So, what I'm asking is, could Holmes have challenged Ali, maybe 1976, and it being a competetive match? Perhaps at that point in time, Larry loses but I'm pretty sure it wouldn't be one sided.
Holmes beats Ali in 76' via a pretty dull decision, Ali was already past his 70s prime by quite a lot by then,
Ali was done after the Manila in '75 and never really looked good again after. Any period after 1975, Holmes should be favored to win a decision imo.
Would have been much more competitive than their 1980 fight. Ali was pretty shot, but still had enough left in the tank to perform at world-level. I think he has enough to beat Holmes at this stage - as Holmes was still green as f**k.
This is just my own suspicion, but Ali selling the "rope-a-dope" strategy to the public as a work of strategic genius probably helped him out. Any time an opponent hit him, Ali could just claim he was rope-a-doping the opponent. So the public was willing to accept that Ali "won" rounds where Ali did very little except get hit. "It's all just part of his plan! Ali gets ring generalship points for getting hit because he's rope-a-doping the opponent!" This is just my ungrounded suspicion, but it makes sense to me.
At that point I’d say it would have been 50/50. You had a prospecting Holmes and a past it Ali. Close fight
Ali never fought a genuine prospect after Manilla. His opponents were either human sacrifices like Rudi Lubbers and Richars Dunn or long career veterans like Lyle, Shavers and Norton. Holmes' youth energy and excellent technique may have been too much for Muhammad.
