Agreed Darkhorse. They truly were great days for boxing coverage. It'd be normal to see The Ring, KO, Boxing89, Boxing Digest, Boxing Illustrated and The Fist all in one newsagency. I still love digging out some oldies from time to time to have a read. My collection is ****ing enormous.
..a young mate up in Townsville has probably still got my old collection...or part of my old collection...that'd be probably 10 years of consecutive Ring magazines at least...premo condition too...as well as the others you mentioned Ippy...I probably dumped just as many a few years prior...:verysad
Dark horse I agree fully Jeff was a freak of nature. If you were comparing him to a featherweight or a bantam. I would agree with what you are saying. He has a chance against anyone. But he was no light weight. Let alone an ATG light weight. The only way people are saying he can win is on heart and relentlessness . Some say he had bad hands and a broken heart for the Nelson rematch. No one mentions Nelson had malaria for the first fight. So is that performance in question too if the rematch is ? It's all opinions, but Pete beat bigger and better men than Fenech . Because he was bigger and better. It's not a slight on Fenech, because Pek te was better than nearly everyone in history.
yeah fair enough mate...I never said he'd beat Sweet Pea..only that it was the mega match up of the day...but at the time I doubt I would've backed against him...momentum was the thing...Jeff was on a roll.. ..on Nelson...apart from the malaria thing..Azumah had not long lost his wife to cancer before that first fight...Azumah Nelson became one of my favorite fighters through all that
http://boxrec.com/list_bouts.php?human_id=555&cat=boxer I know i've gone mad copyin' and pastin' but look at Whitakers record...how many championship rounds does he have under his belt?
I think the malaria story is absolute bull****. I don't think the NSAC would let him fight if he were showing the effects.
You can be clear of malaria but it takes a hell of a long time to get over. So he could well have entered the ring physically clear but physically drained !
Guys he could have been depleted by a bout of Malaria. It may have depleted him by 10% which is a random figure obviously. It may just have taken the sharpness off him, fact is the Return was a hugely different fight. He was a very different fighter that night, malaria could have been.the reason