ATLANTA – Eleven months later, the reminder of one of the grossest gashes in recent boxing history remains very visible down the middle of Badou Jack’s forehead.

Jack joked that it was “just a scratch.” All kidding aside, that long, deep cut impacted Jack’s performance throughout the second half of his loss to Marcus Browne on January 19 in Las Vegas.

An accidental clash of heads caused that terrible laceration in the seventh round. Jack’s face was mostly masked in blood for the remainder of a 12-round light heavyweight title bout Browne won by unanimous decision.

Jack was even taken aback upon seeing it for the first time in the mirror in the locker room afterward.

“I didn’t know it was that big until after the fight,” Jack told BoxingScene.com before a press conference Thursday to help promote his fight against Jean Pascal on Saturday night. “When I looked in the mirror, I said, ‘Oh, sh-t!’ I knew it was bad, but not that bad.”

Sweden’s Jack never considered asking to have that fight stopped, even though he could barely see out of either eye for five-plus rounds.

“I was completely blind,” Jack said. “There was too much blood. I was fighting on instinct. Plus, [Browne is] a bit of a frontrunner. And he still couldn’t hurt me. He couldn’t do nothing. He had like a dead man walking, a blind guy, and he couldn’t do nothing for six rounds.”

Browne out-boxed Jack and appeared well on his way to a thorough victory before he suffered that cut. The 2012 Olympian from Staten Island, New York, won comfortably on all three scorecards (119-108, 117-110, 116-111).

The 36-year-old Jack (22-2-3, 13 KOs) still secured a title shot in his first fight since Browne beat him. The Las Vegas resident will challenge Quebec’s Pascal (34-6-1, 20 KOs, 1 NC), who upset Browne by technical decision August 3 at Barclays Center in Brooklyn, on the Gervonta Davis-Yuriorkis Gamboa undercard Saturday night at State Farm Arena.

Showtime will air Pascal-Jack immediately before Davis-Gamboa as part of a three-bout broadcast that’ll start at 9 p.m. ET/6 p.m. PT.

After plastic surgery and the longest layoff of his 10-year pro career, Jack isn’t the least bit concerned about the cut on his forehead opening again.

“The cut healed pretty fast,” Jack said. “The doctor actually cleared me at the end of March to fight again. I’ve been ready to fight. [The cut] won’t be a problem.” 

Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.