Leon Spink's loss to Gerrie Coetzee

He always talked mondo trash

Remember the Weaver fight?
"I think ill knock you out now"


It came over the mike.

 

I remember seeing this fight live, and I remember using the word "awesome", almost like that word has been used so much in recent years...I was very impressed because I honestly thought that Spinks was going to roll right over him...Coetzee was so damned good with the way he used that right, and that last knckdown, I wonder how far Spinks would have traveled were it not for those ropes?

 

If Coetzee would have had a good trainer early on it would have been a big help...Great right hand you had to deal with and decent speed but became a little too stand up at times and one dimentional but he dropped Snipes 2 times and was robbed

 

Decent bouts against those guys? Just who was buying the old version of Evangelista? nobody thought much of him in his prime years, let alone when he went downhill.

Animal Lopez was mostly a sparring partner for guys and hardly an A level fighter. Mercado had the absolute worst conditioning of any heavyweight and was never back in serious contention after the Weaver loss. About the only thing he did was to outlast an old Shavers. So Spinks manages to get wins against that level of competition really wasn't all that stiff when you look at who else was available to fight at the time.

If Spinks had fought Norton instead of being stripped of the title he'd have had his hands full. Or Weaver. Or the up and comers. Even a Trevor Berbick or a
Snipes in 1980 timeframe would've been a tougher matchup than those 3.

At any rate, some folks thought by beating those type opponents that Spinks was back and was ready for
Holmes. I sure as hell didn't. I didn't think he was capable of handling the top 10 guys and saw no point in a Coetzee rematch.

 

Leon had a good chance to beat Gerrie, but did not have the right mindset.Though in hindsight, it probably worked out perfectly since I didn't give Leon a high chance of beating John Tate.

 

You really think he had a good chance?

I didn't. but then again, back then all you had was flash and magazine articles to hear about Coetzee, unless you lived in South Africa to actually see his fights. The results were there however and he was young and a hitter that had gone 12 rounds. But his reputation was as a big hitter and he was known for about 3 years. He had the size advantage over Leon and this was supposed to be his big Arum push for international recognition.

The bout taking place in Monte Carlo added to the physical attributes of Coetzee convinced me to back the guy. We had all heard those Spinks stories about Leon in New Orleans for that Ali rematch. Now you are putting him in Monte Carlo and he's in there the first time with a big heavyweight hitter. Ali had not scored a tko since 76 and those were different fights and preparations for an undisciplined guy. That bout needed to take place somewhere else & maybe Leon pulls it out. Not there, not after New Orleans.

 

I was totally shocked by this one ! I fully expected Spinks to go through,and eventually claim the vacant WBA title. The first Ali fight proved that Leon was a lot better than we thought he was,but not as good as Muhammad made him look.

 

i think it was Jackie McCoy that helped him develop the hook and he did have more dimension to his game going into the Dokes fight before that he was left jab right hand.....He was not the most well rounded fighter but he had a great right hand, took a good punch and was strong...too bad he did not have the best training early on.

Also I would have loved to see how his style meshed with Holmes...I think it would have been exciting fight because of styles

 

Disagree wholeheartedly.

His career was very well managed. Soloman and Lewis did a fantastic job getting him big paydays in addition to the Ali sweepstakes.

Look at the other contemporaries of Spinks from 76 and how does Spinks do against them instead of Righetti/Ledoux/ Evangelista/Lopez/ and so on?

Dokes. Page. Cooney. Tate was Wba champ. Thomas and Witherspoon were on the radar screen winning fights. You had Tillis winning regional fights, as was Snipes. And Cobb. Another undefeated prospect back then was Canalito. Don't forget Knoetze and Coetzee.


That is quite a few contemporaries right there and what did we get instead? How many of those guys above is say a Lopez beating?

And just how does Leon fare against the best of the bunch, Holmes of that 79 timeframe? Or just how does Leon hold up wading in against Shavers in 79?

That was a masterful job they did with Spinks and when he did step up and face a contempory, his defense and getting hit so easily with right hands sure didn't work well against Coetzee. That was his problem anyway, defense and he walked in usually straight up.

 

Guys , perspective please ..Spinks was a near amateur ... he was ok against an old Ali with no punch ... however, instead of rebuilding his career his management threw him right into a fight against a young, strong , big, far more experienced Coetzee .. Spinks could nt have ran into him more wide open and amateurish ... it was trget practice ... Leon, at his best a small heavyweight with a shaky chin, never had a shot ... Coetzee was immediately over rated as his upcoming losses to Tate and Weaver would prove ...

 

Can anybody name a better amature lt heavy than Leon??

PS
The night Leon beat Ali Angelo Dundee sez in his book....Jeeze we're back in with Doug Jones!!

That guy hits the nail on the head!!

 

I was going to say Tony Tucker, but he never won the amateur nationals three straight years.

 

At the time, it was considered a huge upset, especially the way it happened. Spinks was thought to be durable -- he went 15 in winning and in losing the title and had stood up well against credible opposition on his fast-track rise to dethrone Ali.

The second Ali fight Leon was a mental wreck -- he didn't stand up to resolve the issue of who should be training him so he had three different trainers taking turns talking to him between rounds -- one guy got rounds 1, 4, 7, etc. and so on. He pulled disappearing acts from training camp and went out partying because of the chaos.

It was presumed he was back in mental shape, and certainly in physical shape, for Coetzee.

Coetzee was NOT regarded as a huge hitter at this point. The Spinks fight began that reputation. He hadn't fought outside of South Africa and had 11 knockouts in 21 fights -- not the kind of record to make people quake in fear of his power at that point. His two immediate fights before Spinks went the distance and 3 of his previous 5. And while he had beaten Knoetze, a lot of people thought (quite wrongly) that Knoetze would stand up as the better South African on the world stage because of his early KOs of Shutte, Dunn and Bobick (Coetzee had beaten Shutte on points while Knoetze got the early KO), which gave the perception that he was the better puncher while Coetzee said he styled himself after Ali and was considered more of a standup Euro-style boxer at this point.