Born James Joseph Tunney known to the world as "The Fighting Marine" Gene Tunney.

Tunney was not your average fighter in a time when Fighters were considered rough tough guys were the best fighters in the world. Tunney on the other hand was anything but that. Born the son of a Longshoreman in New York Tunney was a very intelligent and book smart as a young man growing up who was often picked on by the older kids in his neighborhood. To defend him self against these bullies he took up boxing after receiving a pair of boxing gloves at the age of 10 as a gift from his father. Tunney's Parents were strongly against there son fighting and Tunney never considered a career as a professional fighter until his late teens when he became a frequent visitor at Greenwich Village Athletic Club were he would visit every afternoon after working as a typist at steamship company. While going against what his parents wanted he would turn pro at the age of 18 in 1915 with a sixth round Technical Knockout victory over Bobby Dawson.

Tunney would fight three more times this year going 4-0 with 3 knockouts in his first five months as a professional fighter. His next year would go about the same fighting easy competition until stepping up to face veteran journeyman Joe Borrell in December of 1917 in only Tunney's second fight of the year going into the fight Borrell had a record of 47-22-10 compared to Tunney's record of 9-0-1. When the fight started it was clear that Tunney was the superior fighter as he knocked Borrell out in just the second round of there scheduled ten round bout. Tunney would not have another major fight until after he was discharged from the Marines after World War 1. While in the Marines he joined the boxing team were he would win American Expeditionary Force light heavyweight championship. In his next step up in competition he took on Leo Houck in back to back bouts who had a vary impressive record of 130-29-20 Tunney would win the first bout by a six round decision and the second by a ten round decision.

In 1922 Tunney took his biggest step up in competition going up against the legendary Battling Levinsky. Levinsky even though nearing the end of his career was still considered a formidable opponent for any fighter out than and a huge test for Tunney. When Fight night came Tunney put on a masterful display of boxing ability nearly knocking out the legend in the eleventh round. When the fighters came out to touch gloves for the twelfth and finale round Levinsky wanting to keep his reputation as a fighter kindly asked Tunney to let him finish the fight Tunney being the nice guy he was graciously boxed and lightly hit the faded warrior until the ball rang allowing him to finish the fight. Tunney, by this time was well known on the east coast.

Harry Greb Sparring


In May of 1922 Tunney took on one of the all-time greats in Ring history Harry Greb. This was the first of 5 meetings between to two fighters. Coming into the fight Tunney had been nursing a bad cut above his eye and came in prepared as he had mixed orange juice into his water bottle so that if the cute was reopened he would not lose as much strength during the fight. When the fight started even though Tunney outweighed Greb by 12 pounds, but despite this advantage it was a vary close fight all the way though with perhaps Greb's experience and un human like work rate was to much for Tunney to handle who boxed beautifully during the fight but Greb would end up winning on all the scorecards and become the first and only man to beat Gene Tunney.

After the Greb fight Tunney went back to fighting average fighters and won 3 straight fights before taken on Tommy Loughran in an 8 round bout. It was clear from the beginning that Tunney was the dominant fighter when he floored Loughran in the open round of the fight he would continue to dominate the fight until the final bell sounded. After a few more fights Tunney started training for his rematch with Greb this time around though he knew what to expect from Greb and taught himself how to counter Greb's attack. He noticed Greb was open to body blows by the way he held his hands in a defensive position.

On fight night Greb came out the same way he had in the first bout but Tunney did a great job of Countering his attack and going for the body like he had trained to do. Tunney would win a very controversial unanimous decision. After the fight the chairman of the state athletic commission called the decision "unjustifiable". Tunney and Greb would fight again later on in that same year coming in with the same fight plan as he used in the previous bout. This bout between the two fighter was more clean cute as to who won with 8 rounds going to Tunney and 4 rounds going to Greb the rest even with many of the first rounds being vary close with Tunney taking over in the 8th and Greb rallying to take the 15th. Although Greb was the busier fighter of the two Tunney's shots were much cleaner and accurate as compared to the wild swinging Greb. Tunney would face Greb 2 more times going 1-0-1 against him.

In between his last to fights with Greb He would Fight Former World Heavyweight Title Challenger Georges Carpentier who was coming off a loss to Tommy Gibbons also a former title challenger. Carpentier who had challenged Jack Dempsey for the heavyweight title a few years earlier was a good fight for Tunney to take and to tell if Tunney had what it took to compete as a heavyweight. Tunney who had always wanted to fight Dempsey gladly took the fight as he saw it as another step closer to a fight with Dempsey if he could beat Carpentier. When fight night arrived it was vary obvious that Tunney was the superior fight dominating the Frenchman from bell to bell in the 10th he gave Carpentier a frightening beating flooring him 3 times in the round, but Carpentier fought back like a true warrior, but in the 14th he was floored again. When the fighters came out for the 15th the referee stopped is because Carpentier was in no condition to continue fighting.

After his fight with Carpentier, Tunney would again face Greb this time fighting to a draw, and again would face Greb early the next year and beat him by a unanimous decision. After his last bout with the only man to beat up to this point in his career he would take on another former Heavyweight title challenger in Tommy Gibbons who had gone the full distance with the great Jack Dempsey.

