Will Jermain Taylor have to use the same excuse after tomorrow's fight with Arthur Abraham? Or has the 31-year old middleweight champ finally fixed the problems he claims have ailed him for years now? (FLORIAN SCHUH/AFP/Getty Images)

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Ron Borges of The Sweet Science wrote an intriguing article that pretty well hammers Jermain Taylor for his "constant excuses" for his losses. It's the sort of well-written, well-reasoned and totally cutting article that is fairly rare.

Jermain Taylor loses these kinds of fights because he respects neither his opponent’s skills or his own. At the age of 30, a professional for eight years, he claimed to have not trained properly for Froch. After they woke him up, Taylor said exhaustion and Big Macs got him not the undefeated WBC champion. Sadly, six months later he’s still saying the same thing.

"The only reason I lost to Carl Froch was because I got tired,’’ he said this week.

No, the only reason you lost to Carl Froch was because he’s a professional and you’re not. He comes to the arena physically prepared, mentally prepared and emotionally prepared. Although he is far less gifted an athlete then Taylor (or even than young Dirrell who is so blessed with speed and movement) but he defeated him because he is a master craftsman who shows up to work every day with his tools sharpened, a proper lunch in his pail and a desire to leave the job at the end of the day having given full measure to the people who pay him.

It's pretty scathing.

I do disagree with Borges' assertion that Taylor has short-changed fans; that's about the last thing I'd say of Taylor, and I've also been pretty critical of Jermain since the Winky Wright fight, which now feels like an age ago. If Taylor has really lost fights because of bad conditioning, as he claims, then yes, he's certainly short-changed himself. But not the fans. Taylor shows up to fight every time out. Both fights with Kelly Pavlik and the fight with Froch -- all losses -- were great fights, one of them (the first with Pavlik) an instant classic and the greatest middleweight bout of the decade. I see what Borges is saying, but I don't think I'd phrase it that way, that's all.

This is a fight that Jermain badly needs. If he loses, that's not the end of the world, but it can't be for the same reasons he's had before, and I'm of the opinion, as an observer, that his losses run deeper than just mediocre preparation. It's a question of whether or not he "has it" mentally, whether tired or not, he can find the resolve to stand in there and battle through a tough go of it. So far, he's had trouble doing that.

And at 31, no offense to Jermain, is there really any reason to think he's going to start now?

This is the sort of thinking that has me favoring Abraham more and more, even more than in the preview where I picked Arthur. Taylor, as great a guy as I think he is, hasn't shown the ability to persevere when up against it. In other words, Jermain Taylor is guilty until proven innocent. Maybe on Saturday he proves his innocence. Or maybe, now that he's claimed that his training is finally up to snuff, he's just out of excuses.