Frank Bruno vs Tony Tucker

At both their best, close fight till around the tenth, Bruno tires and Tony moves in to stop him.

 

This describes the state of affairs of heavyweight boxing at that time. And what is very interesting is that DKP was the master puppeteer. Arum did nothing during this period. There was no alternative to what was taking place. And it was a case of the same thing--young guy taking on older fighters.


The only contemporary Tyson fought was Biggs. That was it for Main Events until Evander moved up. But Tyrell within that same Tyson opponent environment. So no minefields to be walking through.

And that is even if people were buying into Biggs--which some did and more did not. I sure did not. Especially after watching the Bey fight---and there was another guy whose recent form had been horrible. But that got him the Tyson bout. At least Biggs was active--unlike the rest of that competition getting the Tyson sweepstakes and payday.

As for the topic, I think Tucker goes into his shell after getting hit some and coasts to a decision loss. A winnable fight but he takes zero risks and never takes advantage of the opportunities Bruno provides him. Especially if DKP wants a financial return of sorts on Tucker and lets the bout take place in London.

 

You are correct. In another era Tyson would have had to have taken on some of those contemporaries before challenging Michael Spinks for the title. People incorrectly confuse the belt holders of that period as champions. They were effectively the gatekeepers below Spinks at that time.

If it had been the 1950s where you had one champion and rated fighters faced one another to produce a “logical contender” it would have been a lot different.

Spinks would have been the world champion. Witherspoon and Berbick would have been the number one and number two. Bonecrusher and Thomas were the gate keepers. The next batch of young contenders were Tyson, Tucker, Biggs, Douglas And perhaps Bruno.

There would be no logical contender between Witherspoon,Berbick, Smith and Thomas. They certainly would have to fight each other in order to press for a challenge... or risk losing to an exciting youngster just to keep their ranking.

The youngsters would have been forced to fight one of their own number before tackling a gatekeeper. So Tyson or Douglas would have met Biggs or Tucker first. without doing this first they would risk falling in the rankings.Then they would have to have beaten either a Witherspoon or Berbick to get to Spinks.

We know Tyson beat Berbick then Thomas then Spinks.. but he didn’t first have to get past a single one of the other guys like Tucker or Douglas to get to that first position.

Had he got Douglas in 1985 the whole thing could have been off! He might have lost that. Likewise for Tucker. Was he going to beat Biggs or Bruno then beat Witherspoon or Berbick?

In the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s that was the only way to do it.

As it turned out bypassing one crossroads led to an unexpected failure later on.

 

Correct.

Not battle tested. So important. Crucial sooner or later. And just what happens to guys not battle tested? Often we see them fail. And for some unknown reason or reasons, they tend to fail miserably.

The other thing that is always a huge factor is the wear and tear factor. For a Tyson, it was minimal. He was not even getting to the stage of big puncher concerns---bad hands. Then you have the wear and tear on shoulders. Hips. elbows. Up to Douglas, he had never been absorbing punishment. So how would he handle that? Could he have the ability and willingness to dig deep. Then you have the accumulation factor of the wear and tear.

So when Tyson had to absorb punishment to stay in a fight, let alone rally to win, it was not there. And it was not part of his game.

But this issue is always huge anytime with the "on top" fighters, moreso than other styles.

 

Yeah, even joe Louis had the Schmeling mishap before winning the title and had Louis got the title before that happened, say the Baer fight was his title shot, it would have been catastrophic to have lost to Schmeling as champion.

 

Tucker

 

Tony by unanimous decision.

 

Bruno beat Carl the Truth Williams.

Tony Tucker was never Better than Carl the Truth Williams.

 

Williams hadn`t done much in the few years leading up to his bout v Frank and ws no longer rated in the top 10 by any sanctioning body, he also did nothing after losing to Bruno and was knocked out by Morrison, Tucker did far better than Williams v Tyson and had a far better chin.

 

I don’t think Tucker ever proved to be better than Truth Williams at any point. Tuckers best wins are only comparable to Williams.

Nothing surpasses Williams at all.

Tucker lost all of his key fights. Of the best he won, both could have went the other way. The best wins Tucker had were disputed. Norris and McCall.

Douglas was no higher regarded when Tucker beat him than Bert Cooper was when Williams beat him. The IBF making that a title fight was ludicrous in the extreme.

Tucker lost badly to seldon and Akinwande and Norris in a rematch.

I don’t think Norris or Seldon or Akinwande were the level of Trevor Berbick who Williams beat.

Williams also beat unbeaten guys quite sensationally like Jesse Ferguson and Dave Jaco. He also was the first to expose Bert Cooper. there was some argument williams was robbed against Tim Witherspoon and Larry Holmes.

I don’t think that compares to Williams resume.

 

Tucker beat Douglas and was finished by the time he fought Norris, Seldon and Akinwande, a faded Tucker took Lewis`s punches better than Bruno did.

 

Yes I edited my post to include my opinion on the Douglas win.

Tucker fought Norris between losing to Tyson and Lennox Lewis and Norris was robbed. Tucker did not deserve that verdict.

A guy Winning Against McCall and Norris By split decision is a lower level than the man on the wrong side of a split decision against Larry Holmes and Tim Witherspoon when Williams fought them.

Lasting longer against Tyson is a non issue because Tucker was approaching that fight in an effort to contain or survive Tyson. Williams was trying to win.

 

Tucker was never the same after the Tyson fight he had a lot of drug problems and looked sluggish after `87.

 

Tucker decision or late stoppage if its a 15 rounder.

Kinda like the Buster fight. I feel Buster was a better boxer than Frank

 

It is true that Truth was more accomplished, but he was more weak-jawed than Tucker. It's a toss-up in my opinion. Very close.