by David P. Greisman

The past year hasn’t been very good for Jean Pascal. He was stopped in eight rounds by Sergey Kovalev last March, struggled with Yunieski Gonzalez en route to a controversial decision win in July, then had very little to offer against Kovalev in their rematch this past Saturday.

Pascal lost via technical knockout when his trainer, Freddie Roach, stopped the bout after the seventh round. The defeat dropped the 33-year-old to 30-4-1 with 17 KOs. It’s been a long time since he’s been on top — his reign as light heavyweight champion started in 2010 with a win over Chad Dawson, included a draw with Bernard Hopkins later that year, and ended just nine months after it began with a rematch loss to Bernard Hopkins.

So the Kovalev loss should be a tough one. Yet Pascal took an optimistic tone while acknowledging the skepticism that would come from those who’ve seen how he’s looked of late.

“I will be back and better than ever, but as always I know my performances dictate my narrative, so I will let my next fights do all my talking,” Pascal said. “I feel like I let myself, my team and my close family at Interbox down, but we will continue to work together and build our companies, our fantastic market and god willing my next title fight in the process. Like I said, from now on my performances will do all the talking for me.”

Pick up a copy of David’s book, “Fighting Words: The Heart and Heartbreak of Boxing,” at http://bit.ly/fightingwordsamazon or internationally at http://bit.ly/fightingwordsworldwide. Send questions/comments via email at fightingwords1@gmail.com