Well i'm starting to believe opponents really did rise fighting Larry, and while reading a mag today i stumbled onto some tiddy's. 48 hours pre fight Larry - "You don't stand a chance. David, you're a half breed and you know whites bleed." (Bey's mother is Irish caucasion and his father is of Lebanese descent and once served as Joe Louis' sparring partner in the Army!) Post Fight Larry - "I might fight Spinks, but only for money, not ego (look at the seeds of taking Spinks for granted) Or (laughing) the winner of Hagler - Hearns, but defintiely no more big guys. I'm tired of guys like David Bey hitting me up the side of the head. That means no Pinklon Thomas, no Greg Page, no Tim Witherspoon." Interesting bits, Holmes was already taking Spinks lightly and expected to walk thru him, Page, Witherspoon and Thomas were no chance whatsoever of getting a shot at this time no matter what they did, this is obvious. We also see the burning fire inside Larry per the Bey comments. You'd be lucky to get away with those nowadays lol
Tyson would get away with them. They'd even pay him five million for an interview afterwards. As for Larry... getting your opponents angry is a stupid plan in general. In Poker the general rule is to not give your opponents any extra reason to want to beat you. People are fine with losing to someone they like, but will do anything to avoid losing to someone they hate.
Good points. I'm not sure about the USA, or outside work, but at my government job out here the last few years values and behaviours have come in like you would not believe. If i pass on a sexist, sexual or mildly racist comment that is not approved of by the recipient it's big ****. You MIGHT survive once, but twice would undoubtably be dismissal. 10 years ago and more people got away with anything pretty much. Even in topline sport here, rugby league, there's been some serious drama over some racist comments onfield. Almost court. It actually would have ended there if pushed i'd say. Larry's comments over here NOW would be big news.
Poker is not boxing and are not comparable at all. In a professional boxing match, your opponent will always try to kill you, not "being fine losing to someone they like". Pissing them off might make them forget their gameplan or make them reckless and this is one of the reasons Ali tried it all the time. Nice find JT. Again, there is a lot of revisionism of history when it comes to certain Holmes fans and their excuses of him not facing Thomas, Witherspoon rematch, etc. Indeed, no fighter today would get away with that. Holmes seemed to have such a chip on his shoulder, more so than any other champion maybe. He doesn't carry a big punch, but you can often see him really throwing with bad intend. If he had a big punch, he'd be known as a really bad man. I just watched HBO Legendary fights: Holmes vs Cooney and all i saw in Holmes was frustration, frustration and a bad attempt to brag about his abilities like Ali did, but he lacked the charisma and it looked embarresing at some points to be honest.
Very true. Holmes had a way of getting his title opponents up to face him, which is a reason why some of his title matches were vs the best version of the fighter he fought.
Well going by the things he said about them, little wonder. Personally i think Holmes also fought down at times.
That comment is very Ali-esque. Maybe he was just aiming at shock value to spur some interest. Bey doesn't look very intimidating. It's almost like his nickname "The Hand Grenade" was only describing his body shape. Short and round. Outside of that, I'm forgetting why Bey was his opponent for that fight. Does anyone know why Holmes fought Bey?
Well Larry still didn't seem to want to fight Page, so when Bey beat Page he jumped! Speculation, but damn close i bet. Regardless Larry was looking to cruise just below the top level. If some average Joe beat Pinklon Thomas or perhaps Witherspoon you could bet your house that Larry would have been all over them like a rash. Larry took the easy road late, but hey, at least he had the courage to admit it. :yep
Larry, IMO had a way of bringing out the very best of his oppenents. Like in the Norton fight, you'd think Norton was 25 years old. In the Witherspoon fight, you'd think Witherspoon had 35-40 fights. In the Williams fight, you'd think the same thing. Even in sparring, Larry made sure his sparring partners were at their best hitting as hard as they could and doing the best they could and 100% because he put a $10,000 bounty on his head. If you could knock him down, you got $10,000. A lot of times, Larry is just misuderstood. He was very possibly, the most honest, and straight forward heavyweight champion ever. He said what was on his mind, didn't sugar coat it, and he never let the press down when they egged him on, or pissed him off on purpose. He has a temper, and he lets it go if you egg it on like the press did for quotes for example, the post fight press conference against Spinks. Thats what you get when you **** him off and egg him on.
You don't think it was the insults and attitude by any chance? If he and Thomas ever fought after the things Larry made about him Pink would have had to have died before he stopped fighting lol
So there should be, racism and even mildly racist views are repugnant and should be stamped out with fierce and unrelenting authority. For too long bigots have been getting away with making sly racist comments and putting it down to banter. I find racism of any kind is wholly unacceptable.
