Early 80's discussion

I couldn't stay away I guess

 

More for content than anything, you are killing it.

 

Giving it my best

 

I have always thought Page had an interesting career. His early run and reign as USBA champ was great. But his first real step up at elite level he blew. That was the Berbick fight. And he was schooled in that fight. He was hurt. it took some rebuilding after that but I don't think he did enough to eclipse anyone else. Witherspoon and Thomas had both knocked out Tillis and Page did too, then I think he decisions Larry Frazier if I remember correctly. After that it was all down hill but for the Coetzee upset.

 

Like a brick wall Goo.

 

I think Larry Holmes forfeited his claim to being the world's number 1 heavyweight around 1983-'84, with Witherspoon taking over. Especially and certainly when Witherspoon defeated Page the following year. Those are my rankings for the period anyway.

 

Another thing about David Bey is that he was actually offered big money to challenge Gerrie Coetzee for the WBA title at the end of 1984 but he refused to go to South Africa in those apartheid days.
Greg Page - who Bey had just beat - took the fight and won the title.
Bey ended up with the tougher task of challenging Holmes.
And that was probably Holmes's last really good performance.

 

I think Thomas did a much better job on Witherspoon than Larry did. There is a case that Thomas was actually the best heavyweight in the world at that point but he only had one more winning fight to establish that status with. It was Larrys job to prove he was still better than Thomas because Pinklon had one over him, but Whilst Thomas managed to win his mandatory fight with ex champ Weaver, Larry beat Bonecrusher, Williams and Bey. (Looking back, I don't think Thomas could have beat the three that Larry beat if Berbick could beat him.)

Then Thomas and Larry signed to potentially meet each other with the HBO series and they both lost their next fight!

It is so unfortunate that separate obligations and red tape prevented unifications from happening before one guy got beat. We have missed a lot of super fights over the years that way and this was about the first era it happened.

With one champion Thomas would have been the outstanding contender and there would be nowhere for Holmes to go but fight him. Thomas would not have mandatory obligations or other potential banana skins. Same when Dokes beat Weaver. If Larry was the undisputed champ Larry would have to fight him rather than wait for Dokes to rematch Weaver all over again. Then again, maybe C00ney and Dokes might have had to face one another in an eliminator to meet Larry?

Like I keep saying blaming the fighter is only half of the issue. Larry caused himself grief by being so outspoken.

 

I don't blame the fighters for anything, or care whether they are blameless or to blame.
I just rank them according to what they did in the ring.

 

Well I agree that Thomas went ahead of Larry at the time he beat Witherspoon since that win topped Larry on the year. I have no problem with that.

The guy at the top is the guy with the best win on the year.

 

I'll back the time frame down to 1985 since he only fought once that year losing to Tony Tubbs. But prior to that point he was beating quality comp while only losing to quality comp. And he certainly earned his #1 rating for the year between 83 and 84.

 

Yeah, he wasn't anything special as far as contenders go.
The Snipes win was pretty good in 1983 (because Snipes had a win over Berbick) but he lost to Witherspoon and Bey the following year 1984. He was lucky to get the shot against Coetzee.