Holmes's comp... How highly do you rate it?

Every name you mentioned up there would have beaten Ali in 1980, especially considering that Spinks and arguably Norton actually DID beat him in meetings prior to that year. Shavers fought Ali in 1977 and possibly got that shaft as well. In 1980 he was beaten by Mercado and Cobb so I don't know how the hell you can say he was still ranked. Norton dropped out of the ratings after the Shavers loss then drew with Ledoux in a fight he was decked twice in. He barely beat Cobb then got poleaxed by C00ney. How the hell does piggy backing Ali's previous meetings with these men do anything for Holmes beating him in 1980?

I'd say my response proves the opposite.

Who? Shavers was getting his ass kicked by fringe guys in 1980. Norton had a split decision over a 16 fight Cobb which was the only thing of note he did in years. Leon had a recent first round KO loss to Coetzee and a recent draw with Animal Lopez and who's entire resume was based on beating Ali.. Do these things really do anything to bolster an argument for Ali still be a top force in 1980 let alone giving Holmes props for beating him?

Muhammad Ali RETIRED in early 1979 there bye relieving him of the title as "champ." This sort of thing happens. He was a 38 year old health compromised former titlist who hadn't done anything in years and traded wins and losses with a 7 fight novice in his last couple fights and one who proved to not be very good at that. He was a NAME.... Nothing more.

There were also some who advised against his taking that fight and how does any of the above justify him as still being a force? So what if Holmes was beating Ocasio and Evangelista? Ali had done nothing in recent years except juggle the title back and forth between him and Neon Leon..

Regardless. He was finished. Period.. You're probably the only person I've ever encountered in 30 years of following the sport who actually uses Holmes win over Ali as a building block to rate him above other champions.

 

That's because you and whoever you talked to must've had blinders on.

Beating the Lineal champ, regardless of what shape the lineal champ is in, has always mattered in rating champions.

I don't know why you wouldn't do it in the case of Holmes-Ali, either.

There's nothing about that fight that would disqualify it.

And who you "think" would beat Ali in 1979 and 1980 is irrelevent. He had already beaten nearly every man who rose to the top spot in the WBC number rankings in those two years. He could fight whoever he wanted in 1980. He chose Holmes. And when he first started taking his PED, people were raving about how great he looked in the gym (including Dundee). He was beating up his sparring partners. So he took more, and then more, and it backfired on him.

Like I said the other day, I don't hold Ali trying to cheat against Larry Holmes.

Just like I don't hold Leonard entering the ring with cracked ribs against Terry Norris. Or I don't hold Oscar De La Hoya losing too much weight and looking like **** against Manny Pacquiao against Manny. And I don't hold Floyd Mayweather's win over Manny Pacquiao against him because Manny entered the ring injured.

If one-sided beatdowns of older or injured guys count for other fighters - it should count for Holmes.

Simple as that.

 

You mean while watching the fight itself? It looked pretty clear to me that Holmes was hammering on a has been who had no business with a boxing license.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_sqjkeqrvWo

Not to me or most people it doesn't.. Start a thread asking people to list Larry's best wins. Most won't even put down Muhammad's name and if they do it will likely be with an asterix. And once again. Ali had retired years earlier. boxing had moved on. He wasn't the champ.

I take it on a case by case basis. Johnson beating Jeffries in 1910 means nothing to me because Jeffries had been retired for 6 years. Spinks beating Holmes in 1985 was a very good win because Holmes was still that active defending champion with no visible health issues and Spinks had his own disadvantage moving up in weight. Of course this was a past prime version of Holmes but there were factors which permit me to issue credit where credit is due.. No such case exists in Ali vs Holmes. None...

As I said several times already. It goes down in the books as a win for Holmes and a loss for Ali. But it does nothing to boost his resume when comparing him to other champions. If you're going to cling to your stance that ( beating the lineal champion always means something REGARDLESS what shape he's in, ) then you'd have to award Wlad credit for hammering Lennox Lewis should he ever emerge from retirement.... I can tell you right now, I won't...

Has nothing to do with what I "think".. Its about what ACTUALLY happened. Ali vs Norton III was a consensus robbery and he looked so bad to the extent that his own doctor Ferdie Pacheco advised him to retire.. That was in 1976 - four years prior to meeting Holmes. Leon Spinks was a 7 fight novice who went 1-1 against him and never did anything significant again. Hell he got blasted in ONE round against a relatively unknown fighter in his next meeting. Earnie Shavers barely got edged by Ali 77' and left some thinking he was robbed. None of the above guys were doing terribly well by 1980.

Yeah I pretty much covered this ad naseum.

Maybe I'm a harsh critic but Ali doesn't look particularly spectacular in that Holmes fight. He's a tad flabby, slow and lethargic. And I'm not sure who Dundee was using as sparring partners in training for that fight. At one point he sparred with journeyman Jeff simms in preparation for the Berbick fight and Sims split his lip.

As I said it should be taken on a case by case basis and not approached with a generalized view for every fight. In most instances when a champion beats an ex champion who is old, retired, in poor health and wasn't exactly producing great results in his last few outings prior to retirement I write it off as a "win" but a legacy builder.

If only.

 

Please. The WBC wanted Holmes to fight his #1 contender Page. He wanted to face Scott Frank and Marvis Frazier. The latter he couldn't even get sanctioned as a title fight, though he tried. So he vacated, and landed in the grateful arms of the IBF, who were happy to sanction his fights against novice level opponents in return. It's true they also handed belts out to Spinks and Hagler, but getting the widely acknowledged (by the public) heavyweight champion on board was the coup de grace which really established their credibility as an alternative ABC. So we now had three world champions in each division. Thanks Larry.

 

That's fine if you don't want to recognize Jeffries when considering Johnson's level of competition.

