It seems Turpin gets overlooked in many rankings though he beat some excellent fighters beyond his most exalted victory. Also, his grisly downfall, I think, leads to him being ignored. Being that he bounced between middle and light heavy, it's difficult to rank him by division. However, in overall legacy, where do you put him? How do you think he would have faired against Cerdan, LaMotta, Zale or Graziano?
I appreciate Randy Turpin. Well built, strong, awkward. I can see him outboxing Graziano, but losing to other top dogs. Honestly I wasn't that impressed with him even when he was bearing down on Robinson.
One of the biggest middleweights you'll ever see. He just looked huge in there, and as Red stated, awkward too. With his size, strength, and effective awkwardness, he's one of those guys who would be very difficult to look good against. He had that weird jack-in-the-box thing going where he'd pop straight up and forward, almost lunging. I watched the first Robinson fight some time ago and it was just an ugly fight all the way around, but it needed to be if you were Turpin. He wasn't going to outpunch or outfinesse Robinson, so he did the right thing by just taking Ray's rhythm away from him and outmauling him.
The trouble was his prime was fairly short, he almost immediately went into decline after the 2nd Robinson fight due to out of the ring problems. I honestly think at his best he has a good shot against any of those guys.
A horrible fighter to watch, like a bizarre mix of Herol Graham and Ike Quartey. To be fair though, he certainly did outpunch and outfinesse Ray first time around.He whipped him that night and was superior in every facet of the game to the sloppy Robinson that showed up.
Pretty much my thoughts. He had the Don Coc k ell fight later but that was a blip before his out of the ring problems took over.
A genuine knock out puncher. Real count outs. Randy was a real athletic freak of nature but a vulnerable person. Wild people from hard times. Someone who grew up in his neighbourhood once said it was unbelievable that someone from "where we came from" could become that famous but his brother Dick was almost as good.
when his head was in the right place he would have always given robinson a hard fight.he was a fanatical trainer and had no problems with his weight till he was about 25/26.he also had a lot of trouible with his hands due to his hitting prowess. i think his short right hand to the body was even better than his overhand right which he called alakazam.
A fantastic boxer. Just an unusual style mixed with freakish physical strength, knockout power and a jab that went right through his opponents. Not the kind of guy people want to fight. I think he beats LaMotta, Zale, Graziano and Cerdan. Remember Randy Turpin is the only fighter that beat Sugar Ray in his prime without a severe weight pull. Cant underestimate the damage that fight with Robinson did to him physically and mentally. Sugar Ray hit him with punches that wouldve dropped a Steer. He was teeing off on him for awhile on the ropes. His prime ended that night sadly. But Ray Robinson had to have it.
I think even possibly more than the first fight he proved how good he was in the second fight. Robinson got himself into tip top shape for that fight and although Sugar Ray was ahead,Turpin was giving him all of the trouble he could handle. Robinson was cut bad but then felled Turpin with a monster right hand,how Randy got up god knows, but he was taking huge punishment against the ropes and was still using upper body movement to try to avoid them,but unfortunately he wasn't firing back,so it was quite rightly stopped.
i dont think it should have been stopped srr was missing a lot of those punches and the ones that were connecting werent hurting turpin the ref did srr a favor because he was cut very badly and it was close to being stopped! the one that should have been stopped was graziano vs zale three! rocky pulled himself up by the ropes was extremely out of it and the ref wiped his gloves and let zale destroy him! watch that fight it definitely should have been stopped!
Turpin was hurt badly. The referee allowed it to continue until Robinson connected with two clean power punches and Randy started to sag. Nothing good wouldve happened if it had gone on.
I think some thought it shouldn't have been stopped. But really although Randy was able to duck and dive and avoid some of the shots he was also taking some monster shots. His guard wasn't up and most importantly he wasn't firing back. It was a legitimate stoggage in my opinion.
Add me to the disagree pile. Ray had landed about 25 unanswered punches, and when the referee stepped between them Turpin a had no legs. I honestly think Ray might have killed him had it gone on.