By Gav Duthie: At 45 years of age Antonio Tarver 30-6 (21) is taking a massive gamble by attempting to break into the heavyweight ranks by fighting Jonathon Banks 29-2-1 (19) on September 29th.
Up to now Tarver’s most dangerous fight at HW was against Rocky Balboa when he played Mason ‘The Lion’ Dixon. He has fought two proper heavyweight fights one in 2010 and the latest in November last year knocking out journeyman Mike Sheppard in 4 rounds.
Motivations
I’m struggling to see what Tarver is actually trying to achieve with this middle aged return to the ring. Rumours are that he has gambling debts totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars so if its simply a money issue I worry about him. When i’d heard he’d knocked out Sheppard I was actually quite interested to see him mix it up against top guys. Quite a few light heavyweights and cruiserweights have made successful jumps into the top division with their superior hand speed, good conditioning and Tarver has never had any major problems with his chin. Even at 45 I thought heavyweights fight at such a slow pace and remembering that he didn’t turn pro until 27 years old I felt he could make a name for himself. That however was 10 months back and he has been extremely quiet until two weeks ago when he added himself to a twitter list of Tony Thompson and Shannon Briggs saying he would step in to fight Tyson Fury at just 3 days notice. If it is true about his financial situation then he is going to need a lot more than a win over Banks to earn some serious cash. At Tarver’s age he is unlikely to win a heavyweight title but I would definitely like to see him in the mix for another 3 or 4 fights.
Jonathon Banks
This is a decent fighter. I have been disappointed that he hasn’t fought since his defeat to Seth Mitchell in June 2013. Being that he had already knocked out Seth he could have set up a trilogy. His only other loss was to Adamek who has been top 5 for years until recently. He actually boxed pretty well that night until a straight right, left hook combination knocked him down. Although he got to his feet he couldn’t recover. A win over Tarver would be very good for Banks career.
Tale of the tape
It is difficult to call this a top level heavyweight fight but it certainly is interesting. It looks to be a 50/50 contest. Tarver weighed in at 221 for the Sheppard bout stands at 6″2 with a 75″ reach where as Banks is only 6″3, 76″ reach and usually weighs between 215 and 225. So any advantages Banks has in physicality are very small despite Tarver fighting at 175 for most of his career. The question for Tarver is whether or not the extra weight is muscle or fat as this is Banks natural weight.
I have a sneaky feeling for Tarver in this one with his big fight experience despite Banks being 13 years his junior. Whoever does win this will definitely give themselves an opportunity to fight for a mandatory position with one of the governing bodies.
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