After the fights: What Jamel Herring taught us about boxing

Jamel Herring had a rough boxing bout against Jonathan Oquendo, but he was probably hurt more by statements made by others after the fight. 

On Saturday, Sept. 5, Jamel Herring retained his WBO junior lightweight title after his opponent, Jonathan Oquendo, was disqualified. Little went the way Herring planned, and he probably left the ring that night with a different perspective on the sport of boxing.

In round 5, Oquendo’s head crashed into the area above Herring’s right eye, which referee Tony Weeks deemed an intentional foul. Weeks deducted Oquendo a point, but Herring’s eye got worse throughout the fight.

Herring controlled Oquendo, but by round 8, his eye was a bloody mess, and he could no longer hide his pain. In every clinch, there were moments where Oquendo’s head ground into the open wounds above Herring’s damaged eye, and his face flared with agony every time.

At the end of the round, the ring doctor examined Herring’s eye, and Herring gave him an honest response.

“I can’t see,” Herring told the doctor.

After several minutes of confusion, Oquendo was disqualified, and Herring was awarded the match he mostly commanded. Herring didn’t realize he was about to take the worst blows of the night outside of the ring.

Before Herring exited the ropes, former boxing champion and commentator Timothy Bradley offered harsh criticism of Herring.

“He gave up,” said Bradley of Herring.

Fellow commentator and boxing great Andre Ward agreed and added to Bradley’s disdainful assessment.

“We also got to critique and call them [boxers] out if we feel they didn’t live up to the status that they’re on,” said Ward. “Right now, the status that I’m talking about is Jamel Herring being a champion in his division.

“You let the cut man do his job. You try to stay composed. You take instructions from the corner, and you continue to answer the bell. I’m all for fighters’ safety, but I would have liked to see Jamel Herring grit this out, gut this out. That would have been the confirmation I needed to let me know that he’s ready for Carl Frampton.”

It’s ironic to hear Ward say he’s for fighters’ safety, yet chastise Herring for telling the referee he couldn’t see. More of Ward’s comments imply that Herring was exaggerating the seriousness of his injury and that his vision was likely obstructed by blood, but good enough to continue fighting.

Timothy Bradley and Andre Ward issued a stinging rebuke of Jamel Herring.

Herring didn’t hear Bradley’s and Ward’s comments live, but he surely heard about them later on. It must have felt like a betrayal to listen to two former boxing greats question his heart and call him a quitter.

Bradley and Ward opened up the flood gates of negative feedback for Herring. Internet trolls and YouTube click baiters jumped on the bandwagon to scold Herring for having the gall to tell the referee he couldn’t see.

Alas, here’s one of the problems with boxing—this preconceived machismo that the acknowledgment of pain in the ring is weakness. How many fighters have to die in the ring before people stop questioning their heart during battle?

It’s fair to evaluate Herring’s boxing performance. If his skillset against Oquendo shows that he’s not ready for Carl Frampton, who many assume is his next opponent, then a constructive appraisal is acceptable. That assessment could be made. But to question his heart or threshold for pain isn’t right.

After the fight, while being evaluated in the hospital, Herring tweeted and showed his dejection at the words shared by Bradley, Ward, and others.

“Sitting in a hospital, alone, while being called out with all sorts of negativity is something else,” read Herring’s Tweet. “I’m not angry, I’m not sad, just deep in thought. I will still fulfill my obligations against Frampton, but that fight may be my last. Lost too much time from my family as it is.”

Herring, who was a Sergeant in the Marine Corps, served two tours of duty in Iraq and endured the worst pain a parent can imagine when his infant daughter passed away in 2009. Very few people know how to live with the depths of pain Herring has encountered in his life.

He was fouled in a fight and couldn’t see. It doesn’t need to be more complicated than that. Herring shouldn’t have to deal with the label of “quitter.”

The aftermath of Herring vs. Oquendo shows the unfair expectations that boxers have to deal with. Who knows what would have happened to Herring’s eye had he continued. Many fighters have damaged vision or have gone blind due to their battles in the ring.

Sugar Ray Leonard’s career almost ended after a detached retina, Harry Greb went blind in one eye, and Sam Langford lost his eyesight completely. Don’t ask Herring to follow their lead.

Boxing has a bad habit of devouring its participants’ physical health to spit them out later and leave them broken and destitute. It has happened to some of the best.

Herring’s tweet acknowledges that boxing and its followers can be unforgiving, and it takes a toll on fighters. Herring’s postfight treatment shows boxing’s lack of empathy. That’s one of the reasons Joyce Carol Oates dubbed it “the cruelest sport.” She was right.