Why didn’t Holmes ever unify?

Holmes beat "Cherry Pick" Witherspoon and 10 months later "Cherry Pick" Witherspoon knocks off Page.

Holmes fights "Cherry Pick" Bey right after "Cherry Pick" Bey also beats Page.

Page loses to Larry's 'Cherry Picks" in back-to-back fights. Page selects his own "cherry pick" in Tony Tubbs, who he beat five times as an amateur. The WBA rates Tubbs #7. Nobody else ranks him. Tubbs beats Page. They put Page in with "Cherry Pick" Buster Douglas, who Bey knocked out in two rounds and Mike "the Giant" White stopped. Buster beats Greg Page. They decide to scrape the bottom of barrel and give Page a nobody 'cherry pick" named Mark Wills, who had five wins and five losses. Page gets KOED.

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Page is 27, and he's lost to Larry's "cherry picks" Berbick, Spoon and Bey ... and Greg's own "cherry picks" in Tubbs, Douglas and Wills ... should've lost to to another "cherry pick" Chaplin ... while Holmes is fighting Hall of Famers ...

And you guys are bashing Holmes for not fighting Page.

Page was a bad mandatory. All you're arguing is a rating by a sanctioning body. Not that Page could beat Holmes, or Page was the best fighter around (because clearly he wasn't by a long shot). Page wasn't even as good as the "cherry picks" you guys are bashing Holmes for fighting.

You're just arguing, in a why didn't Holmes unify thread ... that you're mad Holmes tried to unify instead of fighting a bad mandatory.

And clearly history doesn't care. Because Larry is an all-time great and a Hall of Famer.

 

Page was the third member of the Relatively Mediocre 80's Champs. Dokes and Coetzee never really beat anyone great (a stunned Weaver via early stoppage and Neon Leon don't count) and let's face it, neither did Greg (unless you count the 90s victory over Tim Witherspoon).

I don't think any of the three above had a chance, to be forthright. I think the people Holmes was delinquent in fighting were Weaver (rematch) and Thomas.

 

1. Page beat Coetzee
2. Coetzee knocked out Dokes and drew with Thomas.

These wins are par with anything Holmes has.

Dokes has a weaker resume if you subtract the win over Weaver and skip the draw.

 

To hell with that. Berbick was better than Page and Thomas.

Trever Berbick beat the unbeaten Thomas, the unbeaten Page, the once-beaten Tate, the once-beaten Bey and Ali.

Those wins by Berbick are better than anything Dokes, Thomas or Page ever had. Ever.

And Berbick is one of Larry's "cherry picks."

It took Dokes two fights each to get past Ocasio and Tex Cobb. Larry humiliated Ocasio and tortured Cobb.

Larry was head-and-shoulders above all those guys. 20 title defenses. Hall of Fame career.

Weaver, who Holmes stopped, was the only champ during Larry's era to make two successful defenses. Everyone else made one or none. (To Larry's 20.)

It was among the most dominant runs ever in the division's history.

 

Dokes wasn't interested in unifying w/ Holmes during the brief time that he actually held the title. King said immediately after the Weaver rematch that ''Michael Dokes's next fight will probably be against Gerrie Coetzee of South Africa in the fall in this country,'' then "Dokes artfully dodge[d] questions about Larry Holmes" during the weigh-in for the Coetzee fight, which became moot when Dokes ended up losing that fight anyway.

Except the efforts to establish this "trend" in this thread have willfully ignored or downplayed various realities at that time, such as whether any particular opponent was actually interested in fighting Holmes, whether a fight collapsed for reasons unrelated to him, sanctioning body corruption, or promoters' deliberate efforts to keep titles from being unified during this time so more $ could be made.

If Page really was an authentic #1 contender, then any champion who defends his title against him would deserve to be compensated accordingly. Your criticism of Holmes for not accepting what amounts to a pay cut at that time is either an acknowledgment that Page never really deserved to be "a #1/mandatory," or is holding Holmes to a different standard than every other champion.

 

Are you trying to say Larry fought Berbick after he upset Thomas?

 

I'm trying to say Berbick was better than Thomas. Because they fought, and Berbick was better than the unbeaten Thomas.

He proved it in the ring. And it was for the title ... Thomas's title.

Just like Berbick was better than the unbeaten Page. Proved it in the ring.

And Larry was better than Berbick. Better than Trevor in the ring. Better than Trevor in a goddamn parking lot.

 

Well, Thomas was better than Witherspoon who was better than Bruno who was better than McCall who was better than Lewis who was better than Tyson who was better than Holmes.

Proved it in a ring.

 

Trevor Berbick beat the unbeaten Thomas and took his title.

Trevor Berbick beat the unbeaten Page.

It doesn't get any simpler than that. Thomas and Page weren't old. They weren't beaten up. They were riding high. Trevor beat them.

Thomas and Page seem to be the two fighters everyone is so butt-hurt over. Truthfully, they are blips in heavyweight history.

The "long list of top guys" Thomas and Page beat are among the weakest of anyone you can name. Who'd they ever dominate. Quick Tillis?

You guys are arguing for the sake of arguing.

There was Larry way way way up here ... 20 defenses Holmes ... and everyone else WAY WAY WAY down there.

 

Ah, he unified in that case. Got it.

 

Take it up with Jerry Roth. If he'd scored for Holmes in the Spinks rematch, the champions remaining in the 1986 HBO Heavyweight tournament wouldn't been Holmes ... and two guys he already beat in title fights, namely Witherspoon (before losing later that year Bonecrusher, another Holmes title challenger) and Berbick.

Which is a testament to how dominant a champion Holmes had been and how many names he'd beaten.

Unbeaten for 20 straight title defenses. And unbeaten in parking lots in Hollywood, Florida.


Now, on to today's heavyweight fights. Should be starting soon.

 

Why did I not see my last post bringing NoNeck forth?

I used to be so good at predicting.

Hope you are doing well, my friend.

 

Sure, I am. I’m headed to the fights right now.

 

Great to hear. Best wishes, NoNeck.

 

People also forget that all Page had to do was beat Berbick on the Holmes - Cooney undercard and Page was getting the winner of Holmes - Cooney but he showed up out of shape and didn’t take Berbick seriously and lost.