No more mister nice guy. Middleweight champion Jermain Taylor tells the Arkansas Democrat Gazette that when he meets former 154-pound champion Kassim Ouma on December 9 at the Alltel Arena in Arkansas, he is going to have knockout on his mine. Forget boxing, forget touching gloves, Taylor is looking to give his hometown fans a big knockout.

"I’m going for a knockout,” Taylor said. “I think it’s time for a knockout. I know you’re not supposed to go into a fight looking for that, but for me and my fans, it’s really time for a knockout.”

The fight with Ouma became a reality after a December 2 rematch with Winky Wright fell apart, and it appears that the 60-40 split in favor of Taylor was not the deal breaker. Wright was to be paid $5 million to Taylor's $7.5, but it was the date of the fight that made Wright refuse to sign the contract. Lou DiBella tried to switch the date to January 20, because the pay-per-view going ahead on December 2 would have made it the fourth pay-per-view event in less than a month, plus it would been going head-to-head with a Showtime double-header featuring Miguel Cotto and Antonio Margarito.

“Who ever heard of a fighter who really wanted to fight pulling out over a date six weeks later ?” DiBella said. “We would be the fourth pay-per-view in a month. That date didn’t make any sense, and it would have been disrespectful to boxing fans to keep it on Dec. 2. The reality is Jermain really does want to fight that guy [Wright ],” DiBella said. “At this point there is no hard feelings [with Wright’s camp ]. Let’s move on. Truth is, we tried to make a deal, it didn’t happen.

But, the fight may still happen in the future. Taylor promises to go after Winky Wright as soon as he knocks Kassim Ouma out.

“I can’t wait to fight Winky again, and I will,” Taylor said. “After I knock out Ouma, I’ll get Winky. We’re putting the rematch off just for a minute. First I have to take care of my fans here.”