I was at the Holy - Cooper fight. One of Cooper's managers told me before the fight that Cooper tried to jog when they arrived in Atlanta and couldn't go one mile. Cooper was not in shape and looked at times like he was holding back trying to conserve energy. If he had the confidence in his conditioning to go all out, he might have won that fight. As most have already mentioned, Cooper had a drug problem that affected his boxing career. The drug problem made him a woulda-coulda-shoulda fighter. As someone else mentioned, Cooper and McCall had some gym wars (at Big John Studds gym in Winston-Salem N.C. and Martinsville,Va.) when they trained together. If Cooper and McCall had lived clean, they both had the potential to be as good as anyone.
Great report. Cooper also KO'd Tillman in what was a pretty big upset at the time. Both the (unbeaten a pros) 1984 Olympic finalists KO'd in less than 4 rounds!!
I remember watching Cooper fighting Ray Mercer around 1990. It was one of the last fights that I ever watched on public broadcast television. That was an incredible 12 round war. The fight was occasionally interupted with news briefs about the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and America's decision to intervene. Man, the memories that boxing brings back....
Thats utter nonsense! You dont War 7 rounds with a prime Holyfield if you dont have the capability to run a mile. Thats sheer nonsense. Cooper came in at 215 lbs for his fight with Holyfield. That was a good weight for Cooper to fight as a Heavyweight. He had weighed 221 lbs in his fight prior to Holyfield, a 5th round destruction of rugged Joe Hipp! .....and I explicitly remember Gil Clancy who was the commentator in that Holyfield-Cooper fight saying that Cooper who was stepping in on a few days notice was in fighting shape because he had been training for another fight that was scheduled to take place soon. Cooper had to pick and chose when to throw punches, but it was'nt because he was'nt in shape, it was because Holyfield was raining combinations at him that were a blurr. You dont match punch for punch when a fighter like Holyfield starts raining blurrs of combinations......you hope to time Holyfield and catch him in the midst of one of his blurrs, which is exactly what Cooper did that almost brought him the Heavyweight championship of the world! Absolutely Cooper was in shape!!!
You are right about his dedication, but in the long run it would'nt have made much difference, Cooper was'nt going to beat much bigger Heavyweights than himself...... ...... unlike Tyson , Cooper did'nt have the quickness, speed, or the ring level skill. Cooper usually did very well vs fighters that were'nt all that much bigger than himself, but put him up against George Foreman and Riddick Bowe, and he'd get crushed! Cooper did'nt have the speed or quickness to get inside of a reach of a big heavyweight like Bowe or Foreman, he would get devoured by these types every time! Btw Mendoza, I'm fairly certain that Mills Lane ruled that the ropes had prevented Holyfield from going down. Lane ruled it a knockdown, and thus he gave him a count, the ropes saved Holyfield from going down. Its in the rule books, if the ropes prevent you from going to the canvas, a referee shall rule it a knockdown! You would have never seen Lane give Holyfield a count, had he wobbled and not gone down in the middle of the ring, but Lane ruled that the ropes prevented Holyfield from going down, thus he gave him a count.....its been done before by other refs, there's really nothing controversial about it!
What was his catchphrase again? [SIZE=-1]"I may take a licking but I keep on kicking," or something like that? [/SIZE]
Excellent point, Mendoza! I always thaught that this standing eight count was a bit early, Cooper would have finished Holyfield and would have won via TKO IMO, than perhaps he would have trained a bit better and with more seriousness who would be neccesary for the world scene, but "would, should, could", Cooper is a typical "would have been, could have been", etc. fighter, a shame for me personally, because I liked him...
That's probably very true. Both guys had some attributes other boxers would give their left leg for, but their own demons derailed them. I'd have loved to have seem some of those sparring sessions! I remember a few people were saying, when Holyfield-Cooper was signed, that it might possibly be a bit more dangerous than Holyfield-Damiani because Holyfield would not be prepared for a last-minute switch and with such a different type of fighter. Given the way Holyfield fought Cooper, going disrespectfully or unknowingly toe-to-toe instead when boxing would've been better and suffering that massive KD scare as a result...I can believe it.
Great fight! I remember all the pre-fight,the whole 1st rd along with the knockdown missing because of the war. A few yrs ago I found the fight with all the missing footage, prefight, 1strd ,everything .If any of you are interested give me a shout.
FYI - Holyfield v. Cooper is on ESPN Classic at midnight 9/12 Eastern Time (that's just after 11:59 pm on 9/11)