Tommy Morrison - As interesting in death as he was alive !!!

Tommy Morrison was banned from Boxing when he was diagnosed with HIV in 1996..............Tommy Morrison later died of an Aids related illness in 2013...........

However not according to his Wife trish.................

"The Vegas doctor who kicked him out of the sport later said he didn't diagnose him with HIV..."...

"Tommy suffered from Miller Fisher syndrome as a result of a botched operation in Tennesseee......"

"Tommy did two more physicals in 1996 and passed them with flying colors..."

"Tommy couldn't get a copy of the medical that showed he had HIV"

"Before his comeback in 2007.... a Dr Margaret Goodman said she'd seen a copy of his results from Quest labs and it unequivocally shows Tommy has HIV !!!...So we got in touch with the Quest labs and they said first of all we don't diagnose... and we don't have a copy anyway and lastly we wouldn't give confidential reports to another Doctor"

"They did an autopsy of the blood in Tommy and found his blood didn't contain the HIV virus.."

Strange stuff................

Tom Friend, ESPN Senior Writer

Tommy Morrison died Sunday night of an undisclosed illness. But for all intents and purposes, he died of denial.

In 1996, Morrison was diagnosed with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. In 1997, he told me he was still having unprotected sex with his first wife.


"I'll trust an attorney before I'll trust a doctor," he said.

I'm not sure how many wives he ended up with (I lost count after the fourth), but nothing ever changed. His last wife, Trisha, recently told ESPN.com's Elizabeth Merrill that they, too, had had unprotected sex. As far as Tommy was concerned, his HIV never existed. He searched high and low for rogue doctors who would assure him he was fine, who would clear him to go back to boxing. He was nothing without boxing, nothing without sex -- so he looked the other way.

He tried AZT for a month and threw it in the trash; he thought the HIV therapy drug taken by most HIV patients was propoganda. His family staged an intervention to get him back on meds, but he cursed at them and said, "I will lay down and die before I take any drugs." Magic Johnson tried to reach out to him in 1996 -- the same Magic Johnson who is thriving 22 years after his own HIV diagnosis -- and Tommy Morrison plum ignored him.


"I remember talking to Magic the day I announced I had HIV," Morrison told me in 1998. "He was preaching, 'Do what your doctor tells you.' Well, I didn't have a doctor then, so I got down on my knees and I prayed. Every day, I was like, 'God, what do I do?' Hell, I saw myself dying. And then I started getting all these books in the mail, and they all said, 'Don't worry about it. Just live your life.' So that's what I did."

Morrison was a distant relative of John Wayne. But the problem was he lived his whole life like he was in the Wild West. His mother gave him his first tattoo. And his father gave him his first woman -- at a strip club when Tommy was 14.

They entered him, as an eighth-grader, in "tough man" contests. In other words, his parents essentially signed him up for bar fights. That's how he made his name. That and setting fire to his high school football field when he was cut from the team.

The best thing he had going was his blue eyes, his blond hair and muscles on top of muscles. He moved to Kansas City, got a promoter and entered the fight game. Morrison would later admit to me that he was on steroids, but Sylvester Stallone couldn't take his eyes off of him and cast him as Tommy Gunn in "Rocky V."


As a writer for the New York Times, I later watched him defeat 44-year-old George Foreman in Las Vegas for a heavyweight title. That night, while they were clenching seconds before the final bell, Foreman whispered to the new champ: "Don't curse in public." Morrison must not have heard him.

He would later be arrested for multiple DUIs and was always allegedly profane with the police officers. Morrison and Stallone had had a falling out by then. So had Tommy and his trainer. But Bill Cayton was his manager, and had Morrison not been diagnosed with HIV, Cayton was about to get him a deal to fight Mike Tyson. The hype would have been through the roof, or at least through the MGM Grand.

