Tunney and Sharkey really didn’t like each other

Discussion in 'Classic Boxing Forum' started by Melankomas, Jun 8, 2025 at 3:38 PM.


  1. Melankomas

    Melankomas Prime Jeffries would demolish a grizzly in 2 Full Member

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    Sharkey has a natural animosity toward Tunney and openly predicts he’ll "knock out the champion if he ever meets him", and Sharkey boasted he’d knock out Maloney and Delaney too - and he lived up to his word. Regardless, Tunney still maintains Sharkey is a ‘'coward at heart’’ - and Sharkey says simply "Tunney is afraid to meet his logical contender."
    "Tunney handpicked Heeney for his opponent,” Sharkey says," because he knew he couldn't whip me or Risko. This isn’t the first time Tunney refused to meet me. He hoisted the white flag and ran out of a match with me at Madison Square Garden, March 17, 1925, picking on Dan Dowds, Italian Jack Herman and Bartley Madden, a bunch of set-ups." Sharkey's own pet name for Tunney is "the superficial Shakespearian champion.”
    "lf Tunney fought more - and talked less of his superficial book knowledge - he would do Boxing more good. His efforts to review books are as shallow as the wise cracks of a street corner politician when directed at some great stateman." (George Kirksey, Imperial Valley Press, 1928)
     
  2. Ioakeim Tzortzakis

    Ioakeim Tzortzakis Well-Known Member Full Member

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    Didn't know shitting on Gene Tunney was trendy 100 years back, as well :lol:
     
  3. Journeyman92

    Journeyman92 Out For Milk Full Member

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    To be fair Tunney did cultivate a BS intellectual image didn’t he?
     
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  4. Pugguy

    Pugguy Ingo, The Thinking Man’s GOAT Full Member

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    I already liked The Boston Gob but, after reading that,…..I now like him that much more.
     
  5. Melankomas

    Melankomas Prime Jeffries would demolish a grizzly in 2 Full Member

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    It reminds me of how Corbett would larp as a Gentleman when in reality he seemed to be anything but one according to those who met or fought him.
     
  6. Ioakeim Tzortzakis

    Ioakeim Tzortzakis Well-Known Member Full Member

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    No wonder they got along so well :lol:
     
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  7. Journeyman92

    Journeyman92 Out For Milk Full Member

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    James J Corbett’s inner monologue in his book feels like I’m reading the 1800s version of American Psycho. Jim was vain, thuggish, frothing racist and genuinely anti social he isn’t someone you’d want to know and struck me as a demeaning bully mostly. Dempsey unlike Corbett and Tunney seemed like the real, natural gentleman he enjoyed literature was often warm to people and curious about high culture.

    EDIT: Jack reminds me of a sort of Conan the Barbarian figure from the right angle.
     
    Last edited: Jun 8, 2025 at 4:27 PM
  8. Journeyman92

    Journeyman92 Out For Milk Full Member

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    I would hate to be in a room with them at a party it’d feel like a social hostage situation, they’d both probably spend the night “chairing” vaguely discussing a book they skimmed, brow beating everyone into nodding along. JJC’s mask would slip after enough alcohol and he’d probably stick Mark Twains head in the toilet or something.
     
  9. FrankinDallas

    FrankinDallas FRANKINAUSTIN

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    Tunney was an unlikable guy amongst the working class, of which Sharkey was a member.

    He (Tunney) was seen as a smart assed high hat who actually read books. Boxers don't read books. The Sunday comics sure but not literature ffs.
     
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  10. Ioakeim Tzortzakis

    Ioakeim Tzortzakis Well-Known Member Full Member

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    Before feeding it to a gorilla as a ''distraction" in order to Box its head off.
     
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  11. Journeyman92

    Journeyman92 Out For Milk Full Member

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    You should do one of your Wylie style breakdowns on Sharkey. JS was a really good boxer, showed off some flashy stuff, worth more of a study then lots of other HW’s he boxed like a really good 160lber.
     
  12. Ioakeim Tzortzakis

    Ioakeim Tzortzakis Well-Known Member Full Member

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    Why not, haven't watched much of Sharkey anyhow, so this might be a solid chance.
     
  13. AntonioMartin1

    AntonioMartin1 Jeanette Full Member

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    Well, Gene Tunney was a U.S. Marine. It's hard to imagine him being scared of anything.

    That's not to say he could not be. It's natural to be scared sometimes.

    But U.S. Marines operate more like Michael Corleone. Who himself was a U.S. Marine. They are trained to kill if necessary. I am the daughter of a U.S. Marine so I should know.

    That said, this seemed more like Sharkey trying to get Tunney to fight and to sell the fight. Plenty of boxers act like they hate each other when it turns out they don.t Like Jorge Paez told me about the Puerto Rican-Mexican rivalry: "its all to sell the fight".

    But boxers who don't like each other is not uncommon either. Monzon and Valdes and Chavez and Randall, for example. And Frazier (mostly for his part) and Ali although Ali seemed to like Frazier, and Wilfredo Gomez seemed to like Salvador Sanchez, Im not sure about Sanchez liking Gomez, however, but given that Wilfredo gets along with Carlos Zarate, Lupe Pintor and Juan Laporte, Im sure they could be friends nowadays too.
     
    Last edited: Jun 9, 2025 at 11:46 PM
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  14. RockyValdez

    RockyValdez Member Full Member

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    Sharkey says Tunney was afraid to meet him and Risko and handpicked Heeney but Tunney beat Risko (who later beat Sharkey) and knocked Heeney out. The same Heeney who beat Risko and who Sharkey couldnt beat. Tunney also defeated Dempsey, who stopped Sharkey. Sharkey sounds bitter.
     
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  15. Seamus

    Seamus Proud Kulak Full Member

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    Yet he came from the low station of Hell's Kitchen, his family living in a cramped apartment.
     
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