Joyce vs Parker: The Juggernaut Makes His Point

Joyce vs Parker: The Juggernaut Makes His Point

By Frankie Mines

You’d be forgiven for believing that Joseph Parker had just about been rescued from a lunatic axeman as he sat at Saturday night’s post-fight press conference a battered, bloodied and beaten man. Had that been the case, he might have come away with lesser injuries, the most prominent of which was a gruesome wound above his right eye and a swathe of grotesque bruising on the opposite. Whilst such fate does sound like it was imposed by some crazed madman wielding illegal weapons in the street, the reality was far grimmer: the ‘Juggernaut’, Joe Joyce.

Many perceived that this fight would be a fifty-fifty affair. Most predictions felt precarious and the analysis delicate; anyone brave enough to nail their colours to the mast, silently or otherwise, knew the strong likelihood of them being ripped away. That’s what makes heavyweight boxing such a scintillating attraction: knowing that at any given moment, it can all turn on a punch summoned from the Gods or a miss the size of a cigarette paper.

The tentative nature of forecasting either outcome in the build-up lent to an atmosphere that felt noticeably tense even through the often unreliable guise of television. To be there, it must have verged on palpable. The pressure seemed lost on Joseph Parker, that or he has mastered the impression of a relaxed man. He mingled backstage with his promoter, Ben Shalom of BOXXER, whose collaborative work with Frank Warren on this night may yet offer promise for the future of boxing broadcasting in Britain, and the heavyweight champion of the world also Tyson Fury lingered in support.

There were smatterings of applause from the crowd as Parker regrouped in the ring with his trainer, the former middleweight titlist Andy Lee, and they shared brief but informed glances as if they held a shared secret. They spoke short and sharp and there was a hint of a tight understanding between the pair, a belief perhaps that Lee’s intrinsic boxing knowledge and Parker’s dogged training may well culminate in a master plan.

Joe Joyce’s entrance gave little away. Any scrutiny over the Londoner’s demeanour is a futile task, for his facial expressions never seem to move from one emotion to the other quite obviously. If there were either nerves or confidence, they weren’t conveyed. Surely there is something unnerving about facing a man and being unable to assess whether he’s having the time of his life or a mid-life crisis?

It didn’t seem that long ago a few of us had sat ringside at Wembley Arena to see Joyce take on Christian Hammer. We were in such close proximity to the ring that beads of sweat would fly past and the sounds of heavy thuds would echo for rows behind us. Two things stood out on that evening: Joyce’s left jab, and his willingness to get caught flush on the chin. What impact either of those would have on this fight would soon become clear.

Just over a minute and a half into round one with the customary ‘feeling out’ process over with, Parker leapt into action boldly reeling off a series of left-handers. No sooner had his feet found the ground again before Joyce rallied back with a left of his own. Fears before the bout about whether the two different styles would make for a boring watch were subsiding quickly.

The battle of the jab became an engrossing feature, Parker mixing the height between the body and up-top again in preparation for the huge overhand right, but when he did find the time to let it loose, it had little to no effect. Joyce, the bigger and slower man, matched him punch-for-punch and on the inside fired off bursts of uppercuts. At the end of the second, a telling swelling began to circle Parker’s eye.

Both offered each other samples of the immense power they carry in the third, the crowd ohh-ing in disbelief at the sheer venom in each heavy blow, but it was Parker who wobbled most, his mighty right-handers not so much as eliciting an extra blink from Joyce. Joyce clubbed with his left, Parker looking as if he may well implode forwards under the sheer weight of the shots, but he refused to cede and retaliated with an uppercut that would have sent a mere mortal into next week. Still, the Juggernaut remained unmoved.

Parker fought through the fourth with a gutsy resiliency, knowing that to get Joyce to take one step back was a hurdle that needed clearing. In an attempt to force the issue, he cannoned his glove into Joyce’s face, the weight of it forcing the onslaught to pause – for mere seconds – you can’t break a wrecking ball with a hammer.

It was a fair assessment if you’d given the first four rounds two-a-piece but approaching the mid-rounds, Joseph Parker began to lag. He stood his ground, defiant, enjoying success in small bursts. Sadly his engine steadily began to deplete – only the chimneys of the local Manchester houses were puffing harder than Parker after his momentary eruptions of vigour.

Joyce continued doing what he does best in his own unique way: advancing and attacking, assailing Parker with an artillery of ceaseless ammunition. He shot right and left hooks to the middle, the looping missile of a left hand, the left jab, unabating and incessant.

Despite flashes in which Parker seemed on the precipice, just another blow from falling, he remained daring. He clutched on to the notion that Joyce, for his persistence, may well soon hit the wall. Parker continued to mount attacks that seemed audacious given the mess he was in, blood cascading urgently down the right side of his face. He battled on fearlessly, in the eighth walloping Joyce with a left and eating the return right with a brazen impudence as if to imply that not even the proverbial kitchen sink would put him away.

In the ninth, Parker threw another neck-bending uppercut. At the end of the tenth, he threw a hefty left. To see your absolute best look utterly ineffective and then have it psychically dealt back to you with twice the spite must be one of the most demoralising feelings in all of sport, yet on Parker plodded.

He started the eleventh with another valiant attempt at stemming the aggression, but Joyce was steaming in now, merciless in his onslaught. He rocked Parker back, and back some more, back until he could only bounce firmly from the ropes. Joyce slammed the uppercuts in for good measure, left and right with pace again, his work unsparing and unforgiving.

Finally, a colossal left hand dented Parker as if it were the last critical chop into a titanic tree, and down he fell, the choice of caving in wrenched away from him in one herculean swoop. It was a fitting end to a nail-biting slugfest and another entertaining thriller from this heavyweight era, an age that will only deliver more with the right matchmaking.

Despite a heroic effort which straddled the thin line between bravery and recklessness, Joseph Parker ended up another scrap in a devastating trail of the hunted and stalked, the jaded and worn, the overwhelmed and overpowered. Joe Joyce’s charge to the upper tier of the heavyweight division is fast becoming an irrepressible rampage.

Eyes will now turn to Oleksandr Usyk….

Photo Credit: Queensberry Promotions