"Pink Thomas-Tim Spoon" was a 1984 snoozer WBC title fight in my book...

Holmes ducked Page and Thomas. How some people can still debate this is beyond reason. And you are right, had Holmes fought more of the top guys, he might have lost his undefeated record sooner. Holmes was a great fighter, but he DID duck several leading contenders. That's not to say Holmes wouldn't have beaten them, but he obviously didn't want to take the risk. He'd rather make easy money against soft touches.

 

I bet Larry Holmes probably said that the reason Thomas beat Witherspoon was because he (Holmes) beat the fight out of Spoon. I can imagine Holmes saying something like that. :yep

 

Boxing news actualy picked Bey to score an upset.

 

Do you recall their rationale for picking the upset?

Was it the Bey lefthook was going to come over the top for a stoppage win? Or was it one of those rationalizations--Bey beat Page and Larry didn't fight Page, so therefore....

 

The mags were all worked up over David Bey for a short period of time. There's even a Weston mag cover with his picture and the title "David Bey; The New Marciano?" Seriously.

 

All I ever remembering about the guy before that Holmes fight was that he had some amateur experience and fought way down on the undercards of fights. He was not a regional guy but actually fought those off tv bouts in big cards.

He won a decision over Page and all of a sudden his stock price kind of soared upwards. It was a close bout and hardly a Foreman/Frazier type destruction. A guy getting destruction results over Page ******ts some accolades, but close nod?

At any rate, very few people look at things like upper body movement or mobility with their footwork or hand placement and so on. Larry Holmes sure did. This guy used that Scott Ledoux defensive posture with quicker hands. Not Tony Tubbs quick, but faster than Ledoux, was almost every other heavy.

I thought Bey was a guy that was going to be in a lot of trouble once he faced elite competition. He got by Page & that was about it. I thought he'd make for an ideal comebacking Cooney opponent. Bey in there w/ Coetzee/Dokes/Spoon/Thomas/Weaver and Holmes and the top shelf heavies just never did translate into very many wins. He was more like a Snipes and capable maybe of springing an upset, but that's about things ended.

 

go watch that Bey--Biggs fight. It is interesting and Bey has his moments. Then consider the chances Tyrell really truly had going into that Tyson fight. Some folks actually liked the Biggs chances for the upset and I could never ever understand why.