But after the diagnosis, Morrison became a pariah. His words were mumbled and nonsensical. His family assumed he contracted HIV from a dirty steroid needle, but there was no discussing it with him, no discussing anything with him. Before the new millennium, he bought a cave, convinced that the world was coming to an end at the stroke of midnight on Jan. 1, 2000. That's where he slept on Dec. 31, 1999 -- delusional then, and obviously in the years to come.

He had a good heart. That was never the issue. He was friendly, would talk to any kid. But he would also talk to animals, too. He once did an interview with me with his cat in his arms.

He died Sunday at the age of 44, the same age Foreman was when Morrison beat him for the title. Hopefully, he finally took George's advice. Hopefully, Tommy Morrison wasn't cursing at the end.

Got a lot of time for The Duke. 1 of my fav 90's era fighters.

The best most exciting white heavy with a sold skill set. He had flaws that were exposed by the elite fighters and he got very close to becoming a champ. Had to face tough opposition in that time.

Quite the swordsman too bedding up to 3 woman a day. When he was 14 his dad took him to a strip joint to loose his v. Tommy banged 1 of the strippers in there real good.

Fought Mercer as an amature in the Olympic trials but lost a close contest. The two would meet again in the pro ranks but we all know what happened there.

ONETWOFOREVER wrote:Got a lot of time for The Duke. 1 of my fav 90's era fighters.

The best most exciting white heavy with a sold skill set. He had flaws that were exposed by the elite fighters and he got very close to becoming a champ. Had to face tough opposition in that time.

Quite the swordsman too bedding up to 3 woman a day. When he was 14 his dad took him to a strip joint to loose his v. Tommy banged 1 of the strippers in there real good.

Fought Mercer as an amature in the Olympic trials but lost a close contest. The two would meet again in the pro ranks but we all know what happened there.

How old are you??!!?!?!

Someone posted an interview with Tommy on the old BBC once. Some of his comments about AIDS and the homosexual community were pretty horrific. Realise he was probably under a lot of stress with all this diagnosis stuff going on but irrespective of that his comments hardly portrayed him in the most favourable light.

Problem is in some quarters it's regarded as a homosexual illness......I grew up in the "Aids era" and your first thought when someone had been diagnosed with the illness was he must have been gay.....

Young guys around now won't remember the hysteria surrounding aids....Morrison was probably trying to disassociate himself from the homosexual community and overegging the pudding...Abhorrent nonetheless....

But If you are struck down with a "gay" illness and aren't.......I guess I can see the bitterness If you're proud of your heterosexuality...

I recall seeing him on transworldsport one weekend morning many years ago talking about his misdiagnosis and comeback. He looked heavily muscled and at the time I wondered if he was going into bodybuilding rather than boxing.

Agree about the stigma but could he have gotten it from a needle?

DuransHorse wrote:I recall seeing him on transworldsport one weekend morning many years ago talking about his misdiagnosis and comeback. He looked heavily muscled and at the time I wondered if he was going into bodybuilding rather than boxing.

Agree about the stigma but could he have gotten it from a needle?

I believe he had chest implants (on top of his fake tan and bleached hair).

He was also an steroid cheat who admitted he wouldn't have had a career without steroids.

He had chest implants due to a botched operation due to an abscess on his chest..

Plenty of your favorite fighters have taken some steroids..

I liked Tommy great Left hook, for anyone thats interested his son (who looks remarkably like him!!) is doing great in the Prize Ring himself!

Another Heavyweight who seems to KO all in his path - certainly one to keep an eye on!

http://boxrec.com/boxer/678288

Morrison's Son's fight with former Freddie Flintoff victim Richard Dawson on youtube. Did a better job than Freddie but doesn't look like much; quite slow, not the best movement, doesn't look in the best shape etc.
Apparently he's training with Freddie Roach now so he should improve.

HIV and AIDS are a lot more complex than we are taught to believe. Partly because its safer for people to be afraid and take more precautions and partly because the simplified version helps earn a lot of money to certain companies. Speak to adoctor or get tested and you might be surprised at what questions you get asked and what constitutes as risk factors.