Who ranks higher as a heavyweight, Joe Frazier or Mike Tyson?

Uh jimmy had like 8 fights when he fought shavers who was steamrolling through the division with something like 40+ knockouts. It was horrible matchmaking.

Spinks beat an inactive alcoholic version of Cooney. Nobody takes that fight very seriously. Spinks resume at HW is as thin as paper. Even his crowning moment against Holmes, that was against an aging somewhat gunshy champ who many other people could have dethroned that night.

 

Self serving tasks aren’t heroic. Let’s not go further down the hole and derail the thread.

 

Shavers was streamrolling through rubbish competition. His record was as padded as one can be. Soon after the Ellis victory he would lose to Bob Stallings, whose record was 21-24 at the time. Cooney was definitely faded but guaranteed he wouldn't have lost to the fringiest of fighters even at that stage of his career, and he still possessed deadly power.

I agree Spinks had a paper-thin heavyweight resume but that victory over Holmes (who was unbeaten and the 6-to-1 favorite, mind you) is greater than anything Ellis ever did. Spinks out-jabbed arguably the greatest jabber in heavyweight history, and proved himself a formidable heavyweight in that fight alone. I don't agree that Holmes was as faded as people say -- he fought a bad fight because he was befuddled by Michael's awkwardness. He came more prepared the second fight and showed his old self by outclassing Spinks, despite the nonsensical decision.

 

Shavers having a padded record doesn't change the fact young was an 8 fight novice going up against a dangerous puncher.

Cooney was an alcoholic and inactive. Not sure what you're objecting to, this was not a credible opponent.

 

You got the wrong Jimmy, partner. We're talking about Jimmy Ellis.

Fair enough, although the same alcoholic, inactive Cooney beat Eddie Gregg a year prior, who I would say is way better than Bob freaking Stallings. Credible win or not, it proved Spinks could hang with a big banger. I'd pick Spinks over Shavers 10/10 times, to be quite honest.

 

But spinks himself got destroyed in 1 round by Tyson. Obviously Tyson is a higher caliber fighter than shavers, but it seems a bit unfair to blast Ellis for losing in a brutal 1 sided early fashion and then gloss over spinks' equally devastating early blowout.

Ellis was past his prime and his career going nowhere while spinks was right in his prime and undefeated when Tyson knocked him out.

 

Well, the topic of discussion was comparing Ellis to Spinks and which of the two was the better win. The fact that Tyson destroyed Spinks in one round is huge considering Spinks beat Holmes and proved his ability to take a punch in the Cooney fight. Frazier destroyed Ellis who was good but never beat someone on the level of Holmes and was later obliterated in one round by a guy who would subsequently lose to a *very* fringe fighter in Bob Stallings. I think Tyson's win over Spinks was better, which has been my contention all along.

 

But Frazier beat Ellis before shavers did. The Ellis Frazier beat was a much better fighter than the one shavers beat.

Similar to how the Cooney Holmes beat was better than the Cooney Spinks beat.

In other words what happened to Ellis after losing to Frazier isn't very relevant to the value of Frazier's win over Ellis.

 

This is exactly why Tyson's win over Spinks is problematic. It greatly flatters to deceive.

Holmes was done; both fights were dire - and, still, Spinks didn't deserve the decision in the rematch.
Cooney's performance was even worse; bordering on tragic.
But, on paper, Spinks had Holmes and Cooney on his ledger, going into certain defeat against Tyson.

And, if you think the Cooney fight proved Spinks' ability to take a punch, then you perhaps need to watch the fight again. Cooney never once connected with anything of note. He barely threw anything at all, after the first round.

 

Much better in what way? Wasn't it the Shavers loss that sparked Jimmy's downward spiral? Ellis seemed his normal self against Earnie until he got clobbered by that right uppercut. It was after that fight that he started losing regularly.

 

You make good points, but I don't agree that Holmes was "done". He was not a corpse in that ring -- he was still a *very* formidable fighter who would defeat most other fighters, in my opinion. Spinks just came with the business and was as active and mobile as anyone Holmes had ever faced up until that point. Larry was perplexed by Spinks's awkwardness and you can tell by his body language during the bout. I think even Larry at his absolute best would struggle with Spinks.

And while you're correct that Cooney didn't land many punches, the ones that he did land (and he did land a couple solid ones) didn't seem to phase Spinks. Compare that to, say, George Foreman who seemed rattled whenever Gerry landed a solid hook on him.

 

Ellis was the newly crowned wba champion 28 years old in his prime coming off the biggest win of his career before the Frazier fight.

He was 33 against Shavers with more losses and much more shopworn.

 

Wait what? What are you even implying with this? Spinks boxed circles around Cooney and barely got hit.

Spinks and Foreman are not in the same stratosphere of durability. Foreman literally walked through bombs from Morrison, Briggs, Stewart, etc. Some of biggest hitters in the division history and didn't take a knee, let alone got stopped.. Most people remember spinks for being steam rolled in 1 round.

 

My point was that Spinks was more durable than people let on. He was tagged a couple of times by Cooney and it didn't seem to phase him -- the same Cooney who was able to shake Big George up with the same punch a few years later. I'm not saying that Spinks took a shot better than George, but rather that it proves Spinks had a decent set of whiskers which is a credit to Tyson that he was able to stop him so quickly. Perhaps you're right though that Cooney never really landed solidly on Spinks and I'm misremembering.

I think at this point I'm going to agree to disagree. We could argue until the cows come home and I don't think our opinions will be swayed. It was fun, though.

 

All Greats will show some class, even if only in the form of a mere distant echo. Larry was able to do that, despite having been on the wane for a few years since Cooney

Read any quality report on the Holmes/Williams bout, and you might just be reminded about how far Holmes had slipped by then. Holmes was openly and actively seeking the least possible threat for the most reward. There had even been talk that Holmes had considered offering Kip Kane a shot FFS!

The Williams fight was way closer than the scorecards would suggest (except for the card of Roth) and Williams had supposedly been one of those low-risk / high-reward bouts, which turned out to hurt Holmes physically, more than it had hurt Williams. Even Futch would say: "That's the most punishment Larry's taken in a fight since I've been with him."

The writing was on the wall for Larry. Spinks just got offered and took the opportunity that a good number of other Heavyweights at the time could have taken and made work for them - and have probably looked better in doing so.

I disagree. Holmes was a 35-year-old, jaded Champion, whose skills and experience were, by then, writing checks his body wasn't able to so readily cash. His speed, reflexes, timing and accuracy had become dulled, or gone off altogether. His legs were tired; his movement was labored and he had become flat-footed.

I very much doubt Spinks would have been able to live with a prime Holmes.

Cooney landed nothing clean. It's a moot point, as far as demonstrating proof of Spinks' durability.