I would. And so would everyone alive back then. Going into that fight, Johnson-Jeffries was a big deal and Johnson's win over Jeffries solidified Jack Johnson's claim to the title ... even though Jeffries had been gone for six years.

That is simply what happened, whether -- a 100 years later -- you think it did or not.

Unlike the Jeffries in your example, however, Muhammad Ali hadn't been out of the ring for six years. He retired for a whole EIGHT MONTHS -- from July 1979 (just before his exhibition with Alzado) to March 1980 -- at which point he began training to fight John Tate.

The fact that he waited (like Lewis did after the Klitshko fight) 10 months to announce that he was retiring pushed his actual time between title fights to two years when he faced Holmes.

Regardless, when he faced Holmes, Ali was the lineal champ. And beating Ali meant everything to Larry Holmes' career. Had Tate faced Ali as originally planned, the lineage would've followed the WBA line ... from Frazier, Foreman, Ali, Spinks, Ali to Tate or whoever beat him.

And Holmes' reign would've been an afterthought.

Ali had beaten every man he ever faced (having beaten Norton, Frazier and Spinks) and was the lineal champ when Holmes faced him.

Old or not, anyone who thinks it wasn't a big deal or it doesn't matter isn't worth their salt.

With that. I'm going.

Have a nice weekend.:hi:

 

Lineal title? It's the man who beat the man who beat the man who beat Floyd Patterson who won a vacant title against a 40 year old light-heavyweight. It's nonsense. As if Wlad isn't the legit champ today because he doesn't hold the "lineal" title.

 

I can understand and concur where there were some circumstances in boxing history where the lineal title held value. But more often than not its a hollow concept. When Jim Jeffries entered the ring against Jack Johnson in 1910, it was Johnson not Jeffries who was the champ. When Muhammad Ali fought Joe Frazier in 1971 it was Frazier who was champ not Ali. And when Tyson fought Spinks in 1988 it was Tyson who champ not Spinks. The old adage of having to beat the man to become the man is a very old and unwritten rule and one that I think was designed to protect political favorites from relinquishing the title to lesser ones.

 

He vacated because the WBC wouldn't sanction a fight involving Gerrie Coetzee. Simple as that.

If Holmes fought Page first, and then he signed to fight Gerrie Coetzee, they'd have stripped Holmes then.

Gerrie Coetzee was not going to fight for the WBC title. You can poo-poo that all you'd like, but it's true.

Larry Holmes, Gerrie Coetzee, HBO, Madison Square Garden, multiple sites in Vegas ... there were all on board. Deals were signed. The money kept falling thru. And Holmes and Coetzee were both out of the ring for a year trying to make that fight.

Blaming Holmes for a third organization when EVERY LINEAL CHAMP at the time accepted an IBF belt is nuts.

And so is blaming Holmes for walking away from the WBC because he wanted more money and a unified title is nuts, too.

The WBC let Spinks and Hagler keep their WBC belts and hold the WBA and IBF belts ... because they didn't defend their WBC titles against a South African.

Holmes wanted to unify against a South African, and they squashed it. It didn't get signed until Don King got his cut (and even then it didn't come off).

Are you Jose Sulaiman Jr.? If not, you shouldn't be ****ed.

 

What? The Lineal champ retired 12 years ago -- Lennox Lewis. Of course someone like Wlad was going to start collecting belts and become recognized.

Wlad Klitschko's situation is NOTHING LIKE what we're discussing.

Muhammad Ali was the recognized WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION.

Ali gave up his WBA belt in July 1979 before he had to make a mandatory defense in September ... and said he was quitting - which he'd done too many times before to count.

Eight months later, he announces his comeback. NOT 12 years later. Not SIX YEARS later. Eight months.

And when the first guy he was supposed to fight (Tate) lost, he signed to fight Holmes.

And Holmes defeated Ali and became THE WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION.

Beating Ali was a big win for Holmes. Get over it.

Now. I must go. You guys keep dragging me back in by trying to confuse a very simple situation.

Whether they weren't at their best or not, Jeffries was a big win for Johnson, Leonard was a big win for Norris and Ali was a big win for Holmes.

You all know it's true. You know I'm right. Let it go.

:hi:

 

Except he didn't fight Page at all. Doing it the way he did makes it look like he just didn't want to fight Page. Page became his mandatory in mid '83. Holmes' next two defences were against the completely undeserving Scott Frank, and 10 fight novice Marvis Frazier. Then when the WBC put more pressure on him to face their #1 challenger, he vacated. He was quite fortunate to have the IBF ready to receive him with open arms.

Even when the Coetzee bout fell through, he still didn't fight Page, or Spoon, or Thomas, and continued cherry picking his way to Marciano's record until one of the soft touches unexpectedly beat him. I could give Holmes the benefit of the doubt if he didn't already have a history of taking soft touch fights ahead of more challenging opposition. But he does, so I don't.

 

Nice post.

The iBF also gave Pryor the IBF Junior Welterweight title. Or maybe he had to beat unknown Nicky Furlano. Either way they ensured he would get it.

 

Why would they sanction a unification fight with a guy who just won the WBA title weeks earlier. Page had been sitting on the # 1 WBC spot for five months. Larry had already been allowed to fight Frazier and Frank. Also, the WBC policy against recognizing South African fighters was well known. Larry knew full well the WBC would never sanction a fight between he and Coetzee.

From my recollection, the talks with Gerrie Coetzee were in 1984 when Holmes was IBF Champion.

You seem to be the only one who can't see that Larry was going for easy money, low risk after the Witherspoon scare.

 

On paper only.

His fight with Ali means so little regarding rating Holmes's level of opposition, I didn't even include Ali when I gave Holmes a "C". If I include him, it drops Holmes level of Comp. as champ. to a D plus or C minus