Heavyweight Tourney: Rd 3: Gene Tunney .Vs. Rocky Marciano

And who said otherwise?

 

I am just going to disagree with you. Dempsey did not hit harder than Rocky by the way, nor Louis. Tunney fought and beat a clearly past prime Dempsey. Tell the whole story Mendoza.

That's what Walcott thought, and he had better footwork than Tunney (Yes, he did, not as mobile though) and was a superior defensive fighter. Walcott was a cuter and very unpredictable that could bang with two hands. Maybe stylistically Tunney is a harder fight, but Walcott thought similarly about Marciano that you do now. It was a mistake most of his opponents make.

We can agree LaStarza won the first few rounds and that Tunney was definitely superior. What we can't seem to agree on is control of the fights. You overcontribute the fact that Rocky hitting on the break or low was doing the significant damage. A lot of those shots were on the border and nut ball-buster punchers ala Dempsey vs Sharkey (See the difference just in the result). Marciano took control of the fight fairly soon (Mid rounds) and punished LaStarza. He brought hate in the ring, and took a little less on his punches to punish him. The proof is in the ripture vessels. That broke him down. LaStarza couldn't keep his hands him. Nicky Sylvester attests to Marciano "Holding LaStarza up" he could have easily stopped him earlier if he wanted.

Rocky is a slugging swarmer, at least can be. Obviously FOTC springs to mind. Now, Ali was vastly superior to Frazier. Marciano, on the other hand is much more comparable to Frazier at least in qualities. Yes, Frazier had better footspeed and slightly faster hands with a bobbing and weaving that got him inside, but Marciano had superior stamina, punching power, and durability in my eyes. Tunney, is a great mover but he doesn't have any rhythm. Marciano will find him and bust him up. He will take control toward the end of the fight. If Greb can beat Tunney, then Marciano can handle him.

 

:happy

 

The whole story takes a long time to tell. My reply was Tunney chin was iron cast and his fighting heart was gold. Marciano beat past their best venisons of Charles and Walcott, just like Tunney beat a past his prime version of Dempsey. The main difference is, Tunney hardly struggled at all, while Maricano had his hands full. Thought Dempsey was clearly past his best, he still had comparable foot and hand speed than Rocky did in that fight. In fact I think Dempsey even then was faster than Maricano, he just lacked the stamina to sustain it. Tunney simply was not there to be hit.

I agree with what you said. As I said before Tunney was no fool. And his chin was far better than Walcott's, which diminishes Marciano's punchers chance of landing a bomb.

I have seen the fight with an eye on critical commentary. The foul blows Marciano landed were by far and away the best punches he landed up to that point. The tide turned in Maricnao's favor shortly after he landed them.

Agreed on all counts. You might be underestimating Tunney's toughness. Its far better than LaStarza's.

Frazier to me was more dynamic with his feet, closing the gap, and bobbing and weaving to get into range in comparison to Marciano....and closing the gap vs a guy like Tunney who can box and move for a full 15 rounds is the key in this fight. I'll agree Marciano hit a little harder than Frazier, but Rocky's power was a bit over stated. He needed on average a little bit over 9 rounds to win his championship fights, and this includes the 1st round blow out ( looked like Walcott opted not to get up ) over Walcott.

??? Tunney had plenty of rhythm and was keen on switching tactics. If Goldman gave Rocky a good idea, Tunney would already have a plan for it. Yes Greb beat Tunney once, and it was based on a massive head butt to Tunney's face, eyes and nose. In modern times this is a clear NC due to a head butt. Tunney lost a lot of blood, and had to go 14 more rounds blind, and in pain. He received a standing ovation from the crowd after the final bell rung. Also, Greb was extremely quick. Much faster than Marciano, and with a completely different style.

 

Tunney didn't dance and move with the rhythm of a Muhammad Ali. Even Ali comments on this, and you can see he has a good point. Tunney moves, but he doesn't have the same rhythm or ability to almost float like Ali which gave him an easy access to open up his arsenal so fluidly. Tunney doesn't have quite the same fluidly.

I think this would be a tough fight for either man either way. This makes me wonder, is it possible Tunney is underrated H2H as a Heavyweight? Just a thought, he doesn't get talked much about unless your Bert Sugar and ranking him #4 or something.

 

Who eles moved and boucned around like a prime Ali? In terms of mobility, and footspeed Tunney is one of the best heavies of all time. Sugar rated Tunney #5. I have Tunney around #14-15, but I do think he would also edge some great like Joe Louis and Rocky Marciano on points.

 

This is not actualy correct.

Although Tunney claimed that the cut was caused by a head but contemporary newspapers say that it was caused by a punch.

