Boxing Perspective: Kelly Pavlik Almost Dies

According to the infectious disease specialist that treated Kelly Pavlik, the middleweight champion was very close to dying after an extreme allergic reaction to his medication.

Pavlik`s temperature rose past 104 degrees and his heart rate accelerated to 150 beats a minute. The 27 year old fighter was admitted to the hospital in these conditions.

"I don't remember that day, that's how bad it was," Pavlik told the Associated Press upon being released from the hospital in his hometown of Youngstown, Ohio.

Pavlik does remember however that the doctors warned him that his condition was pretty serious.

It all began with a small staph infection on the knuckle of his left hand, for which he received a cortisone injection. The infection however was not getting better, even with antibiotics.

Pavlik then elected to get surgery to clean out the infection. Unfortunately, the staph infection did not get better. If anything,
Pavlik got worst from the allergic reaction his body suffered from the antibiotics.

Finally, Pavlik’s trainer, Jack Loew, called off his fighter’s scheduled bout against Paul Williams.

This is one more misfortune for Pavlik, who has been through a difficult year. Not only did Pavlik miss out on a lucrative deal with the Williams fight, but there are also negative rumours circulating among news sources concerning the misfortunate fighter.

Some people have said that Pavlik doesn’t want to fight Williams. Other have implied that Pavlik wants to take take Jermain
Taylor's place in the Super Six tournament.

Besides the rumour mill, Pavlik says he has lost much of the support from those who once called him a working-class hope.
"I want to fight, and people question because I've been inactive," he said. "It does feel like wasted time, where I could be out accomplishing a lot. And one big fight could sum up that big accomplishment."