Greatest South African boxers

Cool man, glad you liked it.

 

It's great information coupled with videos and some great obscure shout outs, like Kallie. Good stuff man.

 

There are more videos out there if you look for them. The quality generally sucks, being 80's stretched VHS quality in the main. There's also lots of stuff missing. I've tried to collect all of Sanders' fights but there are huge gaps in coverage. Fights like against Pritchard and Nelson should be easily found, and yet are not. C'est la vie.

 

Brian Mitchell
Cassius Baloyi
Welcome Ncita
Botile
Bungu
Thobela
Baronet

Don't really pay attention to heavies. Bungu held the title for a long time.
Nicta was really something. Had McKinney beat until he walked into a right hand.
Thobela had a lot of talent but didn't always use it .
Botile was very talented .

 

Jck Lalor

 

Great thread. Man, you can´t find footage on this guy Charlie Weir nowhere on the ****ing internet. Quite rare thing these days.

 

All I know of the Toweel brothers is that Willie (I think) was stopped by Griffith who was just much bigger and maybe even better. Many showcase bouts available to watch between the brothers do you know?

 

Phillip Holiday, won the IBF Lightweight strap when he KO'd the legendary Jeff Fenech. Defended that belt three times before losing a very competitive fight on points to Sugar Shane.

He may not be the greatest South African fighter of all time but he is worthy of a mention.

 

Davey Moore put him in his place.

 

Vic scored a huge upset by dethroning long-reigning bantam champ Manny Ortiz despite having a relatively small number of fights himself (I forget exactly how few) - it was the bantam equivalent of the 1st Ali-Spinks.

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Vic made a few successful defenses, but then a combination of weight-making & Jimmy Carruthers' powerpunches brought an end to his reign, & effectively his career as a whole.

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Willie came up short in his own bid for the BW title when he was held to a draw by Robert Cohen, but later reinvented himself as a LW contender. His biggest career win was probably over Len Matthews, in which he came off the canvas to outpoint him in MSG (his first ever fight in the US I believe). Willie was largely unknown to American audiences at the time, but his gutsy display impressed the crowd so much that they were cheering for him by the end.

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For some reason, he failed to capitalize on the momentum of this win, & ended up being fed to an up-n-coming Griffith a year or so later & retired.

 

Funny enough, I was just watching this footage of Sammy Angott vs. Slugger White, & about a minute of the Moore-Weir fight appears at the end of the video.

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Somebody has to post some fights of this guy !

 

I came here prepared to challenge anyone who didn’t put the splendid Brian Mitchell at the top of this list and was pleased to be greeted by your post to start it off. In SA boxing history, he really is in a class by himself.

You can argue some others for the next tier, but Mitchell is without peer.

I was excited to get to see Thulane Malinga in person back in the day after he had been giving fits to the UK guys (Eubank and Benn) and was coming over to test out Roy Jones Jr … but Roy was just a force of nature. He had no problem whatsoever and iirc iced him with one uppercut.

 

Rich the Fight Historian has just uploaded a mini-docu about him w/ footage from the Moore & Finnegan fights:

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I like Mitchell. He is one of those guys that doesn't stand out in any area- he wasn't a power puncher, he wasn't really fast. But he was very solid at every aspect of the game. Good pro fighter.