The website known as the scene of boxing, just announced that Toney's promoter Goossen is on the way of closing negotiations of Toney vs. Tarver or Toney vs. Solis. Apparently, the Traver fight would be of interest to the big networks and would therefor be favoured... IMO, Toney vs. Solis would be far more interesting than matching 2 old- timers against each other. Also, Toney/Solis would easily qualify as an eliminator within the WBC.
I'd love to see Toney-Solis. The trash talking in the lead up to the Tarver fight would be really funny and entertaining, but that fight means virtually nothing in the HW division. A Solis fight actually has some significance with the winner placing themselves right there in contention.
While I agree about your thoughts regarding Toney-Tarver, I feel Toney-Solis would be bad match making on Goossens side. Toney is faded, but I feel he has enough left to beat HWs like Arreola, Quezada, Austin... If Solis gets his ass in shape and choses to run and move a lot, I feel that this fight will be a stinker as Toney, at age 41, is not able to chase him around the ring anymore, leading to another close controversial decision one way or the other. That said, if Toney can't beat a prospect like Solis anymore he should retire. The fight would also qualify as a n eliminator for the WBC belt.
I think you underestimate Solis a bit. He wouldn't get in shape and run. Wait, maybe I mean overestimate. You might be doing both.
I disagree with you a little bit on Solis. Toney will easily decision this guy, no question in my mind. I think Toney should fight both. First Solis in February/March with Tarver being on the undercard, then Tarver in the summer.Tarver is the more dangerous opponent for Toney. At the end of the year Toney should face Vitali and retire.
Good plan indeed - I doubt that Gossen would allow this to happen. He seems to have a safety first approach for most of his fighters...
Indeed. In this case then, Toney should rather face Solis in a WBC eleminator than the quicker more experienced Tarver.
Toney has looked good since cutting his weight a little bit in his fights against Fres Oquendo, Danny Batchelder and Matt Greier his last 3 fights.
toney looked positively AWFUL against oquendo. i admit that and i'm a fan! he looked far better and lighter against greer, but that's not really an indicator that he could still do some damage in the upper echelons of the division, now is it? i'd like to see him fight and beat solis, then maybe he can get one final shot at a title...
I'm a fan too, and Toney did look bad against Oquendo. But I can't remember anyone who has ever looked good against Oquendo, so this isn't really an indicator of what Toney has left either. Maybe Toney is shot to pieces, or maybe he's got enough left for a couple decent performances - we really don't know. Fres Oquendos style is all wrong for a 41 year old Toney. In fact, Oquendos style is wrong for everybody. This guy comes to the ring to survive, not to win. All he does is run, hold and rabbit punch. And that was all he did against Toney too, except for some sloppy jabs. If you don't catch him, like Ruiz or Tua did, you're in for a loooooong boring night. Toney had him hurt in the first round, but he couldn't follow up. And at age 41, Toney just can't chase a guy around the ring for 12 rounds. But he tried, and that's why I think Toney deserved the nod in this close fight. Same as Holyfield and Chris Byrd deserved their wins against Oquendo. Some people here call Oquendo the most robbed HW, but he hasn't been robbed 1 single time. These were all very close fights where Oquendo came to survive, not to win - and thus he doesn't deserve to win.
IMO Tarver and Solis would probably beat Toney at this point. Toney's style is a great one, but it requires good reflexes and a lot of body movement (not footwise, but turning, slipping, etc)...those are the kind of things that don't get better with age. And at HW, Toney really doesn't have the power to compensate for this loss...he relied on his sharpshooting to beat other HW's.