He better be. If Tunney was any whiter he'd be a ventriloquist. I think Tunney can find Floyd (as fast as he might be) with his gym nerdiness and his accuracy and get an UD. But I'll say Patterson cause I'm a grown up and nobody tells me what to do.
Gene by close decision. His timing would offset patterson's speed advantage and he has the power to command floyd's respect. I think he could outjab him from the outside and bully him when it gets in close. He key decider is that Tunney has an iron chin so I think he can take what Floyd can give.
#1 I hate cross-era matchups, very hard to call, if not impossible. #2 Styles make fights. Many folks in other of these Gene/Floyd threads over the years have said that Floyd's never fought a fighter like Gene. Well....Gene's never fought a fighter like Floyd! No way Tunney ends this inside of distance. The only three possible results are: Tunney UD Floyd UD Floyd stoppage. Again, different eras. Liston put Patterson out and Liston may well have found Gene and put him out but...Floyd might reach Gene on a regular basis thruout the scrap and cop a nice UD. That's the way I see it, given the different era problems, it would probably be a nice chess match.
I'm probably guilty of selling Floyd too short vs the other HOF heavyweights, but Tunney is one I think he matches up well with (Tunney is usually one of the guys I pick to upset bigger,immobile heavies) because Floyd's no slouch in the speed and combination punching himself.
Floyd doesn't have a weak chin by any means, and this misconception is completely unwarranted. Although Tunney's power is underrated by many, I don't think he had quite enough to stop Patterson, but he could certainly bother him. I like Tunney by a 9-6 style UD and despite this probably being one of the best match ups for Floyd in terms of a hypothetical match up on ESB, I don't think he quite had enough to take down Tunney.