By Terence Dooley
I was never a big fan of Elvis Presley - he was always a little too forced for my taste – but my uncle was an Elvis fanatic. Oftentimes he’d sit me down for an Elvis retrospective, from the young svelte rock and roller to the much-maligned “Vegas” incarnation of The King – a fat parody trying to replicate his best years for a still adoring audience. It was the perceived genius, not the tight, black jeans that the fanatics trooped out to see.
In many ways we face the same situation with James Toney, the mass sea of fireside chair critics who write about boxing dismiss Toney as a grotesque parody of what he once was. During his heavyweight years the critics are sneering and dipping poisoned pens into bitter ink to decry Toney as a big joke; Toney trains on doughnuts, his blood-type is Ragu, when someone tells him to haul ass he needs to make two trips, and on and on. Irony aside – coach potatoes casting aspersions at a chubby overachiever – the jokes are, if you will excuse the pun, wearing very thin. The scriveners continue to tell Toney he needs to lose weight yet the actions of the man himself seem to suggest he’d prefer not to.
In this post-modern boxing age of old-school, new-school, never-went-to-school Toney is patronised as a fat guy who can do a few shoulder rolls. Yes right and Joe Louis was a short guy who could punch a little bit. In a single year, 1991, Toney achieved more than Bernard Hopkins achieved in the years he allowed inertia to follow the triumph of his win over Felix Trinidad. Some fighters receive a fighter of the year award for only fighting twice in a year, most fighters win a title and don’t think “hey I cannot wait to defend this title” but rather “I’m going to take six months off then try and duck out of my mandatory” in 1991 Toney was different and created a very good year for Michigan born boys who love to fight.
Preliminary Sketches – Toney versus Sosa and Alberto Gonzales
For James Toney 1991 opened up with a crossroads fight as he squared up to the fellow unbeaten hopeful Merqui Sosa for the spurious IBC middleweight-title. This was a clash to determine which of the two “0” hopefuls would step into the higher echelons and it was also a fight in which we began to see embryonic flashes of the skills Toney would use to delight, as well as infuriate, fight fans for the next fifteen years.
Merqui, as would become his trademark, brought a kind of rough unorthodoxy to proceedings as he stalked Toney in the early rounds, James had looked focussed before the first bell and brought this focus to bear with clean shots throughout the duration of round one. Already Sosa was looking like a puppet with his strings cut. Round two brought a brief moment of discomfort for Toney as Sosa dug in shots to the ribs of his opponent.
As rounds passed by the clean work from the outside by Toney, coupled with his crisp countering, suggested that he had responded well to the step-up in class whereas Merqui was finding that his crude strokes were not enough to take Toney out of his game plan.
With a clear lead already built-up Toney decided to use his jab to dig out a clearing for himself and when the final bell sounded James looked by far the more composed fighter.
The result should have been a formality for Toney only it was not quite so simple, just as we were given a glimpse of his emerging skills his lack of work-rate in some rounds nearly cost him as the scorecards threw up a ludicrous split-decision. When the final ballot was cast justice was done as it gave Toney the fight, and the decision, by virtue of a 117-109 margin, the same as my card. It seems that Toney’s lazy periods in the fight, despite not coinciding with a swing in Sosa’s favour, had fooled one of the judges into producing an erroneous scorecard. Toney had been all peak and trough and it seems that only his troughs had been scored by one of the arbiters. Irregardless of this Toney now had the IBC title and more importantly a scalp which gave him a claim to press.
There was a Marvin Hagler shaped void in the middleweight division and Toney was intent on filling it, he bided his time with a fine-tuning win over Alberto Gonzales in which he again showed that when he wanted to, when his fuel tank would permit him to, Toney could box quite unlike anyone else in the world.
For the Gonzales fight Toney came in at 162 lbs, throughout his early career his weight had fluctuated between 157 and 165 lbs, that was Ok when he was a contender but for his next fights he’d have to come in under the limit and the fact he sometimes did by a clear 3 lbs suggested his team were leaving nothing to chance as well as suggesting that Toney was struggling to make 160 lbs. It would make for some interesting fights and true tests of judging proficiency.
A Study in Momentum – Toney Versus Michael Nunn
Michael Nunn was the heir apparent to Marvin Hagler in name only. Comparisons only underlined the fact it often goes unnoticed that not all southpaws are the same. Hagler, as a Champion, was all fire and fury whilst Nunn was the quintessential southpaw stylist with an added pinch of spite thrown in when required.
Most reports of this fight amount to a few lines, after all what is there to say? Toney - out-boxed for round after round by the impressive, dominant champion – eventually manages to throw a punch and KO’s the hometown boy with a single left hook, a lucky punch that gives him the keys to the post-Hagler middleweight kingdom.
Well it didn’t quite happen in that fashion. At some barely perceptible moment Nunn lost control of the fight and didn’t adapt to the change in momentum in the way a champion should adapt.
In the first round Nunn posed instead of punching whilst Toney kept a tight guard and worked the champion’s body. In rounds two and three the fans got what they had expected to see as Nunn flurried with combos and flashy arm-punches. James Toney stayed calm and deployed that unusual rolling guard to ensure that for all his effort Nunn only had a success rate of one blow landed for every four thrown.
Nunn looked impressive yet was hitting the gloves of Toney as well as having his shots supinely parried and blocked. Looking back it was an illusory control; similar to the sensation of power the ringmaster has over the panther.
