He dominated and cleared up one of the more impressive Light Heavyweight era's of all time with wins over guys like Johnson, Qawi, Mustafa, and Lopez. Moved up and took on the then undefeated Larry Holmes and won two very close fights against him. Even his destruction over Cooney must count for something. After he was taken out in seconds against Mike Tyson, I get the sense Spinks isn't appreciated half as much as perhaps he should be? Anyone agree? General thoughts, where do you think he ranks?
top 30, maybe if he had more fights he could be top 15. But IMO ANYWHERE from 20-30 is a perfectly reasonable placement. At light-heavy he is top 5 for sure. Great, often very underated fighter/ Its true he is underated because of the tyson fight. But he was above his weight and past his prime the. Foster was stopped in 2 rds vs Frazier, yet it doesnt effect his ranking.
One of the favorite ever light heavies...A truly great fighter in every sense of the word IMO..Very good career and excellent ability. I think I rate him around 30-40 alltime...Ahead of Roy though and yes I think he would have beaten him.
Spinks was a great fighter, but i've never agreed with notion of him dominating and clearing up one of the best era's.He was one of those fighters that came along and bridged two era's, picking up two or three notable wins over the previous era's fighters in the meantime. For one, it really comes down to where you are choosing to as the cutoff point for an era.MOst of the men usually accredited with filling up that great period were '70s fighters who for various reasons were almost done by 1980.Spinks and qawi are your exceptions there, those two are eighties fighters. Marvin Johnson(despite hanging around for a longtime in the weaker eighties as a seviceable contender) and especially Lopez were nearing the end of the road as elites when Spinks beat them, still good fighters and good wins for an up and coming fighter, but very much a case of hte cliched "old pro vs young lion" kind of fights. then you have Gregory, who was ****ing everything up because of his lifestyle\mindset, with the shape he turned up to the Spinks fight being the beginning of the end for him as well.This is more his own fault than anything else however. qawi is really hte one big name who usually gets put in with that great light heavy era who was in his prime and facing Spinks in a supposed 50\50 bout wth both men at optimum levels. Most of the other men Spinks defended against would fall under the eighties era more than the '70s.NOw don't get me wrong i don't say any of this to discredit Spinks in anyway, but i've always thought saying he cleaned out a great era has as much merit as somene saying Ken Buchanan cleaned out the '60s lightweight scene. If anyone did the most as far as quality victories goes in that great mid-to late seventies period it was the less lauded Galindez.
I agree he didn't clean out the era. Saad Muhammad was a huge part of that time period and his prime was 1978-1981, they never fought during that time frame. James Scott and Richie Kates were two major contenders and Spinks never fought them. He didn't clean out the era, he simply fought 3 or 4 good fighters from that era.
He was and still is a Great, and I only list 35 fighters as such. As stated he cleaned up a tough division, arguably just coming out of its strongest (depth wise) era. He then became the first reigning Light Heavy Champ to win The Heavyweight Crown against a fighter who had not tasted defeat for 13 years, and never as a pro. The first Holmes fight was close, and I can see an argument as to why Holmes might of Won. But although it may be wrong, Karma is a *****, and The Big Black Cloud had finally run out of luck, after a few scrapes with potential defeats. His behaviour was disgraceful post fight* Fight two was not Spinks' and indeed boxing judges finest hour, and some figured Cooney was a threat...... The Tyson fight hurts Spinks in the worldwide mainstream arena, which is a shame, because with hindsight, (as I figured he would beat Iron Mike), Spinks did not have his heart in the game anymore; he failed to do what was needed to give himself, his best chance (#1 being sorting out his bum knee), and I get the feeling Spinks saw the money involved, and figured he would be mad not to fight Tyson, after all, Kudos does not pay the bills. *I think some forget, Holmes did show proper class the next day, by apologizing and personally contacting the Marciano family to do so. And a few years back, Holmes won an award given out by the Marciano family, and personally went there to accept the award and was the last one to leave, after signing all autographs anyone wanted and posing for all pictures.
I think Spinks and Galindez H2H is a very interesting matchup. But not as much as Prime Conteh vs Prime Spinks, now that's exciting :good Anyway, I have Spinks around the 30-40 mark. I think he would beat Roy AND Bob Foster. Although I think Roy would have a chance at winning a decision over 12, although I do not agree he has a 'glass jaw' I mostly envision the 'Spinks Jinx' catching him at some point. I genuinely don't want to make a call on Galindez-Spinks................(senses heated debate)
