Gene Tunney's decision to fight Heeney instead of Sharkey in finale

The two best challengers were Risko and Heeney, and neither was seen as much of a challenge to Tunney, and you can find plenty of quotes discounting both. Some thought Heeney was more deserving, some thought Risko was, there wasn't much in it.

The complaint that he fought one of the top two challengers, instead of having them fight an eliminator is not a crtiicism I've ever seen any other champion receive. It's especially silly because there were also complaints from the comission about Tunney leaving it too long between defences, so these could all be dug had had he got them to fight an eliminator.

 

I agree than Jack Sharkey was aheads on the vs Dempsey on the cards, and the ending was a bit controversial. Yet Tunney fighting Heeney wasn't the problem. Lots of tenured champions have given worse the Heney in their title shots. The issue s Tunney retired very young at didn't go on to fight Sharkey, Schmeling or Bear. Tunney did offer Wills a fight and he's viewed as better than Godfey and Gains. He also offered Greb a 6th match. Too bad there weren't million dollar gates for the above fights because if there were Tunney would like taken them. And increased his legacy. He only lost officially one, and that one was to Greb.

 

You ascribed Dawson's remarks to Suzie that's all I'm saying.
I don't think there is anyone who doesn't think Sharkey gives Tunney a harder fight than Heeney. Does that mean that Tunney was wrong to take Heeney.I don't think so.

 

This is new information for me. Tunney did offer Willis a fight though and Wills declined. Politics aside, he did it. The fact that he never ended up fighting a negro has little to do with it. Wills was pretty much washed up by that time.

Greb said no thanks to a sixth fight with Tunney because he was getting too big. Tunney did offer it at one point in time though.

Also, though not in this thread you mention the name Larry Gains. Gains was raked when Tunney was active, so there was never demand of a fight with Tunney. So Tunney didn't avoid them but he did retire to soon!

 

How actually do Risko and Heeney stack up. I went through The Ring's Annual Rankings for rated victims of each and:

Johnny Risko

Champions defeated:

Paul Berlenbach
Jack Delaney
Jack Sharkey
Max Baer
Mickey Walker
Tommy Loughran (2)
Bob Olin

Men who were at one time or another ranked contenders defeated:

Jimmy Delaney
Eddie Huffman
King Soloman
Sandy Siefert
Quinton Romero
Joe Sekyra
Sully Montgomery
Jack DeMave
Lou Scozza
Paulino Uzcudun (2)
Phil Scott
George Godfrey
Otto von Porat
Jim Maloney (3)
Ernie Schaaf
Vittorio Campolo
Tom Heeney
King Levinsky (3)
Tony Galento
Tuffy Griffiths

So Risko had 8 wins over 7 champions, and 25 wins over 20 contenders. Or 33 total wins over men who appear in these annual rankings. That is a very high total for a contender.

Tom Heeney

champions defeated:

Jack Delaney

men who were at one time or another ranked contenders defeated:

Jack DeMave
Bud Gorman
Jim Maloney
Johnny Risko

So Heeney had 1 win over 1 champion, and 4 wins over 4 contenders. Or 5 total wins over men who appear in these annual rankings.

Risko was in The Ring Annual Rankings:
1925--#13
1926--#10
1927--#4
1928--#7
1929--#8

1929 was his last appearance, but he would appear in the NBA Quarterly ratings for another few years.

9-6-1930--#5
1-5-1931--#7
9-20-1932--#4
12-19-1933--#5

This reflects the erratic Risko's lose some and then win some including against very high ranking opposition.

Heeney was in The Ring Annual Rankings:

1927--#3
1928--#9

1928 was his last appearance. He never appeared in the NBA Quarterly ratings.

On Risko's opposition, one can point to a few young fellows on the way up, Baer and Galento, and I suppose a couple of past it fellows, but a surprising number were highly rated when he beat them. Very erratic fighter though. Perhaps the most erratic in history.

Heeney earned that #3 in 1927 basically by winning a fight against Risko.

 

Gains was a good contender, I think he deserves to rank ahead of George Godfrey and was significantly more accomplished. I'm not sure he was all that above other heavyweights contenders around at the same time who never got a title shot either, though he was probably on the level of others who did.

Without racial bias I think he'd certainly have had a better chance of getting a title shot, but I don't think he was really the type of outstanding contender, like Harry Wills, Sam Langford, or Peter Jackson, where it was a injustice that they didn't get a title shot.

Still interesting fighter, and II hope more footage of him surfaces.

 

I don't think anyone is doubting that Risko ended up with the much better career. But much of that was after Tunney retired. Also Heeney in 1927 was ranked at 3, which was higher than any of Risko's ranking, and the most revelant, given Tunney fought Heeney in 1928 and they are year end rankings.

