There was one constant throughout the entire build up to Daniel Jacobs vs. Luis Arias’ Middleweight clash which took place on Saturday, November 11, 2017 from the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum–Arias was angry.
Judging by the comments on YouTube, Instagram and Twitter, it’s safe to say that many people–whether you want to call them casuals or not–hadn’t ever heard of Arias before Saturday night, so they were understandably confused as to why he was coming at Jacobs so hard.
But also, there interested was peaked. Would Arias make good on his word and stop Jacobs in emphatic fashion?
Jacobs, coming off of a closely contested loss against the universally recognized top Middleweight Gennady Golovkin in March of this year, is a likable guy and someone who is hard to root against.
Having defied the odds and come back from osteosarcoma, a rare form of bone cancer, it’s also hard to get Jacobs in a bad mood.
But by the time the final face off came on Friday, Jacobs was beyond amped up and ready to show Arias that, as he said, there are levels to the game of boxing.
While Arias talked the talk, Jacobs, in the end, was the only one who walked the walk. Jacobs comfortably won a 12-round unanimous decison with scores of 120-107, 119-108 and 118-109.
Bothered by an extreme size disadvantage and an apparent foot injury, Arias could never really muster up an effective attack.
“I honestly thought the size wouldn’t be a difference, but he proved that it was,” said Arias during the post-fight press conference. “After about the second or third round my leg, my foot, was just burning and I couldn’t get off.”
Foot injury or not, Jacobs set the tone in Round 1 where he walked Arias down, imposed his size difference and clipped Arias with a good shot that got the Milwaukee fighters attention.
The only major critique you could have for Jacobs is that he didn’t take Arias out, something his trainer alluded to between rounds during the fight when he told Jacobs that he was being too nice.
Although many people scoring the fight–including HBO’s unofficial scorer Harold Lederman and his daughter Julie who was one of three official judges–didn’t give Arias a single round, he still thinks he belongs among the upper echelon of the division.
“I talked myself up because I knew I belonged and I know I do belong,” said Arias. “This is nothing but a good learning experience for me. They always say true champions, by the time you fight for a world title, if you don’t have any loses you haven’t really learned.”
For Jacobs, huge matchups loom on the horizon against the likes of Gennady Golovkin, Canelo Alvarez, Jermall Charlo, Billy Joe Saunders and David Lemieux–all of which he said he wants to fight.
“I just want to stay active that’s my thing,” said Jacobs. “We’re gonna invade Montreal [on December 17 for Saunders vs. Lemieux] so those guys see my face and then call them out afterwards.”
