fights where an old former champ shows heart and goes out on his shield

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really proved his class to me when he was almost knocked out by tyson in the first but came back to win some rounds and shut tyson completely down until tyson unloaded a dozen punch barrage on his concrete chin to knock him down for the first and last time in his career. Incredible that he was getting back up but dundee stopped it.

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almost knocked bowe out with a single left hook after looking out of gas and finished for several rounds in the rubber match. the doctor even said he was going to stop it because they didnt want him to take any unnecessary punishment right before he put bowe down. I still get goose bumps watching holyfield put bowe down right after he looked all out. But bowe survived and stopped holy in the 8th.
In the toney fight he was getting outclassed in a sad way but still gave everything. The image of don turner throwing in the towel and holding holyfield up so he wouldnt stagger around still sticks in my mind.

Obviously the

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holmes fight. Ali shouldnt have been allowed to fight, ferdie pacheco left ali years before and said he wasnt going to be a part of it anymore after watching ali's decline first hand. Ali didnt do much in that fight but still showed great heart.

Holmes looked apprehensive at first against tyson but decided to go for it, got knocked down and fought back courageously but got his arm caught on the rope trying to throw an uppercut and got knocked out.

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took a very bad beating against lennox lewis. Lewis later said he was shocked at the punches tyson was taking. Tyson seemed to realize early in the fight that he had no chance but took his beating anyway

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fighting a young naturally larger savage puncher like maidana with one eye after the first round was UNREAL. He also gave it everything he had against pacquiao the second time.

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gave his best again joppy but that fight wasnt even a real contest and shouldnt have happened. Same for

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against tszyu.

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gave a very good account of himself against hatton but it wasnt enough.


In contrast i found

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performance against tyson fury shameful. He should be ashamed of himself. His opponent wasnt ali or leonard(like it was with duran and liston) Wlad also has massive punching power. Fury was not punishing or outclassing him. Wlad was not getting beat up. There is no excuse for just not throwing any punches and GIVING AWAY the HW championship. I understand someone getting in your head and making you so angry that you get wild, i even have understanding for a fighter who is facing a murderous puncher like foreman or tyson and gets intimidated or scared because thats human. But none of that applies to wladimir. He knew he was behind, he was NOT taking a beating or being outclassed, he knew he had the power to turn it around and he still didnt go all out. IN MY OPINION That was disrespectful to the HW title and to the champions that went out on their shield to try to attain or defend it.

 

Yes it was undignified, but he was 52 and it wasnt the first time he did that. Some of his MW title defenses had tons of such weird occurings, just look at robert allen 1 and 2, echols 2 fights. Still an ATG

 

He has a chance to redeem himself against Joshua but to me it seemed like he would rather lose his title than risk ring knocked down or hurt by going for the win. Maybe he was reminded of his early career setbacks and kind of froze or maybe he just always was a kind of "submissive" guy for lack of a better word, either way what happened there went way beyon having a bad performance or being shot. A shot fighter may not be able to respond quick enough to take advantage of openings but he can still try to swing away and go for a KO in george foreman fashion.
The Joshua fight will tell us more about his character. I think he has enough experience and skill to really test Joshua but if it isn't enough then he should try to go out on his shield. But I won't blame him if he gets hurt early and just tries to hang on. Joshua is a young hungry puncher.

 

Then he should have thrown some more, wlad is a puncher and fury had been dropped by cunningham. that alone should have given him the confidence to go for it

 

How do you see his chances vs joshua? I dont think Joshua is proven and i dont like his personality in the media at all, but history says that comebacks like the one wlad is attempting usually fail miserably

 

Absolutely right. Frazier gave everything in manilla