Muhammad Ali (56-5, 37 KOs) is widely viewed as the greatest heavyweight of all time. During his long and illustrious career, Ali has the unique distinction of being the only three time lineal heavyweight champion in the rich history of professional boxing.
Heavyweight legend Larry Holmes has heaped a ton of praise on new heavyweight star Anthony Joshua while at the same time he has surely annoyed a whole lot of Mike Tyson fans. Speaking recently and quoted by The Express, Holmes came out with the claim that prime-for-prime Joshua would KO Tyson.
In the list of infamous, never to be forgotten fights, the world heavyweight title fight taht took place 35 years ago next month – between defending champ Larry Holmes and unimaginably tough challenger Randy “Tex” Cobb – holds its own distinctive place in fans’ memories.
Spain’s Alfredo Evagelista is, along with Earnie Shavers, Larry Holmes and Leon Spinks, one of the last surviving former fighters to have gone toe-to-toe with an ageing, yet still hugely influential Muhammad Ali.
As with Shavers and Spinks, Evangelista is best known for his fight with Ali. It was back in May of 1977, some forty years ago, when a 22 year old Evangelista entered the ring against the 35 year old Ali. A huge underdog, the challenger who was born in Uruguay surprised quite a few people by pushing Ali all the way to the final bell, losing a 15-round unanimous decision in Landover, Maryland.
Rummy’s Corner proudly presents another edition of a new ongoing series that will explore some of the greatest bouts in the rich history of professional boxing. This week’s second installment of “Classic Fight Recap” features the epic fifteen round heavyweight championship contest that took place on June 9, 1978, between WBC heavyweight champion Ken Norton (40-4-0) and undefeated challenger Larry Holmes (27-0-0), which took place in Las Vegas, Nevada.
During his Hall of Fame career, Larry Holmes was like the Rodney Dangerfield of boxing – he got no respect. In recent years Holmes has finally started getting some of the much deserved respect for his amazing career and accomplishments. Holmes’ long reign had the unfortunate distinction of falling in between two of the most beloved heavyweight champions in boxing history – Muhammad Ali and Mike Tyson. While Ali and Tyson were high profile controversial figures during the peaks of their respective careers, Holmes quietly carved out a more dominant reign as heavyweight champion than either of them. Holmes has been grossly overlooked and unappreciated by many boxing observers for a very long time, and even today when he is just beginning to receive his just dues, some factions continue to underrate this skills, heart, accomplishment, and longevity.
VERONA, NY (June 4, 2014) — Turning Stone hosted “Kings of the Ring: A Conversation with Mike Tyson and Larry Holmes” today to promoted this week’s ESPN Friday Night Fights (see fact sheet below), promoted by Iron Mike Productions, at the resort casino in upstate New York.
Longtime sports columnist for the Syracuse Post-Standard and Syracuse.com, Bud Poliguin, served as the moderator, asking the two Hall of Famers and world heavyweight champions a series of questions, before the floor was opened for the many fans in attendance to ask Tyson and Holmes questions.
by Geoffrey Ciani – Over the course of a sixteen month period beginning in June 2009, I conducted a series of surveys that all began with a very simple question: Who are the ten best heavyweights of all time? While contemplating my own list of top heavyweight pugilists, I decided gathering the input of others might help display a more accurate portrayal of what a ‘true’ top 10 list should look like. Now of course this is not an exact science by any means. In fact, quite the opposite, it is an extremely subjective topic that is often skewed by personal bias, differences of opinion, individual tastes and preferences, and most importantly the absence of a universally agreed upon criteria with which to judge past fighters. Even with these inherent obstacles playing their natural role, however, we can still establish some degree of consensus.
The guidelines were simple. I had every person who voluntarily participated in each survey provide me with a chronological list of who they considered to be the ten best (heavyweights, middleweights, etc) in boxing history. Ties were not permitted, just a straight-forward list from one to ten. I then used a weighted-points system to assign values to fighters based on where they appeared on each individual’s list. First place votes received 25 points. Second place votes were worth 15 points, third place votes were 12, and fourth and fifth place votes were worth 10 and 8 points respectively. After that, the point differential was constant, with sixth place votes getting 5 points, seventh place votes getting 4, eighth getting 3, ninth place 2, and tenth place 1.