Gerry Cooney - We don't know how good he was !!

I'd probably pick Cooney to clear out the Heavyweight division today (Give him a shot anyway).....One of the best Heavy left hookers of alltime (Holmes said his punches were like concrete).....and amazingly probably the only fighter in history to lose three fights and all to alltime greats.....Holmes and Foreman are top 5 and Spinks is a p4p legend.....We can also write off Spinks to a certain extent because he spent most of his training in the local neighborhood bar....

Could I see Usyk beating him yes.....But I can't see Usyk stopping him and if Cooney had landed like Dubois to the body he isn't getting up..Ask Lyle who had his ribs broken.

AJ is too loose to not get cracked though he could land too.......Cooney had the better chin.....

Fury.....Well he tends to get caught.....Wilder had him down plenty of times....Ngannou......that Cruiserweight guy.......Don't know why but I think Fury would be the easier of the three..

But like I said....We don't know how good he was.....Respected observers had him up against Holmes after 6...When stopped one judge gave him 5 rounds and the other two 7 rounds and the Holmes fight is probably the best measure we have...

I do know that had he been around now he'd be a superstar with all this Saudi money and limited talent.

But hey ho.........Cooney never recovered from Holmes and we missed out on Witherspoon-Cooney...Weaver-Cooney...Tyson v Cooney....and who knows what else..

An enigma then and an enigma now....How good was he ???...Is for the birds.

I generally seem to be a bit harsher on Cooney than most others, from my experience. I've never really thought he was much to write home about. No doubt the guy could punch hard, but it's not as if he cracked any chins which were renowned for their durability - and those he did crack were generally a shade worse for wear when he did.

I know I've said it before, but I've often wondered why Cooney gets rated so favourably in comparison to the next 'White Hope' Morrison (albeit that tag wasn't totally accurate in Morrison's case). For me Morrison had much more talent than Cooney and he definitely proved he had more resilience and staying power when the going got tough.

If people want to rate Cooney higher then fine, but I've never understood why Morrison gets painted as some kind of joke figure in comparison.

Back to Cooney himself - I actually like his performance against Young and think he looked more like a quality boxer there, rather than the stiff, one-handed behemoth Holmes made him look like. But again, he sliced Young's face up so quickly that you can't help but be a little curious about how that fight might have developed had it gone past a few rounds, because Cooney never proved himself more than a three or four round fighter at any meaningful level.

I don't see anything to suggest he'd have been reigning supreme in recent times against the Fury, Joshua, Wilder and Usyk types, but I could be selling him short, nonetheless. I've been told before that I do!