I think it's quite easy to dismiss Hearns in MW fights due to the two brutal stoppages he suffered in his short stint there. But is that a fair reflection on Hearns as a potential MW fighter? Would other styles still defeat Hearns at the MW limit? For example could he be outboxed, could he be kept at range, could he be beaten from mid range? The evidence we have screams he is a ko victim against almost anyone at MW, but can a convincing enough argument be made that this isn't the case?
Possibles would include, Freddie Steele, Archie Moore,GGG,Kelly Pavlik,Nigel Benn,Stan Ketchel, Tony Zale,Canelo Alvarez. Sorry misread it, I was providing the style named. Toney, Hopkins,Tiger?
Toney vs Hearns is a really interesting style clash. I've always lazily picked Toney to win, but never actually considered it in detail.
Tommy was one more shot from being ko'ed by Roldan,,, he can beat a lot of good middleweights but there's more that he can't.
Hearns would whip a lot of very highly related middleweights at his best. He was somewhat unfortunate to run into Hagler.
Nah, I don't think so. It does help, though. Monzon was no search and destroy fighter, but if he turned it up on Tommy I can't see Hearns surviving. Same with Toney. Although I would pick Hearns to beat Giardello and B-Hop, it's not out the question for him to lose to both. I'd pick Freddie Steele to rip his head off too and he wasn't a brawler by any stretch. On the flip side, not every brawler beats Hearns. Look at Dick Tiger, Hearns would give him hell, and he's one of the meanest SOBs MW ever produced. Same with LaMotta/Graziano/Zale. However, guys like Briscoe, Ketchel or indeed Barkley, would/did get to him differently, because they could explode forward from mid range. Hagler did it, and he had the chin and heart to facilitate the style. I think someone who can explode forward from mid range is his real weakness. Preferably someone with upper echelon head-movement and power, but it's not gonna work without a great chin.
