Former college football star, super welterweight boxer Jimmy “Quiet Storm” Williams, recently defeated his first world champion, Yuri Foreman, and the veteran New Haven, Connecticut fighter’s boxing career has been revitalized.
This past March 6th, Williams (18-5-2, 6 KOs) was originally supposed to fight Foreman, who withdrew after the weigh in due to sickness. Williams stayed in training camp, took a stay busy fight, and continued preparing for Foreman.
Williams won an 8-round majority decision against Foreman (35-4, 10 KOs) two weeks ago this Saturday in Atlanta for the vacant Universal Boxing Organization (UBO) International and American Boxing Federation (ABF) USA super welterweight championships.
Williams dropped Foreman twice in the sixth round and won the decision by judges’ scores of 77-73, 77-73, 75-75. “Thirty-seconds more and I think I would have stopped him,” Williams said.
Foreman, fighting out of Brooklyn, captured the World Boxing Association (WBA) super welterweight World title in 2009, when he won a unanimous 12-round decision versus defending champion Daniel Santos (32-3-1). Williams and Foreman sparred many years ago at the Joe Grier Boxing Academy in Patterson, New Jersey.
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Foreman, fighting out of Brooklyn, captured the World Boxing Association (WBA) super welterweight World title in 2009, when he won a unanimous 12-round decision versus defending champion Daniel Santos (32-3-1). Williams and Foreman sparred many years ago at the Joe Grier Boxing Academy in Patterson, New Jersey.
“I’ve been chasing him a long time,” Williams noted. “I stayed in camp when our fight was canceled, took a confidence-building fight, and stayed ready for Yuri. He is a good boxer, not a brawler, and he was in tremendous shape. Yuri’s very intelligent in the ring and fighting him was a good learning experience for me. For example, he was working behind his jab to try and get me to lunge. I had to think more in the ring against him.
“I’m sure he was disappointed after the fight, but he’s a world champion who was in against Miguel Cotto and two of his other losses were to world champions (Cotto and Erislandy Lara). This was a huge opportunity for me. I’m excited about my career again. We’ll wait and see what fights are ahead for me.
Williams was a standout cornerback at Southern Connecticut State University who was invited to several NFL tryout camps. He came close to making the cut with the then-Oakland Raiders. “Quiet Storm” has been promoted by Jimmy Burchfield’s Classic Entertainment and Sports (CES) since he turned pro in 2013.
“This is Jimmy’s biggest win of his career,” Williams’ manager Ryan Roach (Fighter Locker) commented. “He just opened a lot of doors for himself. I’m proud of him, he worked hard. He made the sacrifices champions make. Taking out a name like Yuri Foreman is why fighter’s go to work every day. We are working on his next fight date now. Stay tuned, ‘Quiet Storm’ fans.”