Tim Witherspoon (2nd Smith fight) vs Michael Moorer (Foreman fight)

I'm beginning to wonder about you. In the post you've replied to, with this^, I discuss Smith and Smith/Witherspoon, almost exclusively. I mention Foreman once, in relation to being compared with Smith (penultimate sentence). I do not mention Ruddock's name once.

I'm going to assume you didn't live through those times and are looking at the pertinent events, retrospectively and superficially, with little to no actual knowledge of them. The fight almost didn't take place, with Witherspoon threatening to pull out with days to go - the culmination of years of being ripped off by Don King. It made news - at the time.

Seriously - study up before making these types of response to me because they are needlessly speculative and off the mark. The information is out there.

TIP: When you start referring to turns of phrase as "hyperbole", it's a sign you've run out of anything useful to say.

Still you assume Witherspoon was up for this fight and he was not. We're not going to agree on this - a point, which is fundamental to the thread - so, there's a certain futility to this discussion.

I don't need to watch the fight again. I know what Smith did. No one has disputed it.

I don't care.

You know, this type of strawmanning is quite irksome. At what stage did I refer to Witherspoon as being shot to ****?

It's probably best we leave it there.

 

Smith also said on the interview:

"He hurt me the first time I fought him and I tried to pay him back, hit him with alot of overhand rights, and I wanted to hit him with the same punch and I did, and I hurt him and I kept following up."

Its not that he didn´t just jump on to blitz him, he wanted revenge and hurt him early from what I got. Caught him good and one led to another.

Witherspoon said to the question if his mind was elsewhere: "Yeah, but there´s no excuse, I´m a champion, but things during the week might have paid a good tribute to it, but he caught me good, he´s a good ??? strong *nodding*....his strategy was good and it worked for him, I wasn´t hurt that bad he just got me good and I went down three times."

He in fact by his words renounced any excuses.
What happened is that Smith caught him because of his revenge plan and fallowed up. Its absolutely disrespectful by any means to give Smith zero credit in such an attempt, like Witherspoon was trash that night.

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"Foreman has way better stoppages than Smith against better quality fighters and a much higher KO%. Smith could obviously bang but not much else. He was just a big heavy handed guy with a good chin. Any big hitter who decided to go all out in the 1st round against a Witherspoon who was apathetic and not trying may have won the title. Can't say the same for the prime undefeated version of Moorer."

Cobra for god sake, I´ve adressed that numerous of times now and you didn´t want to hear anything or whatelse! I´m sorry to tell you again this is no huge rift, 90s George only stopped four people with a name.

90s Foreman stopped 4 fighters out of ten with a name (

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,

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, Stewart,

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, Morrison,

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, Schulz, Grimsley, Savarese and Briggs, I´´ll exclude unwinning Holyfield). His quickest results were Cooney, Rod and Coetzer.
Again, Smith started late (age 27), lost unexpected fights and had like 5 years of "youth" to fight better opposition until the 90s. His best knockouts are over Weaver, Witherspoon and Bruno, which in fact is not miles away from Cooney, Rod, Coetzer and Moorer. Thats the names both of them stopped. Cooney, Rod, Coetzer and Moorer vs Witherspoon, Weaver and Bruno. Thats a gulf, or what?

No it isn´t. There is

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between the way you like to have it. Instead of comparing Smith - Witherspoon with Foreman - Moorer (like you posted), a better match would me Foreman-Moorer<->Smith-Bruno, both stopped after struggeling in the fight and win late in the bout by stoppage. Bruno of course with no title..
Witherspoon and Weaver are by no means worse than that retired drunkard and Rodriques who got stopped three times, by Holyfield close before the bout. Foreman has that advantage with Coetzer, which might be a very underrated stoppages compared to both these KO2s.

All of that is very debatable for me,

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The stats simply show that he wasn´t in the 90s. For me, Smith was heavy handed, but too hot and cold to make him an reasonable puncher on the avarage course and Foreman simply just had two quick stoppages, mixed with looses and controversial fights in like 100 rounds. I´ve adressed that also who Grimsley and Savarese got stopped against.

 

We come from "Moorer would do KO1 also" to "I know what Smith did. No one has disputed it." to "At what stage did I refer to Witherspoon as being shot to ****"
Whatever you want to call it, I´ll do not agree that a 29 years old Witherspoon in a training camp was in no way able to fight a boxer with less heavy hands than James Smith, when his debacle started by getting rocked. Someone might brake it down to 90% of "agree or disagree on just Witherspoon", but I believe its also a comparison of Smith and Moorer.

