Boxing history articles
Copyright 2016 Ron Lipton “THE BURNED HAND TEACHES BEST.” GIARDELLO V CARTER TRAINING CAMP “I … read more
It really was 30 long years ago this week (November 22) when a young, soon to peak Mike Tyson made boxing history by becoming, at the age of 20, the youngest ever claimant of a world heavyweight title.
Tyson, who had been a pro for just 20 months, challenged WBC champ Trevor Berbick in Las Vegas and those in attendance witnessed a quite brutal coronation.
Mike Tyson? Wladimir and Vitali Klitschko? Joe Louis? Lennox Lewis? Rocky Marciano? Any other heavyweight you care to mention! Would the Muhammad Ali of 50 years ago today – when he was every bit an unhittable, lightening-fast, lethal-punching fighting machine against Cleveland Williams – have beaten any of them?
Historians call it Muhammad Ali’s peak performance; his defining, shining moment of true brilliance in a career filled with majesty. This is the Ali-Cleveland Williams fight from 50 years ago: November 14th 1966. “Ali never danced like that again,” one writer wrote. “That version of Ali would have beaten any heavyweight in history,” a number of experts have claimed.
50 years ago, 1966, the world was being dazzled, baffled and entertained by a heavyweight champion who fought like no heavyweight before him. Muhammad Ali, aged 24 and approaching his absolute peak, had won the crown two years earlier and he had made six retentions since shocking the greatly feared Sonny Liston.
Amazingly – truly amazingly when we look back today – the jury was still out, at least partially, on how good Ali was; or if he was even a “real” fighter. The sage old timers were appalled at the manner in which Ali held his hands dangerously low and worse, pulled back from punches instead of slipping them in the traditional manner. Also, Ali’s self-proclaimed prettiness bothered the old school: what would happen if the pretty boy had to take a shot, a real shot, to that beautiful face?
Imagine how highly heavyweight warrior Joe Frazier would be rated today if he had retired after he had, as he himself put it, “closed the butterfly’s lips” in March of 1971. Often in boxing, it’s crucial, legacy-wise, how a fighter leaves the sport. Too often a once indestructible fighting machine becomes a mere mortal due to the passing of years and the number of hard fights endured.
But heavyweight legend Joe Frazier – who sadly passed away five years ago today – was never going to call it a day after scoring the biggest, most impressive win of his entire career. It was of course March of ’71 when Frazier met Muhammad Ali in a Fight of The Century that lived up to ALL the hype and its lofty billing, and Joe, then aged 27 and at his blistering, unstoppable peak at 26-0 as a pro had truly conquered the world. Why – how – could he possibly walk away?”Smokin’” Joe had plenty of fight left in him, even if the titanic battle with Ali had taken its toll.
Mike Tyson and Cus D’Amato – two legends of the boxing world who are forever … read more
June 2003, The Staples Centre, Los Angeles. The date and venue are familiar to fight fans, heavyweight fight fans especially. Why? Because we saw a great action fight between two huge heavies, both well above the mid-240-pound range, we saw blood and gore, we saw huge bombs landed, we saw heart and courage on the line, and we were left wanting to see a rematch. The task today is quite simple: name a world heavyweight title fight since that has ticked that many boxes.
But the biggest reason fans still talk about this fight, won by Lewis via corner retirement on the part of Klitschko at the end of the sixth round, is because we all wonder what might have happened; what would have happened.
It wasn’t Floyd Mayweather’s most thrilling fight, nor was it one of his biggest, but a decade ago (Nov 4, 2006), “Pretty Boy,” as Mayweather was still calling himself at the time, scored a good win that led to a genuine super-fight. In November of 2006 at Las Vegas’ Mandalay Bay, a 29-year-old, 36-0 Mayweather boxed his third fight as a welterweight and he picked up both the lineal and the WBC 147-pound titles.
Sometimes in heavyweight boxing a fighter, with just one win, arrives on the world stage and captures the attention of anyone and everyone interested in boxing in a massive way. This was exactly what happened on this day, Halloween, in 1992. Lennox Lewis may already have been known to a good share of fight fans, due to his winning the Olympic gold medal in 1988, but his performance on this night really catapulted the Brit to superstardom.
In the 2000s, they engaged in one of the most fierce, genuinely hate-filled rivalries in lower weight boxing history. Super-bantamweights/ featherweights /super-featherweights Marco Antonio Barrera and Erik Morales went to war three times – the first battle, from February of 2000 being recognised as one of the greatest fights in modern day boxing history – and they came to blows outside of the ring also. Simply put, these two did not like each other.