If you were Norton's Coach, What is your gameplan for his Fight with Earnie Shavers ???

First off, I would have never allowed Ken Norton to fight either Earnie Shavers or Gerry Cooney. Ken was at the end of his career Both took credit for fighting the shell of Ken Norton, they both should have fought Ken in 1976 or 1977. I do not credit those wins, it would be like a big strong teenager assaulting an escapee from the local nursing home.

 

The Shavers fight was very winnable for Norton.
All he had to do was fight his fight.

 

"Do what Quarry did and, for ****s sake Ken, don't get knocked out"

 

Probably so, but with Cooney, a youngster beating up on an older vulnerable adult.

 

The only reason Norton fought both fighters is a win over either would get him a rematch with Larry Holmes.

 

Both Lyle and Earnie had been gunning for Norton for years. But Kenny fought soft opposition after that foreman slaughter. It was Ali and those bad hands and a style suited for Kenny. Similar with Young---a non puncher and Norton took that because he had to. But not the big hitters.

 

It's true that Ken should have retired by then. That tremendous effort againt Larry Holmes took it all out of him.
A prime for prime Norton-Shavers fight would be a 50/50 one in my view. While Ken was always vulnerable against big hitters,if he'd landed his own hard shots on Earnie's chin first he'd have won. Even though Norton did n't hit as hard as Shavers.

 

Beating Shavers certainly would have got him a rematch but beating Cooney not necessarily tho it would have been a big leg up.

Interestingly Norton was a 9-5 favorite over Shavers whilst Cooney was a 4-1 favorite over Norton.

 

My game plan:

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To wear an helmet even against Foreman and Cooney

 

I doubt I could instruct him better than Eddie Futch - Though I don’t know if Eddie was still in his corner at that point. At any rate I think it would be prudent to avoid mixing it up with Ernie until he could be softened up in the later rounds. Some here have suggested going out there early and trying to bomb out Shavers. I think this would be a dangerous tactic though as it would force Ken to mix it up and that’s how he basically lost in the first place.

 

Not sure Ken had the durability or style to ever make this more than a 50-50 proposition, but I'd rather he try to back up Shavers with that jab and smother his counter-efforts rather than try to just bomb him out. This probably means tweaking his defense because the cross-armed defense coupled with smothering the opponent means lots of opportunities for Shavers' uppercut.