Boxing Results: Keith Thurman Stops Jarvis, Showing Power and Decline in Sydney

Keith Thurman (31-1, 23 KOs) made his successful return to the ring with a third round technical knockout of Brock Jarvis (22-2, 20 KOs) on Wednesday night at the Hordern Pavilion, Sydney.

The TKO

The former WBC and WBO welterweight champion Thurman, 36, dropped Jarvis twice in the third round with big shots to the head. Referee Will Soulos halted the fight after the second knockdown. The official time of the stoppage was at 2:19 of the round.

On the first knockdown, ‘One Time’ Thurman landed a right hand to the head of Jarvis that sent him down hard. He beat the count when he got back up, but looked in bad shape when the action restarted.

Keith then went for the kill, unloading on Jarvis and knocked him flat with a left hook to the head. The referee Soulos immediately stopped the fight because Brock was not going to get up from this knockdown.

In the first round, Thurman threw almost nothing, moving around the ring, trying to stay out of range of the younger, more powerful 27-year-old Jarvis. In the middle of the round, Jarvis rushed Thurman, nailing him with repeatedly powerful body shots that clearly bothered the aging former welterweight champion.

Jarvis loaded up on a left hook that barely missed Thurman’s head in the closing seconds of the round. That was a shot that would have done damage if it had connected.

Thurman landed two hard body shots in round two that got Jarvis’ attention, seeming to hurt him a little. The Aussie looked tentative after getting hit with those punches, and wasn’t as aggressive as he’d been in the previous round.

Still, Keith didn’t do much to separate himself from the harder shots that Brock was hitting him with. You could see the big difference in youth between the two in this round. Thurman resembled a much older person.

In round three, Thurman stalked Jarvis around the ring, throwing powerful but very slow right hands and left hooks. ‘One Time’ then trapped Jarvis against the ropes and landed a perfectly placed right hand to put him down hard on the canvas. Surprisingly, Brock got back up from the knockdown, but he looked in no condition to be still fighting. Thurman went after him and finished the job with a left hook that laid him out on the canvas.

Speed Lost

The fight was Thurman’s first in over three years since February 5, 2022, and he looked considerably slower than he had in his last contest against Mario Barrios that year. Thurman has a lot from his game in terms of hand speed and mobility from then, which is not going to come back.

With this win over Jarvis, Thurman is expected to face former WBO junior middleweight champion Tim Tszyu in the summer in Australia. Tszyu has lost his last two fights, and is coming off a vicious third round knockdown loss against IBF champion Bakhram Murtazaliev.

You’d have to favor Tszyu over Thurman in that fight because of how slow and old Keith looked tonight. The lack of speed and work rate would put Thurman at the mercy of almost any top 15 junior middleweight. He’s lost too much from his game to beat any top-tier 154-pounders. Based on his performance tonight, I can’t think of any notable contender that Thurman could defeat.