 

It's boxing not ****ing dancing.

Tunney moved beautifully and efficiently. The more I think of this match the more I consider Tunney one of the few sub-200 lb'ers I would take over Marciano. Charles and Moore were demonstrated lacking, Conn lacked the pop, Jones Jr. probably lacked the durability, Dempsey would be another story.... However, Tunney might have the right combination of all necessary assets.

 

He had him looking ragged and taken him out of his gameplan well before that combo landed. It wasn't as if Dempsey simply landed a big combo out of the blue.

I would say the fact that he KO'd Brennan late, and still looked as strong and fresh as when the fight opened, proves that you didn't have a good chance to survive just by getting through the early rounds. Gibbons' only intentions were to survive, and he "fought" accordingly; unlike Ezzard Charles, who was all-out to win and stood toe-to-toe, yet still managed to last the full 15 against Rocky.

 

OK but it is not a given that Tunney would beat the versions of Walcott and Charles that Marciano fought.

 

I'd actually pick Walcott against Tunney. Charles I wouldn't though.

 

He won more than lost against Greb. Greb was a great middleweight, but also an all time great light heavyweight. He was one of the leading contenders for Dempseys crown. If he fought Walcott, Charles or moore it would be a fight where half of people would favour Harry and half would favour one of the other 3. Who wins is highly debatable. A win over Greb (at any weight) is more than realistic. I would say that those wins alone are on the same level as each other! Even if personally someone may think one or the other might be a little more impressive.

If you are going to harp on the fact that one close points loss (avenged) means too much, then you are also going to rate Rocky Marciano the greatest of all time because the others all lost.

When i said big, i really meant true heavyweight of the times, not a superheavyweight by todays standards.

Boxrec has him as 5 '10. Either way, he was about as tall as, Let us say, Rocky Marciano? Boxrec again has him weighing in in his debut fight (record maybe not fully complete though) at 176lbs, which makes him a heavyweight on his debut. given that his opponent was a light heavy, one could probably infer that he was a bigger man who could not quite make the weight limit. In first test against a bigger 200+ heavy, Colin Bell, his weight was 186 which made him a fully fledged heavy in those days. By half way through 1925 - 27(4 years after debut and when he started fighting his highest level opponents, he was weighing 190 to 200 lbs).

You say he was mediocre, but he was pretty much the leading contender when Tunney was champion. He earned this right by beating Johnny Risko, who had beaten Harry Wills conqueror, Paulino Uzcuden as well as Jack Sharkey. He was the legitimate Top contender. That is not really as ordinary as you suggest.

A win is a win. Loughran was young, but he had just been the distance with Harry Greb, losing a close newspaper decision, so he was obviously young and talented. Joe Louis was young when he lost to Schmelling, but it is still a pretty impressive win, isnt it. In fact, it is very, very arguably that a win over a young pre prime champion (who has good results on the board and goes on to achieve great results) is a better win over older opponent like say Jersey Joe Walcott (especially in the second fight). Either way, the wins are comparable. So what if they never rematched. What does this have to do with the quality of Tunneys wins?

Well in 1914, he beat Gunboat Smith to win the White Heavyweight championship of the world. This is the equivalent of one of the alphabet titles floating around today, so i would say that he achieved reasonable status as a heavyweight. Just before he lost to Dempsey, he won the European heavyweight championship, which again I would say is at least some form of achievement at heavyweight. Technically he won more heavyweight titles than Archie Moore!

He may or may not have been as good as the three fighters you think of. If they fought, i think you would struggle to get many to pick carpentier against them. But, he is in or close to their class. If they were to fight and Carpentier were to win, it wouldnt exactly be a Douglas-Tyson style upset. To put it another way, moore, Charles and Walcott were all beaten by lower rated fighters than Georges Carpentier. In charles case, it happened within a year or so of his last loss to Rocky Marciano.

Of course they compare, although Rocky does have many other good wins on his record. but, the Dempsey wins on their own trump the Walcott, Charles and Moore wins, and they were done so in a far more dominant fashion than Rocky did over those three. The Greb wins are probably on par or maybe slightly better, although they werent as dominant obviously.

 

Perhaps. Walcott was irregular and spotty in his performances. Charles was tough as nails, though.

I would take Tunney over Walcott but make Charles a pick-em.

 

in a series of three fights i think tunney would win one at least but i am going for tunney to build an early lead but marciano to come on strongly after the 7th and stop tunney around the 12th. but feel that i could easily see tunney winning a close decision its just more probable that marciano wins the first fight to me.

 

I'm on the Pontius express. Marciano is far more proven at the weight and is hell over 15. Tunney may or may not lead at any stage but i see Marciano prevailing.