SA HWs: Sanders, Coetzee, Coetzer, Botha and others

He was actually an excellent kickboxer. He beat Jerome Le Banner iirc and some other big names. I think he killed himself in the end ... I forgot about him.

 

@ Herol

You haven't watched much Sanders. Your posts prove it. In his prime he went 12 easily. Watch Puritty / Sanders.

What's sad is that you are an ignorant and you try to peddle porkies as a result. Not only have you gotten the facts wrong but we all know about your Wladimir obsession.

Anyone Wlad beat was a bum, and anyone that beat Wlad was at best "semi decent" ... right?

It makes your every post in this thread a waste of space and, dare I say it, worthless. Please go away and leave it to the guys who actually are interested in discussing SA boxing. There aren't many of us, and I'd like to hear the opinions of posters with something useful to say.

If you feel the need to bash Wlad, then make a thread of your own. You could title it "Wlad is useless and so is everybody he ever fought." :good

 

Johnny Duplooy, although limited was a fun fighter to watch and fairly dangerous if truth be told. Several years ago I found his fight with Pierre Coetzer on youtube. It only lasted two rounds with Coetzer as the winner, but every second was action packed with both men trading knockdowns. Some of the south African heavyweight crew were truly exciting to watch.

 

Yup, he could have done better than he had. Apparently his training methods were somewhat lax in his later career, and he picked up a very bad coke habit which didn't help matters much. A bit of a glass cannon I think ... when he was on top he was very dangerous (check out the KO of Broad) but when the tides turned he had a bit of a quitting streak. Just before he KO'd Bey he was b itching to his father iirc that he couldn't go on, and his dad was telling him to just circle and box.

 

Just checked out Mike Bernardo again: He did very well for himself as a kickboxer. Has wins over all the big names like Aerts, Hug, Cro Cop, Longinidis etc. Wow, quite impressed.

 

He might have hit just as hard as anyone. Got started young and wasn't protected either. In addition to the issues you mentioned, he also had poor defense and a shaky chin - never a good combination at heavyweight. There was a period for about 15-20 years when south Africa was putting out some pretty damn good fighters and then they all just sort of disappeared. Wonder what happened.

 

I've got a sort of a theory. SA had quite a macho culture revolving around violence and being manly. Apart from some black groups like the Zulus, this was more of a white Afrikaans thing than a black thing. There was also a fair amount of white poverty in the 60-70s going into the 80s maybe too. I think it is a combination of the more "human rights" oriented black government taking the emphasis off a violent culture coupled with a move by a lot of whites into more educated professions. The local blacks really are quite small compared to the monster black dudes in America, so that could explain the dearth of talent in HW at least. There are still big whites around (I'm ~6ft and I see much bigger guys all the time) It's sort of like asking "where are all the great Italian-American fighters?" A: They got jobs

Again, this is just a theory. Could just be that all the good gyms closed down

 

More like always confused.

The quality of the Wlad haters just isn't what it used to be!

 

Did some searching on the following guys whom I believe account for MOST of the notable south African heavys.

- Corrie Sanders
- Frans Botha
- Gerrie Coetzee
- Bennie Knoetze
- Kali Knoetze
- Mike Schutte
- Jimmy Abott
- Pierre Coetzer
- Johnny Duplooy

There might have been a few I've forgotten about but I believe those are most of them or at least the significant ones... The first man on that list to turn pro was Mike Schutte ( 1971 ) and the last was Frans Botha ( 1990. ) So there was roughly a 19 year period where SA was cranking out heavy's, a few of which became world class or at least contenders. Most of them seemed to have come from the Pretoria, Gauteng area, or some other province of Gauteng. I'm thinking there must have been a boxing circuit going on around there and wouldn't be surprised if there was a particular gym or club where some of the same guys came out of... But I don't know the history.

 

If anything needs to be said regarding the current state of SA heavies, 47 year old Anton Nel, whose greatest achievements were losing to Kali Meehan and Akinwande, is ranked by Boxrec as the #1 heavy currently.

 

Jimmy Richards hasn't received a mention yet. He was arguably the best South African heavyweight in the early 1970s along with Mike Schutte.

Peter Smith was also a top prospect around the time Courage Tshabalala was being hyped. Smith was the only person to reportedly beat Tshabalala in the amateurs. Cedric Kushner was moving Smith until he got stopped in a round by Laila Ali's husband at the time, John McClain, on one of Cedric's Heavyweight Explosion cards.

Bennie Knoetze keeps getting brought up and someone even said he was Kallie's brother.

They weren't related. And Knoetze wasn't even Bennie's real name. Bennie Knoetze wasn't very good. I'd rate Richards, Tshabalala and even Smith above Bennie.

Abbott wasn't good, either. He was a one-hit wonder. He has the shock upset win over a spent Kallie Knoetze, and that win alone probably puts him ahead of someone like Peter Smith. But Abbott was pretty poor.

I'd take Tshabalala over Abbott any day of the week.

 

Thanks for the info and the corrections. It was I who mistakenly called Bennie and Kali brothers. Never knew much about Jimmy Richards or Peter Smith. My whole post was to try and get a better gauge of the south African heavyweight scene that seemed to span form the early 70's to the early 90's and why it ended. Interesting time frame and scenario.

 

I loved Kushner's heavyweight explosion cards. Back then, the television series was the only way to see the up and coming talents. Sanders was the star. Sanders KO over Bert Cooper opened some eyes. What a knockout.

 

well said :thumbsup

 

1# Sanders
2# Coetzee
3# Botha
4# Coetzer
5#Knotzee
6# Du Ploy