Should be one hell of a fight. Both at their best. 12 rounds. Smallest ring possible with a lenient ref.
What weight would this take place at ? both men had a run at Cruiserweight. Cooper himself was quite highly rated as a Cruiserweight at one point. I'm gonna assume you want this fight to take place at Heavyweight ? both men at their best i think i favour Cooper. Spinks obviously had the better wins of the two, but Spinks would be the smaller man here. And his swarming style against the bigger man who can bang might spell disaster. Maybe i'm underrating Spinks a bit here since he did beat Mercado who could bang, but Spinks also pretty much fought Eddie Lopez, Scott LeDoux, to a standstill who were tough brawlers but average. Cooper himself is a brawler but the difference is i think Cooper has a higher peak level than those two clearly and hits alot harder. Overall i'm going with Cooper by KO in an absolute slugfest.
I've got a prime sober Spinks winning this one all day. Spinks is really hard to analyze because he fought most of his career with a major substance abuse problem. When his head was on straight he was an Olympic gold medalist and heavyweight champion in a very tough era. Cooper cannot make the same claim.
Depends on when you think their primes were. Spinks prime is arguably the first Ali fight, but he was very inexperienced at that time. Cooper's career was all over the place. This is partly true, a half truth. Spinks showed up at arguably the perfect time in HW history to win a championship, a rather old and diminished Ali was hanging onto the belt by a thread. The late 70's was rather weak, and then the 80's saw a rise in a new crop of talented but mostly very unmotivated heavies (Holmes and Weaver being 2 exceptions).
Two very inconsistent fighters ... Cooper the much harder puncher , Spinks always game ... who the hell knows ?
I will agree Ali was certainly past his prime but he still had some teeth. His three fights before Spinks were wins over Shavers, Evangelista and Norton. He was still beating quality guys although I do think Norton won that 3rd fight. Leon was a prototypical pressure fighter that was that was destined for a short career. The booze certainly made his prime shorter. I'm from St Louis and knew a lot of people in the STL fight game (most are dead now) that knew Leon well. They all said the same thing, he could have achieved so much more than he did had it nit been for his addictions. You don't win Olympic gold in the 70's against Sixto Soria Savigne without being an absolute bad ass. Leon was 178-7 as an amateur before he started drinking. His drinking started after he left the marine corp.
Let’s assume they’re both well trained, highly motivated and at a weight where they’re both comfortable. Because let’s be honest, these guys were pretty erratic in terms of how they showed up. With all that said I’d probably favor Burt Cooper in an entertaining brawl that ends somewhere between rounds 4-7. My reasoning is that this would likely come down to a slugfest. And frankly I think Burt was better at both taking it and dishing it out. Leon might have been slightly more skilled but this isn’t the type of match that would be determined by a marginal skill level
This. Best for best, Cooper was tougher and punched harder. Spinks' chin was, I personally suspect, less than iron. Cooper could quite possibly have a KO win over Holyfield if the ref hadn't bungled it up. I think Cooper wins. That said IRL Spinks was usually in top shape whereas Cooper sometimes just arrived for the paycheck. Who knows what versions of each other would arrive ....
At the end of the day, Cooper can take Leon’s power, but Leon can’t take Cooper’s power, and with their styles, they’re both going to be taking punches. Cooper takes him out early-mid rounds in a fight that is a great back and forth while it lasts.
