Middleweight Tournament Round 2: Tiger vs Greb

Great, great, great fight.

Shame they had to meet.

Was reading a bit about Bogash and Greb this week. Bogash seems to have been a fighter that was close to impossible to discourage and his pressure seems to have troubled Greb, who squeeked by on points. Tiger has all of Bogash's heart, vigor, punch resistance and mental strength but additional advantages, size among them, but also clinical, consistantly hard punching and counter punching. I think that Tiger's combination of punching ability and extreme indefatigability, would be absolutley hell for Harry Greb.

On the other hand, Greb is the speedster here and he's capable of out-working Tiger, one of the few. It's true, absolutley true in my mind, that Tiger won't get discouraged (like so many of Greb's foes) but that doesn't mean that Tiger will be able to solve The Windwill...

I think Tiger would start very well. I think Greb would be wanting a look and that Dick would take advantage, perhaps even hurting Harry early in the fight with single left hooks downstairs and maybe out-jabbing the quicker man with his combination of punch resistance and technical excellence...Greb would rally (of course) once he'd had a good look at Dick and starting cutting Tiger up with every punch in the book. I'd see it close to even through ten.

So horrifically i've got to try to split these two in the championship rounds where both could excell. I'm going to go against the grain, and pick Tiger's more conservative style to allow him to eek out a disputed split decision in one of the best fights ever seen.

Tiger SD Greb.

 

Rugged, pressure counter-punching might get the job done in combination with certain physical assets (mad durability and chin).

Flowers seems to have been content to let Greb lead for stretches of all their fights and holds two wins over the past-prime version. I'll stick my neck out and say that prime Tiger is a razor's edge better than prime Flowers.

Also. Tunney had success counter-punching Greb - augmented by his being able to match Greb in clinches in the later fights due to size/strength, which I think is an advantage Tiger may also hold.

 

Negative. About as likely as KO I should say!

 

Tunney is more technically sound than Jones.

I feel that way.

 

I agree with you; but I think a better fighter (debateable) and I also do feel that those fights read like Greb did much of the leading and Flowers retaliated with what i'd broadly describe as counter-punch rushes. Tiger's being more precise may actually help him in conjunction with his heart and chin.

Yeah, controversial but very close. I don't think of these losses as a stick that can be used to beat Greb, put it that way. I only raised them because it's an example of fights where Greb was countered to close affairs.

Incidently, would you agree that Greb turned the clock back for the second fight? This seems to have been a much better performance.

My read is different for you in the following ways -

1 - Greb volintarily gave up some of the dirty work because he felt it was costing him against Tunney. It certainly became an issue.

2 - Tunny countered to the body at all ranges