I made the article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Dokes_vs._Mike_Weaver Do you guys think Weaver could had won the first fight if A) he was allowed to keep on fighting and B) the fight was not fixed?
The fight was not fixed. Duk Koo Kim had just died in the ring and there was heightened awareness to not let it happen again, at least so soon after. If there was a fix, then Weaver must have been in on it because he managed to get knocked down and then let Dokes throw 20-something punches (yes a bunch of them landed) while sitting on the ropes without throwing a single punch back or trying to clinch or doing one single thing to signal to the ref and the world that he was all right. If he was OK, throw back. Clinch. Get off the ropes. Anything. I coached my fighters on this — the ref is not a mind-reader. He cannot tell if you’re OK. You have to do something to make him KNOW you’re OK. So don’t lay on the ropes absorbing punches, not throw back and tell me later how you were OK … if you’re OK, fight back. Either nobody coached Weaver on this or he was out of it and couldn’t fight back. To think he could get knocked down and then absorb more punches without throwing back or doing anything else and it not get stopped ignores that he got stopped on his feet by Larry Holmes doing the same thing after getting knocked down. Was it premature? Maybe, a bit. But it’s all on Weaver for putting himself in a situation where a ref has to read his mind. Same stoppage happens in the fifth or eighth round and I don’t think we’re still talking about it.