How did Norton,Morrison and J. Ruiz to survive to those tremendous KOs with Cooney, Mercer and Tua?

With Morrison and Ruiz's situations it helped that they were really young and not fully matured as fighters. Morrison focused on improving his conditioning after the Mercer fight and Ruiz focused on grappling and submission holds lol. Seriously though, a loss like that can be disastrous at any stage and they both showed strong mental fortitude to rebound and come back as better fighters. It's easier to rebound when young, although near peak and peak Lennox Lewis did it twice in his career. He should get more credit for coming back and rematching McCall and Rahman as soon as he could instead of being dumped on for having a poor chin. At that point in heavyweight boxing I feel that even the greats like Louis and Ali would be vulnerable against hard punching 230+lbers like those two beasts. Louis dined on a lot of 185lbers in his defenses, as did Ali at times. By he 90's the heavyweight landscape looked much different as any fighter under 6'2 and 230 was considered 'smallish' for the division.

 

Careful matchmaking.

After knockouts like that it is very important a fighter gets enough rest, chance to rebuild without the risk of that happening again too soon.

The Norton loss was a career ender anyway.

 

Good post . I get fed up reading Lewis had a poor chin. He got unlucky once and careless the other time. He took punches from some serious fighters in his career .

 

Matchmaking Chokky you are right.
Look at Tyrell Biggs career for how NOT to do it after Tyson.

 

Are you talking about dying in the ring? As violent as these quick brutal knockouts are, fatalities are usually caused by longer fights, with repeated blows to the head.

 

Bingo,, I remember when John Tate would come to my home town to train, played basketball with him some times. Early on he was a jovial kind guy laughing and such. Now he was different in the ring mind you, but after he won the title the hangers on surrounded him like vultures and introduced him to cocaine , what I was told. He said after he lost to Weaver he never remembered anything after getting nailed in the 13 the round. Many trainers said he should have taken 6 months off after that but Ace Miller put him back in too soon and first time Berbick hit him solid he wobbled. Drugs really got a hold after that and his life ended tragically. Had he had better management ,,and self control , he could have come back but your point is very valid , he needed a chance to rebuild.

 

Big fighters gave little trouble to Ali or Louis. At their best they would make McCall and Rachman looks like the walking statues they were. Ali would not lose a round. Human punching bags until the ref stopped the fight.

 

Wow. I didn't realize that they threw Tate in with Berbick less than 3 months after getting KO'd by Weaver. I thought there was more time between them.

Back in the glory days of the teens and twenties, fighters were routinely back in the ring the next week after a KO. Greb after Joe Chip comes to mind. Billy Petrolle was back in the ring 4 days after King Tut waxed him in 1.

 

Lewis got unlucky? Lol.

If he had a good chin, he could have accepted the blows.

Alot of guys have been caught with shots they didn't see coming and nothing happened.

 

Boxing deaths usually result from slow prolonged beatdowns, not highlight reel quick kos.

See Jimmy Garcia, Levander Johnson, Willie Classes, etc.

 

Yeah, March 31 to June 20th. Immediately after the Berbick bout Ace Miller told a reporter, "I brought him back too soon." Thing is, I get Miller's logic in taking the Berbick fight. Get Tate back on the horse. Berbick, I'll bet, seemed safe. He was a guy who, within the previous 18 months, was knocked out in 1 by a former Tate victim - Mercado - and who was held to a draw by Leroy Caldwell. Nobody at the time knew how good Berbick was. The Tate fight made Berbick.

John Ruiz was back less than three months after being iced by Tua, though his opponent had several losses in a row. But Ruiz's next opponent, one month later, had a 9-1-1 record, similar to Berbick's when he fought Tate.

Ken Norton was back just a hair under three months after losing to Foreman. He was up against proven contender Boone Kirkman. I'd say that bout was riskier, on paper, than Tate taking on Berbick.

Tommy Morrison was back slightly less than four months after Mercer, though his first few opponents were low-risk. However, Morrison was up against Joe Hipp eight months after Mercer.

 

Morrison openly admitted to being a walking steroid lab. That’s how.

 

You're right that Morrison took steroids, but lets be real, during that era (90's) everybody was looking for an edge and PED's were part of the standard regimen for a lot of fighters. He still had to put the time in training and steroids alone didn't change him from a chubby 214lber to a lean 228 stalker-puncher. Lots of fighters have gotten popped or admitted to steroid use (Frans Botha, Jameel Mccline, Evan Fields, Shannon Briggs, Shane Mosley...), the bottom line is that all steroids do is help the body recover quicker from intense training. If you don't have the natural physical skill and put in the hard training and diet discipline, they won't really enhance your ability to land a knockout punch or improve your stamina. By this point, a lot of lower level fighters have taken steroids as well and because the natural ability wasn't there or they didn't train as hard, they really didn't improve them as boxers. MMA has proven this as well. Steroids enhance what you have, but they won't turn a B level fighter into a champion or even a top contender. There is talk now that Tour de France athletes should be allowed to take steroids because of the muscle wasting that the extreme nature of the sport leads to. I'm of the opinion that all athletes should be allowed to use steroids. The cream will still rise to the top and the rest will settle where they should. The testing is hypocritical because someone will always figure out a way to beat it.

 

Stop trying to say that Ali and Louis would be too small