The "ranked at some point" metric is also a flawed one, as it takes no consideration of the form when the fight happened. For example Rojas was ranked at some point, but when he fought Risko in Oct 1927 he was descibed as "heralded as Bumbo Myers' chief rival for worlds worst heavyweight", and boxrec shows him coming off 5 straight losses, 4 by KO, and 2 in the first round, all to pretty obscure guys, and he wasn't on much better form the other times Risko beat him

 

To the point at which Tunney selected Heeney in late March, 1928

Risko

Champions beaten--Paul Berlenbach, Jack Delaney, Jack Sharkey

Contenders beaten--Jimmy Delaney, Eddie Huffman, Sandy Siefert, Quinton Romero, Joe Sekyra, Sully Montgomery, Jack DeMave, Lou Scozza, Paulino Uzcudun, Phil Scott

Heeney

Champions beaten--Jack Delaney

Contenders beaten--Jack DeMave, Bud Gorman, Jim Maloney, Johnny Risko

I mentioned that there were guys who had seen better days, like Romero, but overall this isn't close. Both beat DeMave and Delaney. Of Heeney's other wins, Gorman, was on a foul. Maloney had been stopped in May by Sharkey, and in August by Godfrey. He had been out ten minutes against Godfrey, but fought Heeney in September. So it all boils down to Heeney got a decision over Risko in October when Risko had only 13 days rest.

Putting Heeney over Risko is like arguing that Gypsy Daniels is better than Schmeling because he KO'd Max in one round.

 

What can you not understand about real time context? I cant figure out if you are ignorant or just being willfully obtuse to keep beating a dead horse. First of all, half the people you list as being contenders under Risko's ledger were not contenders, at least not when he fought them. Furthermore you are clearly using Ring ANNUAL ratings to pad out the ledger. The Ring wasnt a sanctioning body. It was a magazine and being a magazine it had an interest in sales. Its ratings were unofficial. Nevermind the weakness in using year end ratings to tell the story of whats going on in the sport at a particular time that those ratings dont apply. Its absolutely hilarious that you will cry a ****ing river about Risko or Sharkey having a better overall career than Heeney as an excuse for why Heeney shouldnt have gotten a title shot over those two while pretending Sandy ****ing Seifer was a contender. You know, the guy who ended his career 19-10-6 with 7 KOs and who not long after losing a decision with Risko managed only a draw against a completely shot and geriatric Battling Levinsky... Really??? Or Quintin Romero Rojas who ended his career 30-42-7. Despite being knocked out a whopping 27 times in his career he went the distance twice with Risko. The first time Risko faced Rojas Rojas had won just 2 of his last 12 fights. The second time they fought Rojas had lost his last five and been stopped in four of those. Thats your idea of a contender? If you are going to include Rojas in your list of contenders you might as well include everybody on Risko's record.

The fact of the matter is that in the year or so leading up to Heeney signing to fight Tunney he had seven fights, didnt lose any of them, and faced DeMave, Delaney, Risko, Sharkey, Maloney, Uzcudun, and Gorman. The two draws were controversial. You seem to want to gloss over the fact that Risko

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to Heeney during that time. How many do overs should a guy get and how long should the champion be forced to sit on the shelf while promoters have to build up an attraction. I mean, after pages of arguing about this (for god knows why) how do you not see Tunney's exact point when he retired?? Literally everything he said was accurate. Clearly there was nobody who had distinguished themselves. Promoters were having a difficult time trying to establish a clear contender. None of these guys were consistent. But you want to act like Tunney was being smug for stating that simple fact??

You think he should have stuck around for Risko, Godfrey, and Sharkey to get their **** together? Well that would have been a long wait. By the end of the year Risko was completely through at the top, Godfrey would lose every fight he had against a top fighter there after (and he lost most of the ones he had before that), and Sharkey would spend the next two years trying to build his reputation back only to lose to Schmeling on a foul, draw with middleweight Mickey Walker, beat Carnera and win a gift decision over Schmeling in the rematch. Those two years were spent fighting the elimination bouts you think should have gone on indefinitely to seperate the wheat from the chaff. How much of Sharkey's prime do you think he wasted sitting on the shelf waiting for a title shot because promoters wanted to build him up? At the end of the day what is all of this hand wringing for? Heeney was no worse at that time and no worse qualified than any of the contenders you keep playing musical chairs favorites with. He got the shot. Deal with it. Its not like Risko or Sharkey would have done any better anyway. Tunney was a better fighter than both of those guys.

 

Yes, but what year was Larry Gains ranked? When he was Tunney retired.

 

The HoF has plenty of very hard to justify inclusions and exclusions.

The fight where Godfrey beat Gains wasn't a domination, but actually competitive until Gains quit due to a cut lip.