For the middleweight title, 15 rounds, London. It's 1950. The plane carrying Cerdan over the Azores, landed safely in New York. Cerdan stops LaMotta in the rematch. Now Marcel takes on the tough, brawling strong boy from Leamington Spa. Turpin hasn't yet fought Sugar Ray Robinson. How do you see this fight going?
It's a tough one because of how the stars crossed. If it's 1950 (we'll say mid-1950) then Cerdan was 34 years old with over 115 bouts behind him and 16 years of fighting. Turpin would be about 22 with about 32 fights behind him. Turpin was just starting to come into his own. Later in the year he would fight for and take the British middleweight title from Albert Lynch, who had previously beaten him. I won't say he was green but still a bit inexperienced. Would this be the perfect time where youth would overcome experience? A toughie. I might still lean towards Cerdan, but just barely. Cerdan on a 15 round decision where he might be looking the worse for wear at the end. And again, that would be because of age and miles on the tires.
Hi Guys. A very intriguing matchup, I lean ever so slightly toward Cerdan, Peter Wilson described him as " a well armoured tank " and he was, from what I have seen, he had a tight defense, threw short hard accurate punches, not so much a KO artist, more his prolonged and persistent attacks wore his opponent down, add to this Turpin was mauled and pushed around by Olsen, battred from pillar to post, I see Cerdan as as least as strong as Olsen, plus Randy could be troubled by events in and out of the ring, if Cerdan was lucky enough to catch him on one of those nights, then I see a rout, that aside still a tight call. Stay safe guys. Mike.
I'm a fan of Turpin. He's explosive and exciting and he's got one of the more unorthodox styles which, combined with exceptional strength and punching power, propelled him to the top of the middleweight division. Aggressive with a good jab who threw from all angles and is a helluva body puncher.
