Jamel ‘Semper Fi’ Herring (23-2, 11 KOs) had too much size for Carl ‘The Jackal’ Frampton (28-3, 16 KOs) in cruising to an easy sixth-round knockout defeat in a successful title defense for his WBO featherweight title on Saturday night in Top Rank promoted show at the Caesars Palace in Dubai, UAE.
Frampton was knocked down twice in the fight, once in the fifth and a final time in the sixth.
Herring knocked Frampton down with a beautiful left uppercut in the sixth. When the Irish fighter got back to resume fighting, Herring unloaded on him with a storm of heavy shots to the head that had him stumbling around the ring on weak legs.
Frampton hurt in the fifth
At that point, Frampton’s corner threw in the towel to have the contest stopped because he wasn’t going to make it out of the round in the shape he was in. The time of the stoppage was 1:40 in round six.
The beginning of the end for the 34-year-old Frampton came in the fifth round when he got a little careless and walked into a straight left hand from Herring that put him down.
Although Frampton didn’t look badly hurt from the knockdown, he was clearly buzzed. For the remainder of the round, Frampton stayed on the outside, trying to avoid getting hit again.
But even when Frampton seemingly out of range of the 5’10” Herring, he was still getting touched by his left hands down the pipe and right-hand jabs.
The much shorter 5’5″ Frampton was unable to get inside on the taller Herring, as he was getting hit with straight lets and jabs while he was trying to get in the inside.
A big part of why Frampton couldn’t get close was his inability to move his head. If Frampton had used head movement, he would have dodged the shots that Herring was throwing at him when he tried to get in range.
Surprisingly, Frampton didn’t have the head movement that he needed to get in close. When Frampton was fighting at super bantamweight [122] and featherweight [126], it wasn’t necessary for him to develop his head movement because he was fighting guys close to the same height as him.
But in moving up to 130, Frampton ran into an abnormally tall guy for the division, and he didn’t have the tools to beat him.
Frampton and his management team picked Herring, likely believing that he was the most beatable of the guys in the super featherweight, but that was clearly a mistake on their part.
Frampton would have been better off challenging WBA ‘regular’ 130-lb champion Roger Gutierrez. However, even with the 5’9 1/2″ Gutierrez, Frampton would have had many issues with his size as well.
After the fight, Frampton made it known that he’s retiring. His rationale for choosing to fight WBO 130-lb champion Herring was to become a three-division world champion. He wanted to be Ireland’s first three-division champion, but it wasn’t to be.
After the fight, the 34-year-old Frampton announced his retirement. Herring, 35, called out WBC champ Oscar Valdez.
Frampton announces his retirement
“I said before the fight I’d retire if I lost, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do. I want to just to dedicate my life to my family now,” said Frampton after the fight.
“Boxing has been good to me. It’s also been bad for me, but the last few years with these boys have been the best years of my career. I just want to go home to my beautiful wife and kids, and that’s it.
“I just got beat by the better man. I really struggled to get inside on him.”