 

In which of my posts in this thread did I type that? There isn't one.

Misquotation doesn't serve anyone well, in a debate - especially, the person doing the misquoting.

Everyone who watched the fight saw what happened. So what? Who has disputed what happened?

You implied I had claimed Witherspoon was shot to ****, when I had not and still you won't correct your mistake. Instead, you add another misquotation (see above).

I fail to see what stringing together your misquotation of me, with a straightforward statement of fact, with my request for you to address, yet another misquotation, is supposed to mean. It doesn't remotely characterize my side of this discussion and, quite oppositely, just looks like a garbled lack of comprehension, on your part.

Everyone is entitled to their opinions.
Here are mine:

Witherspoon was significantly compromised going into the Smith (II) bout. Smith benefited from that, got a 'shock' victory, but never came close to replicating that apparent form.

For Witherspoon's part and to his relief, it freed him from the Kings and enabled him to take them on in court. That might not have been the wisest thing for him to do, since the battle was dragged out over years. But, another way of looking at it is that going through the courts was probably the easiest way he was going to clear $1M from Don King.

Moorer, at his best, would have been a match for Witherspoon at his best, and both were, by some distance, better than Smith, who got a timely second shot at Witherspoon and capitalized on it (Smith's only real moment in the sun and an overrated win).

I don't really care whether Moorer could have exactly replicated Smith's anomalous victory over Witherspoon, but I don't find the idea improbable, beyond reach. Either way - Moorer, along with plenty of other world class heavyweights would have beaten Witherspoon, on that particular night, and a stoppage win would have been likely. Like I've mentioned before, Witherspoon was there to lose.

Smith, for the most part, carried a puncher's chance into his contests, which is more a product of him getting his weight behind wild swings than any kind of cultivated technique. His punch selection, placement and accuracy can really be boiled down to a 'hit and hope' tactic.

Anyone who thinks Smith is comparable to Foreman is out to lunch.

I trust that is clear.

 

No, no lack of comprehension.
You wrote:

If "the same manner" is a stretchy term for what you wrote, fine. Moorer is not any heavyweight here? Fine too.
Smith stopped him in one round, so the chance of doing it in the same manner needs power. So I think it would need a heavy handed man like Ron Lyle, Shavers, Ruddock, Bruno, Lewis etc. to do that. Moorers quickest results were KO4 (Stewart) and KO5 (Cooper), which reasonable doesn´t make him the man do accomplish it.

We didn´t even see this Witherspoon box for more than one round that night. I see you´re more at he was "there to loose" than that he was "shot to ****". So there´s not that much to adress for me, with the difference that I wouldn´t sell Spoon too short because of that trouble, when he still had a camp for a big man also.
And yes like you said, Smith carried the punching abilities to do something like that. Like he carried the abilities to be dangerous in a fight with Ruddock. Hit and cope tactic takes it too far, he stated in that interview he wanted to hurt him like Spoon did to him. It lead to him nailing him so good, that he jumped on it of course.

 

Your rambling a fair bit now and it's not clear what some of your post is actually addressing.

For clarity: You completely misquoted me. I gave you a fair clarification, when you initially questioned the "in the same manner" comment, which you chose to disregard and twist into: "Moorer would do KO1 also". I never typed these words - period. This is just poor form, from you.

For extra clarity: the manner of Smith's victory over Spoon was a TKO (subject to a 3 knockdown Rule).


You strawmanned my argument, in regard to Witherspoon's condition and particularly his state of mind, going into that fight. Falsely equating the case I put with an imagined argument, in which I am supposed to have asserted that Witherspoon was "shot to ****". That's a strawman, which I can only assume you have used to avoid actually looking at the wealth of evidence concerning Witherspoon's out-of-the-ring issues, at the time.

Your rebuttal of the case made for Witherspoon's poor physical and mental conditioning is predicated entirely on Witherspoon having had a "camp".

OK - You can think that's a strong counter-case, if you want. I don't.

 

Witherspoon has one prime stoppage loss. Later stoppage losses in his 40s are irrelevant. He certainly seems less chinny than Moorer given he fought more good opponents and has fewer prime stoppage losses despite that.

The version of Foreman that stopped Moorer failed to stop any of his remaining opponentrs who included the likes of Grimsley and Savarese.