The knockdown against Reggie Johnson he was definitely hurt. But he was also clear headed and recovered very quickly.
For me the thing that seperates Toney from the likes of Hagler, Lamotta & Chuvalo is the fact he started at middleweight & ended up at heavyweight. Now I know he had a great defence as mentioned, but at some point you're gonna get hit flush, it's unavoidable & he fought some heavy hitters at heavyweight. A truly remarkable fighter.
Actually its funny you should mention big george. Ironically they couldn't be further apart in terms of style and ability, basically opposites. Even though toney had marvelous counters, good hand speed, and was almost impossible to ko, on paper he sounds like the perfect opponent to pick apart foreman. However, he was still 5'10 with a 72' reach. Frazier and Qawi were both amazing, tough durable fighters with great inside skills but against the immovable object that is foreman, it looked like a dad playing with his kids. Foreman would simply never allow toney to dictate the pace with his ramrod jab, his shoving, mauling, brutal uppercuts, and savagery. Toney might not get stopped but he would be in defensive mode for the 80% of the round just to survive. I dont think his workrate would be enough, foreman would be winning rounds on aggression. Best case scenario for toney is maybe use hit and run tactics like morrison did and win a close decision. I don't think he could pick him apart with his usual cagey, inside countering style. Foreman had a hell of a chin too, and hit so damm hard it threw you off balance and "interrupted" whatever you were attempting to do, ruining your game plan. Foremans jab had so much sheer force it pushed holyfield out the way and he ended up missing his own follow up right hand for a 1-2.
Guys like Basilio, Greb, Panama Brown, Ross, Villa, Billy Graham, Wayne McCullough, Laporte, these guys all deserve mentions and shout outs but are so often forgotten too.
The Jones KD was actually a push.I do think Toney has a granit chin but it is not one of the very best of all time.He had good defense, very difficult to hit him flush with two consecutive punches.He also had a habit of rolling with the right hand that would take out the steam of the punch. guys like chuvalo, Ali and mc call would rank higher in the chin department.
An old Holyfield. And it was pretty much a flash knockdown. Here's a big puncher This content is protected
I agree with you. I included every decent heavyweight Toney fought. Not all of them were punchers but they were natural heavyweights. Toney wasn't. I should've specified this. Your point is valid.
