Badou Jack is an upcoming super middleweight, undefeated in 15 fights with 10 KOs. He fights from an oblique stalking guard and has a good overhand right. His jab though is long and slow, as he does not keep the lead hand off the shoulder by a hand span, but back up against his shoulder.

Marco Antonio Periban is an older busy journeyman with a record of 20 and 1 with 14 KOs. As with most Mexican fighters Periban is good for some rough body work, is tenacious, well-conditioned, and takes monstrous head shots well. Stylistically he fights out of a closed guard and cross steps to his lead, which results in long loopy right hands. If he had better foot position it would have gone badly for Jack.

Periban did demonstrate a good use of the outside sweep-parry and wing block while turning, which is something you need if boxing from a closed guard.

These guys went at it like 1950s welterweights. Their punch counts were 532 for Jack and 806 for Periban. Many of those punches were thrown with bad intentions. Periban fought like a warrior and Jack took a while to get in his groove. The referee was very experienced and let the fighters fight. There was basically no clinching until round 9 when a nasty ‘trench war’ broke out with both fighters banging hard from the clinch and the referee letting it continue, unlike most of his counterparts declining to interject himself into the drama needlessly.

Jack kept up the pressure to the end but did not seem to have the gas tank to take down a tough man late. He reminded me of a small Ken Norton. This was a tough fight that ended in a majority draw. If Periban could learn to fight out of an oblique guard more consistently and Jack could up his stamina these guys could put on a fight of the year.

If you are a pressure fighter you should view this fight for a look at what did and did not work for Jack. Likewise if you are a standup boxer look to Periban for an example of how effective combinations can be against a really dangerous stalker, and how much better they might work if thrown from a guard with more consistent foot placement.

I would like to make one final note. Periban had a member of his entourage holding up his Mexican title belts during the introduction. That dude is one of the scariest looking people I have ever seen. He could be the next Johnny Trejo. Quinton Tarantino needs to cast him as a heavy, if the Juarez Cartel can spare his services for that long.