Floyd Schofield III is a world champion, and he had to take real punishment to get there. Schofield beat Lucas Bahdi by unanimous decision Saturday night at Wintrust Arena in Chicago to win the vacant WBA lightweight title, taking the cards 116-110, 119-108 and 115-111 over twelve rounds.
Schofield moves to 20-0 with 13 knockouts. Bahdi, who arrived unbeaten at 20-0 with 15 knockouts, drops to 20-1 and absorbs the first loss of his professional career. The belt was on the table because the WBA installed Gervonta Davis as champion in recess while he deals with legal matters outside the ring.
The Scorecards Flatter the Winner
A three-card sweep with one judge at 119-108 looks like a shutout on paper. The fight was nothing of the kind. Bahdi dropped Schofield with a right hand in the eleventh round, and in the ninth another Bahdi right put Schofield’s knee on the canvas without the referee ruling a knockdown.
Schofield’s best moment came earlier. He put Bahdi into the ropes and onto the floor with a left hook in the third, the cleanest punch either man landed all night, and he banked the middle rounds with hand speed Bahdi could not answer. His speed won him a title. His willingness to stand there and trade almost cost him one.
What He Actually Proved
The talent was never in doubt. Schofield is 24, undefeated, and capable of throwing faster combinations than most people at 135 pounds. The open question was whether a fighter whose reputation was built on early blowouts could handle twelve hard rounds against someone who hits back, and he answered it by the thinnest acceptable margin.
Twice he got caught badly. Both times he was in range for no good reason, having already established that he could hit Bahdi at will from distance and move. Champions at 135 pounds do not get to make that trade repeatedly. The next man to share a ring with Schofield has already watched the ninth and eleventh rounds a dozen times.
That is the correction to make, and it is fixable at 24. Schofield’s footwork and reflexes are good enough that a disciplined version of him beats most of this division. Saturday he chose the entertaining version, and he got a belt plus a scouting report he would rather not have handed out.
A Vacant Belt Is Only a Starting Point
Being precise about this matters. Schofield holds a title that became available because the division’s most recognized name is unavailable, and he won it in a fight where he was hurt more convincingly than he hurt his opponent. Those two facts sit alongside the win rather than erasing it.
He also earned something a coronation would never have given him. Schofield had never been into the eleventh or twelfth round before, and he had never been staggered by a legitimate puncher. He has now done both and still had his hand raised, which is a better education than another two-round highlight reel.
Bahdi deserves his credit too. He came in untested at the top level, lost on the cards, and still spent the back half of the fight as the harder puncher in the ring. A rematch would sell, and it would not be the mismatch the scorecards imply.
The real test comes next. Schofield now has to defend against someone with Bahdi’s power and better feet, and the version of him that showed up in Chicago loses that fight. The version that uses his legs for twelve rounds beats everybody short of a fully available Davis.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.