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By Patrick Kehoe - His eyes blinking in wonderment, trying to reframe the world through the numbing fog of a savage ring annihilation, Jermain Taylor could barely comprehend the shifting events of ring warring that had just culminated in the loss of his middleweight championship. Few at ringside though were surprised when Youngstown, Ohio’s Kelly Pavlik finally administered the blows that left Taylor crumpled in a corner of the ring. The defending champion’s trainer Emanuel Steward summed up how fleeting opportunity can be in a prize ring: “When Jermain hurt him in the second and couldn’t finish Kelly off he used up most of his energy,” for a knockout that never materialized. Pavlik, long limbed and tortuously trained to probe and punish, found out he was also a survivor, after having reversed what seems a clear course toward defeat. [details]
