Headlining a fast and furious Boxing After Dark card tonight at the HP Pavilion in San Jose, James Kirkland systematically broke down Joel Julio in their junior middleweight battle of wills, forcing the referee to step in and wave off the contest directly after the closing bell of the sixth round. It was a convincing, brutal victory for Kirkland, and yet it was no one-sided affair, not by a long shot. In fact, Julio, who suffered a badly cut and swollen right eye, must be wondering right now in his bruised and beaten thoughts what exactly it would take to beat James Kirkland right now, because he hit him with all manner of chin-snapping bombs across the six rounds of their fight tonight, the type of clean, accurate power shots that generally bring mere mortals to their knees.
