Hey guys i have not seen this fight. But did spinks hurt Holmes at all in this fight? I know he stopped quarry. But i was thinking why didnt holmes just press him the whole fight and show no respect. Also how did spinks fight? Thanks
No, Ive seen plenty off others say he won the fight, just not on this site. I go to another site too, and I like it tons more. This one is too, wild, obnoxious, and flat out full ass holes. I still come on here to talk and all, but if I was a mod, or admin, there would be a ton of changes for the better.
Spinks did rock Holmes during the first fight, round three or four I'm sure. Can't mind exactly which round precisely. I would not come to the conclusion Holmes was seriously hurt, but he was alarmed by Spinks assualt. I do have the fight on my PC, as well as the rematch. If you doubt me, no problem giving you the round, and exactly which time the clock was at when Spinks unleashed his assualt. But we'd come to no end. Because you'd no doubt say Holmes never felt the punches.
My father and I attended this fight in Vegas. We did not like the way Holmes looked at the weigh-in, and put money on Spinks. It wasn't so much his physical condition, but his demeanor. He seemed very distracted mentally...almost anti-social. We had Spinks winning a narrow decision. Considering that both my father and I attended Holmes' fights with Norton, Cooney, and Witherspoon, I don't even hesitate when I say that Holmes would've stopped Michael Spinks during his prime, which was 1978-1982. As an aside, after Holmes - Witherspoon, I saw Larry Hazzard at the concession stand. I asked him who he thought won that fight, and he said Witherspoon. I thought Holmes narrowly won that one. In terms of his prime, what a lot of folks miss about Holmes is his toughness and physical strength. He's really not that far away from Saad Muhammad in the toughness department. At 6'3" and around 212 in his prime, he was also unusually strong physically.......and damn smart. I'll never forget watching him think his way through the Cooney fight. He was like a big, smart, black cat luring a mouse in. Sitting in the crowd, you could sense he was setting traps, and was going to pull the trigger when he felt it was right. One of the greatest fighters I've ever seen.
I always thought that in a close fight the champ retains the belt. It's politics that often decides who wins a fight. Think about it. Ali got a gift in the 3rd Norton fight as well as the Young fight and maybe the Shavers fight also. No sanctioning body wanted to lose the biggest draw in Boxing to a boring fighter and a no draw champion like Young or Shavers. Fast forward to Holmes-Spinks. A pretty close fight but the stakes are different. No one at the time wanted Marciano's 49/0 record to be broken, least of all by a less than beloved champion like Holmes so if Spinks could make it a close one then he would be given the championship and that's what happened. Holmes did'nt help himself by fighting a timid fight instead of bullrushing the smaller Spinks and beating him up but that's what happened nonetheless. Larry can't complain too much however since he benefitted from the same circumstance in his fight with Norton. Another close one but who really wanted Norton to be the HW standard bearer for long. So much for the champ keeping the title on a close one eh?
Personally i don't think this fight was that tight. I think Spinks was definitely the better man in fight 1 and it would have been a travesty for that not to be recognised. Conversely i think Holmes was clearly the better man in the rematch and got ripped off. Larry let himself down by coming into fight 1 in very ordinary condition and was surely overconfident. He was a different man in the rematch. The big question is if he did actually come into fight 1 in top shape and had similar success to what he did in fight II would they have actually ripped him off? I think it likely. I don't believe tho that he was cheated out in fight 1 as it stands.
I agree with most (nearly all) on here that Spinks won the first fight clearly, by around 2 or 3 points. I tend to score rounds even when they're even, so I had the fight 7-4-4 for Spinks. Holmes just didn't use his right. The rematch is not an open and shut case in my opinion. Holmes definitely won the first 4 rounds, but Spinks made things interesting down the stretch. I did a "clearly landed punches" count of that fight which came out to 132 to 126 for Holmes. Close fight, if it had to go to someone, it should have been Larry.