Contrast Holmes' reign with Klitschko's.

And BTW - You Klittards need to keep Larry Holmes' name out of your mouths...

 

Wlad's reign is already better than Holmes', Holmes era was a joke

David Haye alone would beat any of Holmes' contenders, let alone Wlad

 

Is that when you call it when a fighter never unifies against any other beltholder and vacates his belt by ducking a top contender?

 

IB underrates Leroy Jones a bit and overrates Lorenzo Zanon (Norton always started slow and Quarry was done when he met Lorenzo in his two real steps up in class), methinks. Evangelista is borderline, imo.

Good thread, though.:good

 

Please. we mean you no harm, my brother

 

Holmes himself has said the only reason he fought Zanon and Evangelista was because it was an easy way for him to stay in shape and busy and make 1.5 million dollars for an easy fight.

Holmes had some awful title defenses and most of his fights were predicated on money. He would pick an easier fight (see Marvis Frazier) that paid more than a more difficult fight (see Greg Page). Money was the determining factor on who Larry fought.

We need to wait until if/when Wlad gets to #20 to look at the list again to properly access this. Early 1980's Heavyweight Division was a mess just like today's is. To me right now it is about even with Holmes having the edge because there is more of a sample size (16 fights vs 20 fights)

 

The difference is Holmes often got back up after being knocked down and FIGHT, and often won because of it, making his title defences all the more credible.


Holmes never always had the size advantage as he fought fighters taller and bigger than him even though Holmes was over average size and height for a HW himself.

 

You don't have to put all challengers side by side and lin'em up. Larry Holmes won the title by going beyond the call of duty against Kenny Norton and surviving knockdowns, fighting back all mighty punches of Earnie and Snipes curiously in the same 7th round to stop them in the 11th. He also wiped out the Division by going against all the future Champs and serious challengers in Terrible Tim when he was only 18 pro fights, Mike Weaver, James Bonecrusher Smith who is missing in that list, Trevor Berbick, Carl the Truth Williams who is also missing... and Michael Spinks. The names that you see in Wlad's reign are nowhere near Larry's. Forget about it. Wlad's not Top ATG HW before or standing on top of Larry, Mike, Evander or Lennox.

 

Defeating Leapai skyrocketed his resume past that of Holmes, IMO.

 

Larry was a businessman first and a very smart one. He fought Frazier for more money instead of Page. He fought Bey instead of Pinklon Thomas if I remember correctly (could be wrong) also for more money. He didn't fight Coetzee (and I agree with Larry's reason for doing so) Holmes resume could have easily been better but for whatever reason (right or wrong) he missed a few of the other contenders that would have certainly helped his cause in this debate.

The parallels between the early 80's heavyweight Division and now are very similar which makes this such a fun topic. :good

 

Interested thread and points.

My strong believe is that it is harder nowadays to rule for so long than it was in 80s. Pro boxing has become global unlike in 80s when it was quite restricted in its scope.