Pacquiao vs Horn results: Jeff Horn scores shocking, controversial upset

Jeff Horn is the WBO welterweight champion, but it wouldn’t be boxing without controversy.

Jeff Horn won the WBO welterweight title tonight. In the record books, he beat Manny Pacquiao by unanimous decision, 115-113, 115-113, and 117-111. But what will time really remember? Will it be Horn’s Rocky-like upset, or will it be an outrageous robbery of an all-time great?

That story is still to be told. Time will tell us how this will be remembered.

BLH had it 116-111 and 115-113 for Pacquiao. Horn (17-0-1, 11 KO) fought his ass off. There’s no question about that. He definitely outperformed expectations. He survived a furious ninth round assault from Pacquiao (59-7-2, 38 KO), where referee Mark Nelson wanted to stop the fight after the round.

Nelson gave Horn the chance to continue. “Show me something,” he said. And to Horn’s credit, he showed something in round 10, and made it the distance.

Horn made this a rough and tumble fight, using his physical size and strength advantages, and he made it dirty, too, with his head coming into play, cutting Pacquiao on both sides of his hairline.

That said, boxing is a physical sport. It gets dirty sometimes, and Horn did what the referee allowed him to do. Pacquiao still, though, was the better fighter. Looking old at 38, and maybe a bit under-prepared, he still did the overall cleaner, more effective work for the bulk of this fight. He probably should have won.

But he didn’t. He lost, which nobody expected. Even the minority, who felt Horn had a better shot than most of us, didn’t actually expect him to win the fight. And in reality, he didn’t deserve the win. As hard as he fought, as many new fans as he surely would have won even in defeat, for a game and gritty effort, he didn’t deserve the win.

So it’s another one of those late Saturdays/early Sundays in boxing. Scorecards. Officials. Judges. What really happened, and why?

All of that overshadowing a good fight and a great performance from a scrappy underdog against one of the all-time greats.

CompuBox stats saw Pacquiao land 182 of 573 (32%) of his total punches, and 123 of 380 (32%) of his power shots. Horn, meanwhile, landed a mere 92 of 625 (15%) total punches, and 73 of 428 (17%) of his power shots.

Pacquiao said after the fight that he plans to exercise his rematch clause, and that he would return to Australia for that fight.

How did you score this one?