Young decisions Moorer, how? Michael decisions him or stops him late. Too busy for Jimmy to outwork him, and way better at his peak than any of the fighters that Young beat. Outboxing San Juan George is a good feat but not a great one. That version of Foreman is a much lesser fighter than Michael. The fight against Cooney should've been STOPPED before the cut, too.
Moorer is too placid if not attacked directly. As Young would not do this, Moorer will be content to follow him around with the intent to unload something but will become distracted by his own inertia to do much.
I’m thinking Moorer has a chance here. He had quick hands and a south paw stance. And Young didn’t have much power to take advantage of Moorer’s shaky chin either. Probably goes the distance resulting in a close decision which Moorer MIGHT take.
That’s why I’m having difficulty making a pick, it’s always difficult to predict how someone would do against a southpaw who never fought them, considering you have to box completely different, from the set ups, positioning and most importantly, the neutralisation of the jab, it becomes less about the jab and more about using your lead hand as bait and deception to force errors from the opponent. With these matchups, we can only either assume they wouldn’t have issues with southpaws or asses based on their attributes and whether it would work well against southpaws, although experience against southpaws is way more important than anything else. Jimmy Young doesn’t have the sharpest or straightest of right hands and he does utilise the jab as one of his main weapons, although I do think his lead hand play and his great bait and sneaky counters would work well against southpaws. I suspect he’d have some issues with the southpaw stance, but not as bad as many other guys like how I’d imagine an earmuffs pressure fighter would who doesn’t play with the lead hand like a Leon Spinks or even someone as great as a Mike Tyson (not saying Moorer would give Tyson issues, just a stylistic breakdown on how certain attributes do or don’t work well against southpaws).
It is a tough choice but if it is Jimmy Young at his best and in shape I believe he could get a close decision over Moorer. Don't forget that Young did beat Ron Lyle twice and lost a razor thin decision to Ken Norton. Never thought Young beat Ali as Young cheated and ducked under the ropes to avoid being hit which actually is to be counted as a points deduction or can actually be counted the same as a knockdown. He may have beaten Ali that night if he hadn't done that.
Moorer isn't as active as Norton at Heavyweight in regards to workrate and Young still had a razor thin close fight against him that quite alot felt he won. I could see Moorer maybe winning a decision due to his bigger punches and the Southpaw stance but his workrate certainly isn't going to bother Young. Moorer is certainly no whirling dervish at Heavyweight he fights in spurts unless he gets tagged by a big punch. I also think again you're not giving Young enough credit for the Foreman win saying that version of Foreman is "a much lesser version of Moorer" when a 45 year old much slower Foreman poleaxed a prime Moorer is a bit of a silly thing to say to be quite honest. Are you trying to tell me a 45 year old Foreman is better than the 28 year old Foreman of 1977 ? I mean put it this way what's Moorer's best win at Heavyweight ? Beating a Holyfield with heart issues via split decision. If the Foreman of 1977 were to of fought the version of Holyfield with health issues that Moorer fought who would win ? Yeah exactly. Young was doing reasonably well vs Cooney why should the fight of been stopped before the cut ? Young was in no real danger until the cut.
(I might come back to all of this to respond when I wake up) To clarify, I mean that the fight should've been stopped before the end of the fourth (before the cut stoppage), not that the fight should've been stopped before the cut altogether. And yes, Young was doing fine against Cooney for most of the fight.
Very few have a chance to beat prime Jimmy Young in a contest over 10 rounds. Even fewer should be favored. Jimmys only 2-2 in such encounters(2-3 counting the Page fight in the 80s) because he fought in the 70s. He could easily be 4-0 against Ali, Foreman, Norton and Lyle. I think Moorers very underrated and have him over Holyfield and Tyson. Hes the only LHW combo fighter of the last 70 years to have a run at HW over 5 fights without the help of PEDs. Moorer won more than Jimmy but Jimmy proved more. Picking Jimmy if its both their peaks and at 12-15 rounds but at 10 rounds or any other timing its either a tossup or I'd pick Moorer. Even when picking Young, Moorer has a better chance than most. Moorers better offensively but so is virtually everyone else with Jimmys ATG chin, Moorer stopping Young isn't even worth consideration.
This. I've spoken my piece repeatedly about the pedestal Young is placed on around these parts, there's no need to rehash that. And this is another of those matchups that I think would be as entertaining as watching that phony BBC cheese documentary they kept showing in National Lampoon's European Vacation.