Tommy Morrison
Tommy Morrison
Tommy Morrison
Tommy MorrisonAfter the Olympic Trials, Morrison was contacted by someone associated with John Brown, the founder and President of Ringside Products, and told that Brown was interested in training him. Morrison packed up everything he owned, which wasn’t much, and made the drive to Lenexa, Kansas, headquarters of Ringside. He sat for a very long time waiting for Brown to finish a telephone conversation. When Brown hung up the phone, Morrison was surprised when Brown asked “Well what the hell do you want?” Morrison answered that he was Tommy Morrison and that he had heard Brown wanted to train him. Brown bickered about board and training expenses, and Morrison went to work for him stuffing heavybags.
Morrison's professional debut finally came in November 1988, in the Felt Forum which was a part of Madison Square Garden. His opponent, a man named William Muhammad, was also having his first professional fight. "I remember the main event that night featured big Art Tucker. I remember thinking at the weigh-in, looking at Tucker, this guy is huge. A few years later I knocked him out. The guy I fought that night though, was William Muhammad, and I knocked him out with a right hand," Morrison recollects. The knockout came in the first round, as a matter of fact, and it convinced Muhammad never to fight again. It would turn out to be his only fight.
Following that success and one more one round knockout in November, Morrison began a breakneck schedule of what would turn out to be 19 fights in 1989. In April 1989, Bill Cayton came on board as a co-manager for Morrison with Morrison’s second round knockout over Lorenzo Boyd. It wasn’t long before Cayton began billing Morrison as “The Duke,” due to Tommy’s relation to John Wayne as a great grand nephew. Wayne, you may be aware, changed his name which was originally Marion Michael Morrison.
Morrison was taken the distance for the first time against veteran Steve Zouski in June, and had to settle for the decision victory. Along the way to becoming a prospect in the heavyweight division, Morrison caught attention not just for knocking out opponents, but for the way he knocked them out. One punch knockouts of Dave Jaco and Harry Terrell, which were televised on ESPN, come to mind. ESPN televised many of Morrison’s bouts that year, and these fights caught the attention of Sylvester Stallone, the writer and star of the classic Rocky series. Stallone was casting for the latest installment, Rocky V, and was impressed with Morrison’s boxing ability, not to mention his movie star looks. Morrison relates, “Stallone got a hold of Bill Cayton, my manager, and Cayton and I flew out to Los Angeles. We went to the screen test, and then I went back home. About a week or ten days later, Stallone called and left a message on my answering machine telling me that they were going to use me and congratulated me.”
Morrison impressed in his role as Tommy Gunn, as many critics praised the movie as a return to the glory of Rocky I and II. It had been complained that Rocky III and IV had turned Rocky into a caricature, fighting against villains like Clubber Lang and Ivan Drago. Morrison’s performance in the movie brought a more realistic feel to the movie, and certainly helped his own marketability as a rising heavyweight. Stallone and Burt Young even accompanied Morrison to the ring on one occasion, in a November 1989 fight against Lorenzo Canady. The distraction led to Morrison winning a tougher than expected six round decision, and sustaining a cut in the process.
After December 1989, and due to the filming of Rocky V, Morrison would fight only once again in the next six months, that coming in a second round knockout of a fighter named Charlie Woolard. Morrison broke his hand in that fight, and was forced to lay off for another four months before coming back to boxing regularly. It was then that he began stepping up the level of competition.
In January 1991, Morrison stepped into the ring to face former contender James “Quick” Tillis on a card that showcased Ray Mercer and Bruce Seldon in addition to himself. Morrison was by far the most impressive of the three on that night, completely ripping through Tillis with uppercuts and left hooks, while walking through Tillis’ best shots. Tillis would later claim to have thrown the bout, but as Morrison now says when told of the charge, “It didn’t look that way to me. He looked like he was in pretty good shape. Anyone out there can watch the tape. Tell me what you think.”
