Great Fighters and the Men they Avoided...

I read that Jack Johnson avoided Sam Langford when he was world champion. Riddick Bowe and Mike Tyson didn't want to fight each other, because they were from the same neighborhood. Sven Ottke wasn't keen to box against Joe Calzaghe (at least I've heard it a few times, even once from a reporter on German television).

 

With a potential Tyson fight on the table, The Jinx was not going in the same room as Tony Tucker, let alone the same ring.

 

James Toney would fight any slugger or swarmer but he wanted no part of speedy technical guys as he went up in weight.

He was offered fights with Juan Carlos Gomez but turned them down and after his back to back losses to Montell Griffin, he never fought an elite mover again.

 

Foreman has said he avoided Quarry. But he’s said a lot of things.

 

How do you see a Toney/Gomez fight playing out?

 

I think Toney is the better fighter overall by a lot but Gomez is all wrong for him. I see Gomez staying on the outside and not giving Toney a chance to counter punch him by not letting him set his feet. Those Cuban fighters are trained at a young age to win amauter fights this way and against the right opponent like Toney, they are hell to deal with. Dan Goosen was a smart boxing man and he knew who to match Toney with at that point in his career. Bangers and Swarmers were his opponent of choice.

Chris Byrd is another guy that Toney would not go near.

 

Top stuff, pal. How do you see Toney/Byrd playing out?

 

It’s such an oversimplified view that so-and-so ‘ducked’ another fighter.

Does it happen? Sure, sometimes, but this is a business. So you have to answer questions:

Did the promoter of the fighter allegedly being ducked make a legit offer to try to make the fight happen? Was that offer better than other offers the alleged ducker had on the table at the time?

For instance, in an example no one ever brings up because it doesn’t fit a narrative, Marvin Hagler went more than a year without defending his middleweight titles between Mugabi and Leonard. You can’t convince me by the spring of 1987 there wasn’t anyone who deserved a title shot and could claim he was ducked by Hagler when MMH fought Leonard ... but Marvin would have been a fool to fight someone else rather than take the career-high payday vs. SRL.

 

Honestly I see Byrd vs Toney the same way. Outside fighters were his kryptonite especially as he moved up in weight. Toney was at his best in the pocket and counterpunching slower fighters. Gomez and Byrd would cause him problems for sure with their amauter pedigrees and focus on movement.

 

The question is when did he avoid Quarry? When a fighter is working his way up into contention for a title shot, a smart manager might avoid all sorts of fighters. Some managers might want to pace his fighter's progress so that he will have learned his craft pretty well by the time he gets his title shot. Others might want to pick and choose his fighter's opponents so that he can have the most direct path to the title possible. In either case, a manager might want to avoid certain opponents on the way up. If the fighter is fortunate enough to win a title, all bets should then be off when it comes to avoiding a top contender. Dick Sadler might have avoided Quarry as an opponent for Big George prior to his winning the title, but I doubt that he would have ducked Quarry after George defeated Frazier. One thing that can't be said about the "first Foreman" (which is the relevant period in which he might have fought Quarry) is that he avoided the top contenders after becoming champion. Obviously, the same thing cannot be said about the "second Foreman."

 

Plenty of people on this forum know more about this then I. But I’ve seen enough people post about it. I think it was more of a style issue. You’re right plenty of reasons to for people to avoid other contenders if they can. No shame in that as long as you’re not champ.

 

I'm a fan of his but to my knowledge Larry Holmes never fought a southpaw. He criticizes Foreman's victory over Moorer as lucky, but if Larry had been in the ring that night I believe Moorer would have beaten him easily and stopped him late.

 

Toney called out Byrd many times.

 

Can you name any southpaw contenders from his era?