Questions for fans/critics of Michael Spinks...

Best win is Holmes I of course, though the performance aspect of that fight isn't quite his best.

 

.............Given the quality of opposition and the situation Spinks faced in and out of the ring at the time, his best performance was probably Qawi.

Spinks' common-law wife had been killed in an auto accident six weeks prior, and he soldiered on through training in a bit of a fog, understandably. Tough thing to have happen on many levels, but it was also unfortunate that it happened on the eve of the biggest fight of his life against perhaps the toughest opponent he'd faced yet.

In the dressing room before the bout, a friend brought his three-year-old daughter in to give her daddy a good luck kiss before he went into the ring, and she innocently asked, "where's mommy?"

Spinks broke down in the dressing room, all that emotion being released after weeks of feeling he had to keep it in.

It would have been excusable, perhaps expected, for him to fight in a daze and be overwhelmed by the buzzsaw Qawi that night. We saw what happened though; he was amazing, fighting a disciplined fight, keeping Qawi busy thinking about avoiding the jab all night and not allowing Qawi to counter him by leaving the right hand out of his arsenal. He just circled and boxed all night, and took home the WBC title to go with his WBA belt.

The man deserved a medal for that. What mental toughness.

 

His best wins were against larry holmes, gerry cooney, dwight qawi, eddie muhammad

his most impressive was against holmes in the first fight.

his most exciting fight? IMO against gerry cooney

 

Pick up a copy of Spinks's 1981 kayo over Marvin Johnson to see his one punch kayo power in action. Very dramatic. It would be good also to watch Spinks's 1980 kayo over Yaqui Lopez, and his 1981 decision win over Mustafa Muhammad.

Another interesting fight to watch is Spinks's 1980 TKO over Ramon Ronquillo. That was Spinks's break-through fight, as Ronquillo was a strong, hard hitting clubfighter who most world class fighters couldn't have beaten as decisively as Spinks did.

 

His best and greatest accomplishment was undoubtedly against Holmes for the title (first fight).

The second Holmes fight was closer (IMO, Holmes should have got the nod).



Cooney was having problems, physical and personal at the time. IMO, prime Cooney would have stopped Spinks.

But nevertheless, a good fight well worth watching.


Tyson ? Very brief.

Dwight Muhammad Qawi, Eddie Mustafa Muhammad and Marvin Johnson were also decent.

 

Why did he retire after the tyson fight?

 

Have you ever seen that fight ???

Just kiddin' !



Maybe because he was 32 and would never win a title again as Tyson was 22 and looked invincible.

He'd done it all already.

 

Um, he got his ass kicked.

 

People hate on Naz when he retired after his first and only loss but Spinks does not get the same treatment.

 

Knee problems and a long successful career behind him, idiot.

 

If an invincible Tyson was the problem He could have made a comeback when Tyson was in prison.

 

That sounds more resonable. Now I know why he never fought again but it was a shame because he was a good fighter who could have achieved more.

 

Exposing Holmes for what he was...a great fighter...nothing more, nothing less.

 

.............He was never a heavyweight. Every fight at that weight was a sort of leap of faith, against (at least until Tyson) very carefully chosen opponents. The Holmes fights were exceptions too, but Holmes was ready to be taken anyway, by any number of contenders at the time.

Spinks was manufactured up to 200 pounds, but that didn't make him a heavyweight; every single guy he fought was bigger, naturally stronger, and more powerful. There would have been no point continuing because he was simply physically outmatched against any real top guys.

Had he continued, we'd be sitting here saying he should have got out earlier. The smart ones leave when the time is right, and he rightly recognized he had nothing left to prove. And he'd made a lot of money in the process.