How good was Michael Spinks?

He's top 5 at 175 for me, easily. Ezzard Charles and Archie Moore are probably the only 2 I would rank above him. A very dominant champion in an excellent era for the division.

I'd pick him to knock Jones out, and purely in a head-to-head sense, he's got as good a case for the #1 spot at LHW as any other fighter.

 

One of the very best LHWs ever - IMO right alongside Charles, Tunney, and Moore, and better than most of the rest. He thoroughly cleaned out a very strong and deep LHW division, then went up and scored probably the biggest single win ever by a LHW champ, when he toppled the longtime reigning, 48-0 Holmes. The only mar on his legacy is the crushing Tyson loss.

 

One of my favourite fighters...Not unreasonable to say he could have beaten any 175 pounder to lace them up on his day.

I often find him under appreciated, more then likely because of the Tyson loss..I have no problem with somebody arguing that Roy would beat him, though I do disagree but so many people seem convinced that Roy would have easily dealt with him and is the greater lightheavy..two notions I find frankly quite laughable.

 

Michael Spinks was a great 175 lb. champion.... He is in the top-5 with ease...... Spinks was also lucky to have benefitted from lotsa' national TV exposure, as boxing on regular network TV had hit its peak in the 1980 thru 1985 genre of boxing...... Michael Spinks' 175 lb. title reign was from 1981 to 1985.... Spinks got a lot of good exposure from TV..... Nowadays it's all Cable/PPV stuff........

MR.BILL

Note:

Spinks did eventually go to Cable / PPV when he moved to heavyweight to fight Larry Holmes in 1985.... Spinks never again fought on national TV after 1985.....

 

I think it's sad that so many people only remember Spinks for his loss to Tyson. I saw this man lift an opponents feet a good 6" off the canvass with an uppercut. The man beat Yaqui Lopez in his 14th pro fight. He took the WBA title away from Eddie Mustaffa Muhamed, beat Qawi, unified the division, got the win over Holmes in his very first HW fight, and then beat Cooney a fight or two later. Ya, he was that good!

 

I just talked to Bobby Czyz last night, and he said that even though he considers himself to be a good light heavyweight, even he realizes that there is no way he was going to beat Michael Spinks.

 

Legacy wise, he was awesome,

1. Olympic gold medalist

2. Undefeated, longtime reigning lightheavyweight champion

3. First lightheavyweight champ to capture the heavyweight crown

4. Only a single career loss that came past prime and to an all time great who was considered virtually indestructable at the time.

Ability wise, I'd say he had a fairly complete package - Great boxing ability, above average punching power, decent chin, good stamina, etc. He also had a fairly solid managment and training team that he stayed with consistantly throughout his whole career. His weakness was that he was a slow starter and often took a bit too much time figuring out his oppoent, or letting them punch themselves out. This was okay for some foes, but against fast starting punchers, I think he might have had a problem.

Spinks is a difficult fighter to gauge at heavyweight. his best win was arguably his first performance against Larry Holmes. He showed up looking good in the rematch too, but this time, he was facing a different man in all honesty. The Cooney and Tangstad matches were entertaining heavyweight fights against middle of the road opposition, but neither of those men were serious players in the division in 1986-87. Then there's the devastating 91 second loss to Tyson ( though I personally think Spinks had plans that didn't involve fighting much that evening. ) If Michael had ascended to the heavyweight division at a slightly younger age ( perhaps 25 rather than 28 ), and had steadily built himself up by fighting a streak of household heavys like Tillis, Broad, Snipes, Cobb, etc. He might have developed into a potentially all time great heavy in a similar way to how Evander Holyfield did. As it stands however, head to head matchups that involve Spinks need to be limited to lightheavyweight.

 

And now that I think about it, that would be one hell of a war.:bbb

 

Top three LHW of all time, really. Moore, Charles and him are switched around by most people.

Some feel Tunney is up there too, though.

 

:huhI'd say he was more a case of a fighter with above average boxing ability and great punching power than vice-versa.

 

Whatever floats yer boat there Cletus.

 

I have trouble ranking anybody over Spinks at light heavyweight. He was that good. He is definitely up there with the greats, with the likes of Charles, Moore, and Foster.

His win over Holmes was amazing. I hated to see it, but I couldn't help but be blown away by the perfect mix of aggression and strategic retreat. Spinks was a smart boxer. As Larry showed in the many years after that loss, he has a lot left in him, so it was a significant accomplishment. Larry won the rematch, in my opinion, so Spinks wasn't perfect even before the Tyson blowout, which completely surprised me.

What suprised me the most about the Tyson fight is that Spinks looked scared. I can only imagine what he thought after seeing Buster do what he did in large part because Buster did not fear Tyson. A lot of Tyson's success depended on his opponents fear of him. I have always wished that it had been Spinks who humbled Tyson not Buster, who didn't care enough about the title to defend it properly.

I think the same thing that made Spinks so great - his intellect - is what got in the way with Tyson. He let the concept of Tyson get to him. He dwelled on it. He got it in his head that he was going to lose. Sorry for the psychoanalysis, but I just can't help feeling this is what happened. Spinks is better than he showed that night. He had the tools to beat Tyson.

And, of course, we can't ignore the reality that Spinks' knees were shot by that time and he had real mobility issues. He couldn't get away from Tyson's rushes. Tyson was a monster that night.

 

Spinks is one of those fighters whose achievements are overshadowed by a loss (his only one)

Was thinking the other day about starting a thread about other fighters who are overshadowed by a high profile wipeout

 

hows the training comeing on mate