Larry Holmes Latest Remarks, ALI, Lewis,Frazier..

I knew some of this, but I'd forgotten. You're story has credibility and it is moving and persuasive. The only thing I would add is Larry Holmes was one thing that most of us never were or ever will be, the best in the world at what we are doing at any given time.

 

What did Larry say about Tyson?

The fact that Larry is still happily married to his first wife and how everyone who knows him on a personal level speak so highly of him to me speaks volumes as to how he must be a very genuine man.

 

But you have to admit they were funny.

In any event, your right, he could be cruel when he wanted to be at that age (Ali-Patterson I was difficult for me to watch).

Apparently when Frazier's kid Marvis was in school, kids would make fun of him calling him "Guerilla Jr.". Nobody deserves that junk.

 

Nicely written and maybe he's nice in person, but in the stuff that i and 99,9% of the people read he comes across as a bitter, arrogant *****. Simple as that. And a lot of the **** he asked for himself. Not even talking about the jockstrap comment, but claiming to be the best and fighting everyone while he clearly didn't. At times he was honest that boxing used him, so now he uses boxing. Okay, fair enough, but then don't claim you fought everyone and everybody:huh

 

Vicious circle, like I said.

From the very start of his career, Larry was pissed off about the way Ali overshadowed him when in his eyes he was the better fighter. From there it moved on to the stuff surrounding the Cooney fight, the Marciano 49-0 mark, Joe Louis's number of title defences etc etc, all building up.

So I can understand why Larry feels bitter at times.
I'm also certain that he's a great generous guy in private, having particularly done a lot of work in local business and charity.

Doesn't change the fact that he brings a lot of it on himself by fighting fire with fire like that. He's handing over ammunition to his critics. While some of what he says is true, other stuff is so utterly off the mark and seemingly coloured by emotion that it waters down his strength of opinion, making it easy for others to paint him as the quintessential "back in my day we would've whupped all these bums!" grumpy old-timer.

 

i just keep thinking about all the guys he struggled with,

ernie shavers

carl williams

tim witherspoon (who i felt won)

and when he was more past his prime michael spinks who i felt won a clear decision in their first fight.


always this venom comming from holmes, i remembered in ken nortons biography about how holmes was trying to punk him out when ken was training.

i also watched his fight agains maurice harris and i though harris won that by 4 points.

 

Tho commendable in the day and age i'd be wary of holding this up as too big a guage of genuinity or character. With divorce statistics what they are many a fine man would fail this barometer. In fact i know several.

Certainly, the point can be used for him in some ways but i'd be leery to judge the other way.

 

Well, that one was widely seen as a gift decision, though it was a 47-year-old Holmes in there, with even his jab failing him. Time had already passed him by, and indeed this was the last fight he had as part of a consistant schedule...the final handful were 'special event' types.
Can't hold that weak performance against Holmes, though it should've been a loss yeah.

 

Great post, glad to see at least one other person on this site understands that, and has gotten to meet Larry in person when he was being him self.

 

He didn't struggle with Shavers. He shut him out the first time, and the second time he was well on his way to doing it again until Shavers nailed him with that right. Even then Larry stopped him.

 

Apparently he's the opposite of George Foreman.

 

So Larry isn't just pissing about George when hesays that crap about him? I always figured the smile was fake and such, but I figured he'd be an ok guy too.

 

I don't know for sure, I'm just saying that the perception among more than just a few people in boxing is that Foreman is a completely different person away from the cameras.

Here's one story I heard. I trust the source as reliable.

http://fightbeat.com/forums/showthread.php?p=604147

 

In Atlas's book he also says George is a very different person away from the cameras.