Holyfield and Bowe Vs Bert Cooper. How did Bowe make it look so easy?

Bowe was big man and had great leverage on the smaller Cooper. Cooper won the first round but he wasn't good enough or big enough to beat bowe.

 

First of all, Holy went life and death with Cooper only in 3rd round when he was hurt and recieved 8-count. Since then, Holy dominated Cooper and 3rd round of that fight is one of the best in history of HW fights.

Second, prime Bowe is far better than many people think.
He stopped many good and tough fighters - Thomas, Coetzer, Cooper, Fergusson (yes Fergusson as he lost razor-thin to McCall and beat Mercer). Bowe also Ko'd young, fast and promising boxers like Seldon, Hide, Gonsales. Not to mention he has 2 wins over ATG Holy.

Shame he was lazy, not dedicated to sport and became shot fighter very early, at 29.

 

Partly because Bowe was a legitimate big man with big man power, and I don't think Coop was having one of his 'on' days there.

However, the reason Holy nearly lost that fight with Coop was because

a) He was heavily criticised for not stopping Foreman (which in hindsight was a huge task)

b) He was fighting in Atlanta, his home state, in front of his fans.

So he desperately wanted to impress the fans and the critics. He wanted to blow Cooper away early and it shows in how aggressive he was at the start.
It almost paid off, because he dropped Cooper with a great bodyshot and at one point, Cooper after taking some big shots, half turned away from Holyield, as if ready to quit.

Then, as if realising what was on the line, Cooper made a stubborn and defiant stand, one that neither Holyfield nor anyone else expected. So with Holyfield in Cooper's face trying to get the knockout, and Holyfield never being hard to hit in the first place, the door was open for Cooper to land something at some point, and he did.

That fight made me a lifelong Bert Cooper fan.

 

I don't think Holyfield was focused on sub Cooper, but the main difference imo, was the size factor.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xj_TRKvtgfg

Cooper being toyed with by an old man, yet giving a good world champion life and death?

It was size on both counts. Holyfield might have been better off boxing Cooper a bit more, he went in to dish out punishment and caught some return fire.

Cooper did better against men the size of Holyfield, and both fighters had the same range. In a shootout at mid-range, you're going to have to catch and pitch, and Bert had just enough pop to hurt Evander.

 

Bert Cooper was a beast on certain nights but he was inconsistent in his approach and also he had trouble with big men who could punch. The argument can be made that Cooper was better suited for the cruiserweight division as he had a few fights there and did pretty well. Cooper always when on seemed to be able to give any opponent who didn't have a substantial size advantage on him a good fight. But Bowe was too big and dished out to much punishment for the hard charging Cooper to deal with. Bowe at the time when he fought Cooper was as devastating a force as any heavyweight to ever step in the ring.

 

Bowe was huge, had a lot of height and reach, along with massive power, much more powerful than Holyfield, and with all that height and reach, he could hit Cooper with devastating blows from far away, but Cooper's blows were falling short. Different matchup altogether.

 

i think cooper's biggest problem stylistically was he didn't know how to fight "short" like marciano,frazier,tyson and norris.tyson killed williams in 1rd while cooper had the power but couldn't get past the jab.i don't feel being under 6' as a heavy hurts a fighter like most,but you have to bob and weave and still utilize a jab.

 

Pretty simple explanation, Cooper was very inconsistent, in his career, against Holy he came to fight and went balls to the wall.
Against Bowe he said the hell with it , I'm just gonna lay down get my check and roll outta here, don't let the door hit me in the ass on the way out.
Cooper also quit against Foreman.