Is Jennings Arum’s Last, Best Hope For Another Heavyweight Champion?

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. – Trainer John David Jackson has an interesting, but not exactly preposterous, idea for why his fighter, one-time heavyweight title challenger Bryant “B.Y.” Jennings, is topping Saturday night’s ESPN-televised card here at the Ocean Resort. The 33-year-old Jennings (23-2, 13 KOs) will swap punches with Alexander Dimetrenko (41-3, 26 KOs), 36, in a scheduled 12-rounder that can be termed as flying beneath the radar.

Although Jennings is nominally in world-title contention with a No. 11 rating from the WBA, he is not listed in the top 10 of any of the four major sanctioning bodies, and neither is Dimetrenko, a Germany-based Russian who has never fought for a widely recognized title. In the IBO’s computerized ratings of the top 100 heavyweights, Dimetrenko comes in at No. 14 with Jennings at No. 27.

But when Jackson looks at Jennings, who in his street clothes and black-framed glasses has the bookish look of a college professor, and has an introspective manner to match, he sees so much more than a guy who had his shot at the big prize and came up short when he dropped a reasonably competitive unanimous decision to IBF/WBA/WBO titlist Wladimir Klitschko on April 25, 2015. He sees a potential world champion who is still honing his craft, and he believes that Bob Arum, the Top Rank founder and CEO who signed Jennings to a make-good contract in June 2017, sees the same thing, or at least is daring to hope so.

“I think Bob wants one more heavyweight champion,” Jackson hypothesized Wednesday afternoon at the Atlantic Police Athletic League gym, where seven of the fighters on Saturday’s card went through brief and light workouts for the benefit of a small media turnout. “Yeah, he has a lot of great fighters, but if you have the heavyweight king, you rule boxing. It’s still the most prestigious and most marketable division in the sport. That’s just how it works. And Bryant represents the last, best opportunity for Bob to get there before he retires.”

It is something to consider. Although Arum was with Muhammad Ali for 27 of “The Greatest’s” bouts, and later rode the high surf with George Foreman during the second phase of Big George’s remarkable career, when he defied all odds by winning the heavyweight title at age 45 with that bolt-from-the-blue overhand right that put Michael Moorer down and out, the Top Rank honcho’s history with heavyweights is a bit sketchy. He took a flyer on Hasim Rahman after Rahman shocked the world by knocking out Lennox Lewis in South Africa, but Rahman never could summon more of the same magic and their association ended with little fanfare.

Arum has arguably the two finest pound-for-pound fighters in the business today, WBA lightweight champion Vasiliy Lomachenko and WBO welterweight ruler Terence Crawford, and he still holds paper on 39-year-old legend Manny Pacquiao, the only man to win world titles in eight weight classes and again a champ of sorts after he stopped Lucas Matthysse in seven rounds to claim the “regular” WBA welterweight strap. There is a steady flow of talent in the TR pipeline, one of the most promising prospects being featherweight Shakur Stevenson (7-0, 4 KOs), the baby-faced (he’s 21 but looks younger) silver medalist at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics who continues his professional development in a scheduled eight-rounder against Carlos Ruiz (16-4-2, 6 KOs) on Saturday’s card. Truth be told, there is a much greater likelihood that super middleweight contender Jesse Hart will find himself in a world title bout sooner than fellow Philadelphian Jennings. Hart (24-1, 20 KOs), who is ranked No. 1 by the IBO, No. 3 by the WBC and No. 10 by the IBF, lost by unanimous decision to WBO 168-pound champion Gilberto Ramirez on Sept. 22, 2017, and he could be in line for a rematch should he get past pesky veteran Mike Gavronski (24-2-1, 15 KOs), of Tacoma, Wash., in Saturday night’s co-featured attraction.

“I want to go out and get it over as quickly as possible,” said Hart, the 29-year-old son of 1970s middleweight contender Eugene “Cyclone” Hart, a huge puncher who imparted to his son the benefits of taking care of business as expeditiously as possible. “My dad (who now trains Jesse) always said that if you let a guy hang around too long, and he gets a little bit of confidence, the next thing you know, you’re in the fight of your life. I’d rather get in and get out fast.”

That philosophy is in stark contrast to the learning curve the more patient Jennings has been asked to master by Jackson, with Arum’s apparent consent. A very good defensive end at Ben Franklin High School in Philly, Jennings’ physical gifts are obvious, but getting his boxing skills to align with his raw athleticism has been a process. Jackson, a former WBO super welterweight and WBA middleweight champion, describes Jennings as a “work in progress,” but whose ceiling, presumably when attained, will elevate him far above his present status as just another fringe contender waiting for the more elite crowd above him (Anthony Joshua, Deontay Wilder, Tyson Fury, Alexander Povetkin, Dillian Whyte and possibly a few others) to thin out.

“I like Bryant’s position,” Jackson said. “He’s under the radar right now. He’s not being talked up as a dangerous heavyweight, even though he is. But he’s not as dangerous as he can be. He’s using this time to develop his skills.

“The wonderful thing about being with Bob is that Bob is old-school. He’s committed to rebuilding Bryant’s career back up. You don’t hear Bryant calling out people, demanding a title shot right away. He knows, as Bob does and so do I, that you have to earn your way back up to the top and another shot at the title. It could take four or five fights. Bob is making Bryant prove that he deserves another shot.”

Since Jennings’ image-smudging two-bout losing streak – he followed his points loss to Klitschko with a seventh-round stoppage by Luis Ortiz on April 25, 2015 – he has strung together four consecutive victories, all of which can be  described as learning lessons. There were TKOs of Daniel Martz, Daniel Haynesworth and Akhbor Muralimov and a 10-round unanimous decision over Joey Dawejko, each fight a building block in his evolution into a new and improved version of his former self.

“Bryant needed to learn how to cut the ring off on an opponent, how to get inside and work in tight,” said Jackson. “He had no inside game. He just worked off the jab. You have to remember, Bryant had almost no amateur career, so when he turned pro (at the relatively advanced age of 25), he probably was rushed along a little bit. It was all on-the-job training. It still is, to a point. But when it all comes together for him, he’s going to be a helluva fighter. He’s some kind of physical specimen (at 6-foot-3 and 225 pounds) and he has more power than people realize. If he continues to believe in the things I’m showing him and gets it into his mind that he can do it, he has all the tools to be a world champion.”

Should Jennings get past Dimetrenko – clearly the most difficult test he will have encountered since the setbacks to Klitschko and Ortiz – he moves a step closer to another grab at the brass ring. A loss might end his quest, at least in affiliation with Arum, a realist who knew when it was time to end the experiment with Rahman.

“To have someone like (Arum) to have faith in me has to be a positive thing,” Jennings said. “I’ve always had faith in myself. Now I have to show everybody what I’m still capable of doing.”

While Jennings-Dimetrenko and Hart-Gavronski will be televised by ESPN and ESPN Desportes, the remainder of the card – in addition to Stevenson, fighters who bear watching include popular Philadelphia bantamweight Christian Carto (15-0, 11 KOs) and Atlantic City super welterweight Thomas “Cornflake” LaManna (25-2-1, 9 KOs) – will be carried on the new ESPN+ app.

Check out more boxing news on video at The Boxing Channel

To comment on this article at The Fight Forum, CLICK HERE.