As the rounds passed the predicted pasting never quite panned out. Throughout the fight Nunn was constantly moving around the ring, yet he was flicking with his right hand jab and allowing Toney to counter him with a stronger right hand.
Nunn was finding in this fight that Toney could cut-off the ring and snatch a few body shots in close, yet the fight was still, on the surface, very much in Nunn’s favour as the bell rang to end the fifth round. Between rounds Toney stared intently across the ring at his foe as Bill Miller told him not to give it up, concise with his words Toney spat out his reply: “I’m not giving shit up!”
Michael Nunn came out for the sixth with a fire under him only to find that his impassive challenger continued to slip and block the incoming blows. Toney was ultra concentrated and when the tempo slipped in the middle of the round he began to show cameos of fire. Nunn was not enforcing his rule adequately, his shots were flicked in rather than driven, and Toney was not just there to make up the rounds.
In round seven both men measured each other with power punches only for Toney to drive his shots to the body then urge Nunn on; in complying and losing his composure Nunn gave the clearest sign that Toney had crawled under his skin. This frustration spilled into round eight as Nunn powered in shots with a certain resignation, it seemed he had realised that he could not hurt Toney and was coasting for the final few rounds; Nunn’s tank was severely depleted by his earlier profligacy. Toney had now broken Nunn’s serve. It was no longer a mismatch between an established champion and a green challenger; it was now an active, hungry fighter stalking a fading celebrity.
In the ninth Nunn was badly wobbled as Toney pressed his advantage, Nunn was hit with right uppercuts and looping right hands as well as being bundled along the ropes by the incessant Toney. Clearly, irretrievably Nunn had hit the wall without putting a dent in Toney, even during Nunn’s best periods his blows had been flicked from the arm as opposed to powered from the shoulder, he had mistaken Toney for a heavy bag and was about to pay a costly price. Toney cruelly allowed Nunn to utilise his tired legs for the majority of the tenth round before exploding a long right hand onto the chin of Nunn at the rounds end.
Between rounds ten and eleven Angelo Dundee used all his experience to try and get Nunn to box his way to the final bell but Nunn seemed dazed from the regularity with which Toney was trouncing him with right hands. Toney sat serenely on his stool seeming very much like a man whose moment in time had come. He had brought Nunn to the boil early in the fight and was now facing a busted flush, he had seen all the flurries, all the fancy shots and they had taught him one thing, Nunn could not hurt him.
Seizing his moment Toney continued to press on Nunn in the eleventh round and when he got him to the ropes he abandoned his earlier caution and tagged Nunn with that ever-present right hand counter. Right hand after right hand had been thrown by Toney in the fight and as he moved Nunn around the ring it seemed a question of whether Nunn could continue to take this shot. Toney answered this question for Nunn by walking Nunn away from the right hand and detonating a silent-storm left hook onto the jaw of the home town boy.
In this round Toney had shown his cunning by using his right to move Nunn into position for the big left hook, a punch no one had expected Toney to detonate so effectively. It was a truly awe-inspiring left hook and it dumped Nunn on the canvas in an unstylish bundle, Nunn was given the luxury of a sixteen second count by the referee but it was to no avail, he’d have needed fifteen hours to recover tolerably from his nights work and when he did finally rise Toney was not to be denied as he finished Nunn along the ropes to claim the IBF title.
For all the flash skills of Nunn Toney had been cranking up the pressure for round after round, Nunn had won rounds yet even when doing this the younger, stronger and more active fighter had been slowly beating him up. James Toney, the exemplary black-hat bad guy had rolled into dodge and taken out the sheriff in an absorbing boxing melodrama.
Who Wants It? – James Toney Versus Reggie Johnson
Only six weeks after his stunning upset win over Michael Nunn James Toney found himself in the ring again for a fight with another high-quality southpaw foe in Reggie Johnson.
The fight opened with the real possibility that Toney would be the shortest reigning middleweight champion of all time as he was dumped onto the seats of his pants by a round-house left as early as round two.
Toney responded by out-working Reggie through the next three rounds as Johnson slowed the pace, in the fifth a big right and an uppercut from Toney made Reggie fade noticeably only for Toney to undo that good work by allowing Reggie to steal round six.
It was a mixed debut as champion so far and it seemed that James’ upset win over Nunn was going to be his defining moment unless he could force the fight more. Luckily Reggie seemed exhausted by his prior efforts as Toney forced him back throughout the ninth and tenth rounds; in particular a left hook twisted Reggie’s head round and for the first time he did not throw anything back at Toney. Reggie had twelve rounds to claim the title but could not raise his game at crucial times.
It was all going to go to the last round and as both fighters stepped away from a clash of heads Toney dabbed at a spring of blood over his eye. Fury suitably awakened Toney roared forward and caught Reggie with big lefts and rights, for his part Johnson looked done in and allowed the blood-crazed Toney to press the fight as the seconds ticked away. It seemed that the late rally, as well as the rot-stopping seventh round, had saved Toney from the indignity of losing his title after a single defence. Again the judges turned in split cards. Ric Bays gave it to Toney by 114-113, Mike Glienna saw Johnson a 114-113 winner and the final ballot had Toney a 115-112 winner. I had it 114-113 for Toney. His body of work had already been enough to give him a strong shot at fighter of the year but Toney was not done yet.
James Toney was barely into 1991 and had defeated Sosa, Nunn and Johnson; all men who would go onto win various versions of titles. He had already crafted one hell of a year and it was only the beginning. We’ll see how the rest of this Annis Incredible panned out for Toney in part II.