Damiani V Morrison ?

Damiani grew a lot on me the more I watched him.

He looks like a big goof physically with a haircut out of "Studio Hillbilly".

But appearances are deceiving. He had a good chin and a good gas tank. He could do a bit of everything - fight on the outside with a surprisingly nasty jab and rough people up close. Francesco could throw a wide variety of punches and didn't rely on any one mode of attack. He was straight up giving Mercer a boxing lesson before he got stopped by a punch from hell.

Morrison looks the part and he was far more explosive. His left hook was a killer.

But, Tommy tended to gas and did not have the greatest chin.

I think that Morrison starts well, but by the mid rounds he's spent his wad and gets worked over for the rest of the fight for a UD or late stoppage. So, I pick Damiani but there's a reasonable chance that Tommy could get Damiani early, I think. Tommy was a big puncher.

 

Morrison destroys him early.period

 

Damiani boxes his way to a decision win. He certainly is not going to trade with the guy. He'll just kill rounds until Morrison drops his hands. Which is like the 5th round. It'll be all Morrison can do to make it to the finish line before dropping a decision.

Morrison's strengths are from the waist up. Chasing a guy down like this for 12 rounds really fatigues him & Morrison will be about a full step away from where he needs to be.

 

Damiani is an example of a very good amateur merely being a good pro. Yes he could box, and punch some, but I don't think he was very tough, and that is a problem when you are facing a puncher and stalker like Morrison.

Damiani did gas some vs Mercer, and blew his chance as a sub to face Holyfield. I don't think he liked pro boxing much.

This could be a very good fight though. Pretty much all outcomes are on the table. I'd favor Morrision.

 

Some good analysis here. Damiani was better than the general public perception, and had the poisoned chalice of carrying round the joke WBO strap at a time when there was a clear undisputed #1 in the division.

Morrison always has a puncher's chance, but I think he's up against it in this one. Damiani is the better boxer, and would spoil and maul if need be to disrupt Morrison's rhythm. While Morrison is the bigger puncher, he was as we all know vulnerable to knockdowns and stoppages, even against fighters not known as punchers.

The most likely scenario is Damiani stopping Morrison in the mid to late rounds, but Morrison could always land a bomb that could end it at any moment.

 

Judging from the Mercer fight, which I saw live, Damiani either had no ability at all to take a punch, an extremely low threshold of pain, or no heart at all, sort of a typical Euro front runner, an Italian heavyweight version of Gratien Tonna....let's quit the nonsense here...Morrison had heart...he took his beatings like a man, and he showed vs Joe Hipp, that he definitely did have heart...and a certain threshold of pain...better than Damiani's anyway, when he fought on with a broken jaw and a broken hand. He had no quit in him, and...he could punch. He would ko the Italian as soon as he had an opportunity.

 

I disagree. Mercer's punch blew Damiani's nose up like a grenade. It was a really potent shot by a guy who was a big puncher:

"In the ninth round, when trailing 79-73, 79-74 and 78-74 on the three score-cards, Mercer unleashed a punch he had been working on in the gym. A slicing left uppercut-cum-hook landed right on the tip of Damiani’s nose and down the Italian went. Initially, it was hard to see the punch that had done the damage; some fans even thinking Damiani had for some reason opted to quit. The replay showed anything but: Damiani was in extreme pain, the punch having clearly damaged his nose, blood soon pouring down the face of the fighter who was counted out. Later, it was revealed how Mercer’s venomous punch had shattered Damiani’s nose.
[...]
This writer had the opportunity to speak with Mercer recently, and he recalled the win that is 25-years old today:

“Looking at him, he didn’t look like he could box or that he was fast, but Damiani could really move,” Mercer says when looking back. “He never hurt me. They say speed generates power, and he had speed, but he never hurt me. I was losing that fight from every which way though. But I knew I’d get him. I knew I’d catch him. It was a great punch [I caught him with], and as I saw him down, with blood all over, I knew he wasn’t getting up!”

http://www.boxingnewsonline.net/on-...s-brutal-one-punch-ko-over-francesco-damiani/

There's not a lot of boxers that would, or could, have gone on after that.

 

Damiani would make Morrison look bad. Tko mid rounds.

 

You can’t quit when you’re sleeping standing up. Damiani at least made Mercer look a lot worse than Tommy did.

 

8 times out of 10 Damiani has enough to defuse Tommy's predictable offense and boxes him to a standstill within a few rounds and wins a lopsided decision. The other 2 times, Tommy catches him.

 

This thread is full of morrison crappy haters with no credibility

 

Au contraire, I have probably written more words in Morrison's defence than you have.

Check this thread out :

https://www.boxingforum24.com/threads/max-baer-vs-tommy-morrison.602216/#post-19027482

 

I did not mention to anybody and you exposed yourself. Congratulations.

 

I picked Damiani, so it seems a fairly obvious step to assume that you were including me in that set of people.