TUNNEY’S TITLE

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 507, 9 November 1928, Page 7

TUNNEY’S TITLE

Who Will Get It? “A MEDIOCRE LOT” FIRPO THREATENS “COMEBACK” The heavy-weight elimination is wide open to aspirants of all sizes, weights and capacity in boxing, says a “Sporting Chronicle” writer. The rugged Paolino is willing to “fight anyone who will meet him,” and he will be dangerous at fifteen rounds to anyone venturing into the ring with him because of his ability to “take it. Firpo, who sensationally knocked Dempsey out of the ring (when Dempsey should have been disquaified and Firpo crowned champion), acknowledges to 245 pounds, but states he will reduce easily 45 pounds, and Firpo has never drunk nor smoked, and is only 30 years old. He has been doing a lot of systematic road work, an Argentine correspondent tells me, and has already “shed” 25 pounds. WHAT A CHANCE! Nothing would please Rickard more than to have Firpo back in form. Then there is Young Stribling. with more than 100 bouts under his belt and another clean-liver, and these, with Heeney, Sharkey, Roberti, Risko, Loughran (dangerous if he can learn to hit —and why not?), and Benny Leonard, always a good judge, favouring Sharkey as the best of the mediocre lot. What a chance for a smart, fast, hard-hitting Englishman! These men, without exception, have developed automatically. None has given the real science of the sport much consideration, being content to slug, take it and “hope,” or to be flashily clever at “feathedusting.” Tunney studied hard for seven years, eradicating faults, perfecting defence, acquiring speed and endurance, and, above other things, learning how to hit the twisting impacts that cut a man to pieces, and how not to use those blows blindly but only when they would tell their story. The modern boxers, almost without exception, are working the “hit or miss,” no matter where or how, so long as blows are continually struck and landed —or missed by something under the proverbial mile.