By Jake Donovan
Very few in the boxing industry even gave Joe Smith Jr. a chance of being competitive versus perennial Top 5 light heavyweight contender Andrzej Fonfara, largely due his relative anonymity in the sport. Even fewer believed he would win and it’s doubtful that anyone among the crowd he brought from Long Island to the UIC Pavilion in Chicago could have predicted the night would have ended the way it did.
Smith Jr. didn’t just deliver a leading candidate for Upset of the Year, but did so in explosive knockout fashion in ending the Premier Boxing Champions (PBC) on NBC headliner with time to spare in the opening round of their light heavyweight clash.
Fonfara was dropped in center ring and then subsequently bumrushed by the heavy betting underdog to force a stoppage at 2:32 of round one.
“There’s no feeling like this,” Smith Jr. (22-1, 18KOs) said of the shocking result, by far the biggest win of his career. “I’m happy to take this victory back home to New York to all my fans.”
The night marked the first time in his career in which Smith Jr. fought outside of the East Coast. The blue-collar working man from the Mastic/Shirley section of Eastern Long Island. New York had been predominantly showcased on promoter Joe DeGuardia’s regular boxing series held at The Paramount in Huntington (near the Nassau/Suffolk border of Long Island) and was appearing on his biggest stage to date.
It’s an understatement to say he handled himself well in stepping way up in class. The lingering question now on the heels of such a big win is what lies ahead.
A win for Fonfara would have placed the popular Chicago-based Polish light heavyweight back in the title mix. Some eight months removed from his Fight of the Year-level punchathon with former titlist Nathan Cleverly in this very same arena last October, Fonfara’s team sought a favorable showcase ahead of a potential rematch with World light heavyweight king Adonis Stevenson, against whom he traded knockdowns in losing a 12-round decision in May ’14.
Those plans were shot to sunshine the moment Smith Jr. took his best shot and delivered heavy artillery of his own. To the spoiler goes the victory – and now he hopes the spoils as well.
“I’ll talk to my promoter but I’m hoping for another big fight to get myself to a world title,” Smith Jr. indicated. “Now everybody knows who I am. This is the best thing that could have happened for me.
“Once I started hitting him and pushing him back he fell away and left himself open for the right hand. I thought this would be more of a fight, but I took him out early and it feels great. He was punching and I knew he leaves himself open. I was just looking for the punch and it landed.”
Jake Donovan is the managing editor of BoxingScene.com. Follow his shiny new Twitter account: @JakeNDaBox_v2