Tua vs. Rahman III in December?

By Jim Dower: It’s looking more and more like heavyweight David Tua will be fighting former heavyweight champion Hasim Rahman in December, in New Zealand. This is a fight that Tua wants and an opponent that is probably not too dangerous for him at this point in Rahman’s career. There was a time when Rahman was more than a handful for Tua. The two fought twice previously with Tua winning the first by knockout and the second fight ended in a controversial draw.

Many boxing fans felt that Rahman should won the second fight because he appeared to control large stretches of the bout with his long jab. However, that fight was a long time ago and Rahman has aged in the past years and doesn’t appear to be nearly as formidable as he once was. Rahman was stopped last year by IBF/WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko, a fight in which Rahman was thoroughly dominated from start to finish. Before that, Rahman fought James Toney in 2008 and the bout was ruled a no contest after Rahman was cut on the left eyebrow in the 2nd round.

Tua, 36, resurrected his career this past Saturday night with a 2nd round knockout over Shane Cameron in New Zealand. Tua looked like his old self from over 10 years as he knocked Cameron to the canvas twice in the fight with powerful left hooks to the head. Tua threw combinations, moved his head and fought with a great intensity, all of which were missing from his Tua’s offense in the past 10 years.

One big advantage that Tua had in this fight was that he came in shape at 237, and wasn’t carrying around excess weight like he has in the past. Tua seems to fight really well in the 230s as opposed to the mid 240s. But what made Tua fight even better was that he was throwing combinations, moving his head and attacking in explosive burst of offense instead of the one punch at a time style that Tua had mostly used in the past four years.

Tua hasn’t been explosive on offense for quite some time, dating back to late 90s. For some reason, Tua held back with his all out attacks and became dialed into to throwing one shot at a time, usually leaping left hook. That style not only was predictable but it was also prevented Tua from taking advantage of his hand speed and explosive combinations.

It’s when Tua is throwing fast combos that he’s his most dangerous. Earlier in his career, Tua was compared often to the great Mike Tyson because of the way that Tua would show great power and hand speed when attacking his opponents. But around the time that Tua fought Lennox Lewis, he suddenly started having problems with his weight and conditioning and started throwing only one big shot at time.

Tua blew his chance for winning a heavyweight title against Lewis by not attacking him in an all out style. That was really his only chance at beating Lewis, but Tua instead held back and rarely threw anything at all during the fight. When he did throw punches, it was always one shot at a time.

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