Why was Hearns so inconsistent after the Hagler fight

..............Weight and age. It's a ***** getting old.

 

:rofl

 

He didn't have a middleweight chin neither.

 

He did not look to bad against Shuler!!!!!!!

But that was the end of prime Motor City Cobra.

He kept his technical skills, but we never saw that power that he showed against the Cuevas' and the Duran's post Shuler.

I suspect the weight gain was part of the reason, but he was comming up for 29 by the time he fought Andries, with two devastating defeats in his legs, I think with hindsight even someone as good as him, it is going to suffer physical problems.

 

If you ask me I think he just took some guys more lightly than he did others and so didn't train as hard for them as he should have. A good example is the difference between Hearns in the Shuler fight compared to the Barkley I fight. Against Shuler he was up on his toes, his balance was fantastic and he was sharp as a tack. Compare that to when he fought Barkley where he is basically plodding forward, doesn't seem to have much bounce in his legs and is sloppy by his own very high standards. Hence he got knocked out in round 3.

I think you can see that when Tommy took a fighter seriously, like Hill, Shuler, Duran etc he was a different fighter compared to when he didn't, like Kinchen, Medal, Roldan etc. His jumping around in weight didn't help matters either and Manny Steward said that was directly responsible for shortening his prime.

 

He was just fighting bigger guys and found it harder to take the punches.

 

Tho some performances might be a little sketchy Tommy lost just one time in 6 years post Hagler. Not bad for someone on the downside.

 

Roldan, Kinchen and Barkley are under-rated.
Tough awkward mofos all three of 'em, but not too crude as to negate their advantages completely.

Hearns was a bit shaky in the chin and legs all his career.
Big middleweights would get to him. The Hearns of 1980 or 1984 was fighting no big strong middles/super-middles.

Hearns took a lot of tough fights, you got to credit him that.
Andries was far too crude at the time, but still a risk. Hill was highly-regarded but proved inferior as a boxer, and had no other way.
Schuler was iced, pure and simple.

Maybe Hearns was on the slide from 1988 on, people were saying so. But that doesn't give his opponents quite enough credit, or him enough for tackling them. He fought some rough ones.

 

That's a bloody good post. Those 3 are definitely awkward for most anyone. Hearns fought all three when they were quite close to their best.

 

Not just that, all 3 were probably stylistically horrible match-ups for Tommy in a sense that all 3 were strong, awkward, durable and had good power of their own. If Hearns wasn't an ATG puncher Roldan would have beaten him.

 

Totally agree.

 

Hearns was lucky not to have Tony Ayala to run into. The Barkley fiasco would've seemed like a pleasant memory.

 

atsch

 

Tommy, Marvin, Mike, Ray, Nunn, they were all damn lucky bro!