former champion Austin Trout by unanimous decision and Jermell won the vacant World Boxing Council belt by knocking out John Jackson in the eighth round.
“My brother and I made history. I knew my brother would get the job done,” Jermall (24-0) said after the judges gave him a 115-113 (John McKaie), 116-112 (Robert Hoyle), 116-112 (Glenn Trowbridge) victory over the game Trout (30-3).
In the main event, Cuba’s Erislandy Lara defended his World Boxing Assn. super-welterweight belt by defeating Glendale’s Vanes Martirosyan by unanimous decision.
Lara (23-2-2) out-boxed the gritty Martirosyan (36-3-1), saying, “I’m an intelligent fighter and in no way did I feelthis could be lost.”
Jermall won at least five of the first eight rounds on the judges’ cards, relying on his power-punching advantage to control the fight. He buckled Trout’s knees with a third-round punch and ultimately opened a cut by Trout’s right eye by the ninth.
Trout’s toughness impressed as he picked up three of the final four rounds on Trowbridge’s card, out-boxing Jermall, but the punches he landed clean had little effect on the champion.
Jermall landed 130 punches compared to Trout’s 117, and out-jabbed Trout, 54-45, to set up a mandatory title defense against unbeaten Philadelphia fighter Julian Williams.
“Austin Trout is a hell of a fighter, I can see why he beat [Miguel] Cotto and gave Canelo [Alvarez] a good fight … tremendous competitor, but there’s no way you can contain a lion,” Jarmell said.
Jermell made the brothers simultaneous champions in the division in the opening Showtime bout, changing his deliberate boxing style through seven rounds to aggressively pursue Jackson in the eighth and win by knockout 51 seconds into the round.
Jermell Charlo tries to land an overhand right against John Jackson during their WBC super-welterweight title fight on Saturday in Las Vegas.
“It’s history. We did it. We’ve been boxing for all of these years and it had to happen,” Jermell said. “I was behind. He was boxing, he was moving around a lot. That was unexpected of him. I thought he was going to come out to brawl. I had to make an adjustment and I did.”
Jackson (20-3) was ahead, 69-64, on all three scorecards through seven rounds in which he was mostly the aggressor, but Jermell (28-0, 13 KOs) rushed to meet him with an opening combination.
As Jackson backed to his corner, Jermell followed a jab with a hard right to the head that loosened Jackson’s mouthpiece. As Jackson worked to adjust it, Jermell planted a crushing left to the head, followed by another that sent Jackson’s head to the ropes.
“He was out on his feet,” referee Tony Weeks said.
Said Jermell: “When he started slowing down, I was able to catch him with a shot. I knew that if he could have continued, he could have come back so I had to hit him.”
Earlier, Beibut Shumenov defended his WBA cruiserweight world title with a 10th-round technical knockout of Chicago’s Junior Wright (15-2-1).
Shumenov (17-2, 11 KOs) was knocked down in the fifth round after Wright landed a left hook. But Shumenov decked Wright in the eighth.
Twitter: @latimespugmire
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