Julian Williams is getting to know the highs and lows in boxing all too intimately.
Williams turned in the performance of his career last May, stopping then-unbeaten Jarrett Hurd to win two of the four major junior middleweight titles and put a knockout loss to Jermall Charlo far behind him. On Saturday at Liacouras Center in Philadelphia, he was rudely reminded of that crushing setback.
Jeison Rosario, a strapping but little-known contender from the Dominican Republic, stunned everyone watching by cutting, hurting and then brutally knocking out Williams at 1:37 of the fifth round to become a 154-pound world champion.
Rosario, a 24-year-old first-time titleholder, wept as the belts were placed on his shoulders after the fight.
“I gotta keep crying because I’m so emotional in this moment right now,” he said through a translator. “When I lost my last fight I said I’d never lose again until I won the championship of the world and that’s what happened tonight.
“I came prepared. So I knew before the fight I was going to win it.”
Not too many others did.
Rosario (20-1-1, 14 KOs) was 7-0-1 against solid opposition since he was stopped by Nathaniel Gallimore in 2017 but he didn’t seem to be a realistic threat to Williams, who was coming off a sensational victory and had climbed onto some pound-for-pound lists.
The first round seemed to support that line of thinking, as Williams, an excellent technician, outboxed Rosario fairly easily.
Then, in the second round, a jab from Rosario opened a cut on Williams’ left eye lid and everything changed. Suddenly, Williams was somewhat tentative because of the cut and, it seemed, Rosario was emboldened. We had a fight.
Williams pawed at the blood dripping into his eye occasionally but remained competitive for the next few give-and-take rounds, as the outcome of the fight was still in doubt. And then, in an instant, it wasn’t. In Round 5, Rosario landed a hard right that stunned Williams and then followed with an overwhelming onslaught of power punches.
Williams was able to remain on his feet until, while attempting to hold Rosario, he fell to the canvas. He was able to get up slowly but his eyes were glassy and his legs were shaky. He was in big trouble.
Rosario picked up where he left off by landing a vicious right uppercut, followed by a left hook that prompted referee Benjy Esteves to jump between the fighters and stop the fight. Esteves looked Williams in the eye and the now-former champion nodded, his way of saying that the referee made the right move.
Just like that, a fighter whose impressive performance in his previous fight seemed to portend a long reign at the top was cut down by a fighter with whom few were familiar. Such is boxing.
“I wasn’t surprised,” he said immediately afterward. “I kept telling everybody this was a real fight. … I have to accept it. [The cut] blurred my vision a little bit but that wasn’t the reason why. He was just a better fighter tonight.”
Where does Williams go from here?
He was knocked out by Charlo in five rounds in 2016 only to battle back into contention and upset Hurd. And now, as a result of another fifth-round knockout, he would appear to be where he was after the Charlo fight.
Not so fast, though. One thing is different.
“We have a rematch clause,” he said. “We’ll see him again real soon.”