Larry Holmes: Klitschko has no jab, no heart and would be beaten by Wilder or Stivern

He got stopped twice, beaten BADLY in own words, aged 23, by a club southpaw in competition. Take your medicine pal.

 

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+1. People will ignore the actual ****ysis and continue the insults, but that spells out why I'd strongly favor Wlad against Holmes.

 

He'll have to clarify the exact point that he was trying to make.

Spinks's resume isn't overly impressive, but he only had 5 fights at the weight.

But Holmes was still decent in 85.

Realistically, who would drill Spinks today?

If Michael Spinks fought today at HW, he'd probably be one of the better fighters in the division.

Just look at today's top ten.

It's hardly brimming with talent.

 

who cares it was an amatuer bout / not even in his prime / larry holmes as an amatuer was around 185 lbs / so who cares / we talking prime like i said the holmes who beat mercer would spank brewster and easily

lennox lewis lost to razo rruddock 2 of 3 times as a pro ...look what happened in the pros / tyrell biggs beat lennox lewis in the amatuers look what happened in the pros / nick wells was nothing / go look at his pro record then look at larry holmes pro record

 

He'll have to clarify to me exactly what he meant to say.

Because he said that none of Larry's opposition could have gone close to beating Wlad.

He didn't say none of the guys who Larry beat, he said none of Larry's opposition.

He also said that Larry's best opponents couldn't have beaten the best guys who Wlad beat.

If I've misunderstood him, then fair enough.

But if not, he's talking nonsense.

 

Yes, Wlad's loses damage his resume. Jack Dempsey, Lennox Lewis and even Tyson have embarrasing loses and they pay for those.

Although Wlad was very green when he lost to Purrity, he was already near his prime when he lost to Sanders and Brewster. However, after those losses, Wlad has gone 11 years undefeated. That's longer than Marciano's career, longer than Foreman's first career, and longer than Frazier's career. Holmes wasn't able to remain undefeated so much time while fighting at top level.

 

Mike's loss to Douglas affects his ranking.

But all I'm stating, is that Mike wasn't at his best for that fight.

That wasn't Douglas's fault.

Maybe Douglas would always have beaten him.

Mike had to take responsibility for how he handled his life/career.

If you've no sympathy, that's perfectly understandable.

But Mike was not mentally and physically at 100% for the fight in Tokyo. His personal life was a chaotic mess, and he wasn't training as he should have been. Douglas didn't beat the best version of Mike, who was fit, focused, and fighting to his full capabilities.

Yet people will specifically use the Douglas defeat, as a form of evidence as to why Mike could never have beaten Wlad.

But IMHO, that's not being objective.


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Wlad would KO this old grumpy racist in his prime.

 

I think Loudon is right on this one. Wlad avenged his loss against Brewster, but the losses against Sanders and Purrity is an issue for the reasons listed above.

It seems clear though, that Wlad was not at his best until Emmanuel Steward got his hands on him. It's worth to notice that Steward is a legandary trainer and the mastermind behind two of the most dominant champs in boxing history. Training for someone like him is sure to make a differcene, and after they had teamed up Wlad fought and defeated better opponents than Sanders.

One way to look at it, is that Purrity and Sanders exposed a weakness, but with the right trainer Wlad became able to work around that weakness. It's also possible he overcome the weakness completly due to personal growth, but he hasn't been tested enough for outside observers to tell.

What Loudon forgets to mention is that even though Sanders had lost to Rahman and Tubbs, they were the only ones he'd lost to. Sanders record as a pro is a bit too decent for him to be written of as a journeyman.

I recall his manager Boete mumbling something about Wlad re-establish his superior strategy or something like that, so I think they planned on rebuilding him step-by-step. Which is to say they were not going after Sanders straight away. Not sure if they could at the time, had they wanted to.

 

How was that in any way the same?

 

Douglas is the only thing anyone got on Iron Mike, so they have got to make use of it

I will of course not buy into your confusement of circumstances and a mental weakness that Douglas exposed, but I don't think there is much point about going on about it either, since we've debated it before.

 

But you're talking about Holmes as an amateur.

Wlad had fought 41 times before he fought Sanders, and he was just weeks away from being 27.

He'd also fought 44 times before he fought Brewster at 28.

So it's hardly the same is it?

I appreciate that every fighter has a different set of circumstances surrounding them, but you need to take the above information into account.

Sanders was a dangerous fighter, and styles make fights.

That also applies to Brewster.

But I can't envisage Sanders going through Holmes in just two rounds.

 

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I agree with you.

I don't see how what he's wrote is relevant.

Larry getting beaten as an amateur, isn't the same as Wlad losing to Sanders after 41 fights, at almost 27.

Larry's amateur defeat also doesn't prove to me that Sanders would have done the same to him, as what he'd done to Wlad.


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