Lyle of the Ali title fight goes up against Tucker of the Douglas ft ? Lyle doing pretty well against Muhammad till getting stopped. Tucker losing to Buster till coming back . So who takes it .15 round s ?
I think Tucker is too durable, mobile and rangy to get knocked out by Lyle. Therefore a UD or late TKO for Tucker is the most plausible for me.
Lyle was by far the harder hitter of the two, but Tucker was pretty good boxer and could win this by decision.
Tucker definitely wouldn'tbe able to stop Lyle. His power was sligtly above average at best. His KO% is the most deceiving in boxing history. Even Vitali Klitschko, whose KO% is incredibly deceiving too, hit harder than Tucker IMO.
Most of the time, if the boxers didn´t feed on total tomato cans, a KO% has some truth in it. It should be kept in mind that a late brakedown KO/TKO can occur, even if the boxers doesn´t carry a lot of power. So the question about KO% should be if there´s a correlation with power in general. Maybe its worth looking at KO/TKO < round 6. Tuckers KO-ratio until he faced Tyson (I don´t think he was on the same level after that layoff) is 86%, most of them before 6 rounds. So I would say his power was above avarage and good in general. Lyle did got stopped by Ali late, but made it through 10/12 against Young two times. I don´t know, either UD or late TKO.
His opposition before Douglas was atrocious. Ali would probably have 100% KO ratio against that type of opponents (including beyond shot Jimmy Young). His 2 best opponents were James Broad and Danny Sutton, and Tucker wasn't able to stop either of them. Broad was already knocked out cold by Tim Witherspoon in 2 rounds before he faced Tucker, and Sutton was well known for his glass jaw - he was knocked out in 6 of his 7 losses (before Tucker fight). Hell, Tucker even failed to stop Eddie Richardson in the first fight.
I doubt a 75 Ali would. Later Ali was just featherfisted, as well as didn´t fight offensive. But you may be right, Tuckers opponents were not top notch. But not beeing top notch doesn´t mean they were defensively inept. Other boxers went through early opposition too, accomplishing alot less than 86% KO-ratio.
I don't see Tucker stopping Lyle ,not unless he suddenly falls apart like Douglas. And I believe Tucker was extremely durable back then .So it's a win for TT ,but Lyle has his fair share of rounds .
Tucker had good power. His problem was fragile hands. He's too good a boxer, with too many tools, for Lyle. I wouldn't take too much from his losing effort against a very shopworn Ali.
I'd say Tucker decisions him or perhaps as a second opinion stop him late. Lyle is competitive though and puts up a stern test
