He's a heavyweight professional boxer from Jay, Oklahoma, who made national news Thursday, Feb. 15, 1996, when he announced that he is HIV positive. He was suspended from worldwide boxing when he tested positive prior to a boxing match against Arthur Weathers in Las Vegas. He said he plans to pursue AIDS awareness activities.


He is the great-nephew of John Wayne. In 1989, Morrison had 19 wins, 15 by knockout. Among the fighters beaten were former Mike Tyson opponents Lorenzo Boyd, Dave Jaco and Lorenzo Canady, as well as former George Foreman opponents Steve Zouski and Ken Lakusta. A huge Elvis fan. In the Olympic trials, he got to the finals and lost to Army Sergeant Ray Mercer. Mercer was eight years older. Seeing the Stallone classic "Rocky" was what really inspired him to go pro with his boxing. Originally aspired to be an actor like his grand-uncle, but with all the boxers in his family going on at that time, his mother pressured him to try out for Golden Gloves. He won. He was 25-0 before he realized that boxing was something he wanted to do full-time. Made an extremely brief cameo in the film They Live in 1988. From the age of 13 to 19 Tommy entered every tough man contest he could. Winning 49 fights out of the 50 he participated in. During this time starting in December of 1976 he also was fighting amateur boxing matches. In 1980 he also won the Jr. Olympics. He continued this until 1988 where his total of amateur fights was 242 with an impressive amount of wins which was 222 with only 20 losses.