This by fare was probably the most important bout to date that Tunney had participated in the reasons being that Gibbons was the only one of Dempsey's title challengers to go the distance with him. Gibbons also a very good boxer and counter puncher and even though on the downside of his career was still a formidable threat to any heavyweight out there at the time. During the fight Tunney used his speed, intelligence, and strength to slow gibbons down but didn't do so with out taking a few shots from the former title challenger Gibbons had Tunney dazed in a few rounds after connecting with some solid punches. While Gibbons put a heroic fight it was not enough to stop Tunney who knocked him out in the 12th round. This was important win of Tunney's career and the fact it came by knockout made it as spectacular win sense this was the same man that went the distance with the most dangerous puncher in the world at the time World Heavyweight Champion Jack Dempsey.

After his fight with Gibbons, Tunney was sure he would get a shot at the Heavyweight Title that he had been after for so long. Tunney would take 4 fights with easy competition to stay in shape. One of those was against journeyman fighter Johnny Risko. In his fight with Risko he injured his right hand in the first round with a shot to the jaw an injured his left hand later on in the fight but convincingly beat Risko despite having two injured hands. After one more fight he would go into training for Dempsey.

This by fare was probably the most important bout to date that Tunney had participated in the reasons being that Gibbons was the only one of Dempsey's title challengers to go the distance with him. Gibbons also a very good boxer and counter puncher and even though on the downside of his career was still a formidable threat to any heavyweight out there at the time. During the fight Tunney used his speed, intelligence, and strength to slow gibbons down but didn't do so with out taking a few shots from the former title challenger Gibbons had Tunney dazed in a few rounds after connecting with some solid punches. While Gibbons put a heroic fight it was not enough to stop Tunney who knocked him out in the 12th round. This was important win of Tunney's career and the fact it came by knockout made it as spectacular win sense this was the same man that went the distance with the most dangerous puncher in the world at the time World Heavyweight Champion Jack Dempsey.

After his fight with Gibbons, Tunney was sure he would get a shot at the Heavyweight Title that he had been after for so long. Tunney would take 4 fights with easy competition to stay in shape. One of those was against journeyman fighter Johnny Risko. In his fight with Risko he injured his right hand in the first round with a shot to the jaw an injured his left hand later on in the fight but convincingly beat Risko despite having two injured hands. After one more fight he would go into training for Dempsey.

Tunney trained harder for his fight against Dempsey than any other of his previous fights watching films of the great champion to learn his style and be able to adapt to it once in the ring. When Fight time came Dempsey had not fought in over three yeas compared to Tunney who had stayed busy fighting six times in 1925. Despite Dempsey being vary inactive many experts were predicting him to walk through Tunney with easy such was not the case. From the first round on Tunney boxed beautifully around the constantly tiring champion. In the fight Tunney damaged Dempsey's eyes so bad that he would have trouble with them the rest of his life. Dempsey was so upset by the loose that he retired in the ring that day. When asked by his wife what happened he replied "Honey I forgot to duck". However Dempsey's retirement didn't last long before he was egger to make a comeback and was offered a rematch with Tunney, but Dempsey declined saying he would like to take a warm up fight first against rising contender Jack Sharky.

In his comeback fight Dempsey was fighting even with his opponent until he throw a right to the body then a left hook to the head the knocked Sharky out. After this fight Dempsey was egger for a Rematch with Tunney who had not fought sense he won the title from Dempsey a year earlier.

Gene Tunney vs. Jack Dempsey II


The Dempsey-Tunney rematch was build as one of the biggest boxing matches in boxing history, and was also the first million dollar gate in any single sporting event in history.

On the day of the fight when Dempsey arrived he was sick to his stomach but insisted the fight go on despite being told other wise by the people around him. By the time of the fight it had began to rain but promoter "Tex" Rickard said the fight must go on.

When the fight got underway it started right where the first fight had left off with Tunney successfully out boxing Dempsey and scoring constantly wit sharp crisp punches. That was until Dempsey landed his famous left hook in the seventh round followed by a barrage of punches from Dempsey that floored the Champion, but instead of going to a neutral corner like the rules stated Dempsey stood over his fallen victim given Tunney four extra seconds to recover this became know as the infamous Long Count Controversy stating that Tunney was given 14 seconds to get up instead of 10 but you can clearly see at the referee's count of 4 Tunney looks at the referee an picks up the count and wisely take an 8 count. Tunney got up and got on his bicycle to stay away from the re energized Dempsey who in the 8th round ran into a punch from Tunney that floored him for a count of one. The rest of the fight was much like the first one with Tunney easily boxing his way to a unanimous decision win.

Shortly after the fight Dempsey retired for fear of the health of his eye's Tunney would soon follow after defending his title one more time against Tom Heeney who he beat by 11th round knockout.

In the opinion of this author Gene Tunney is the most underrated Heavyweight Champion of all-time and is also ranked as the 3rd greatest heavyweight fighter of all-time who fought many great fighters and ended his career while he was still on top of the Heavyweight division something most fighters have not done.

Article By: Brad Benton