A Letter To Ali

[brownpimp88]

It's not like benitez was shot either, when he fought hamsho. He only had two losses and he was using hamsho as a stepping stone to get a fight with hagler down the line. Its too bad hamsho ended benitez's run as a credible fighter cuz his career went downhill after this fight.

Would u admit that guys like rocky graziano, randy turpin and bobo olson are overrated. They are in the hall of fame, but i wouldnt use the word "great" to describe them.

Bennie Briscoe, charley burley and hamsho are proly the 3 best to never win the strap at 160.

[SABBATH]

Being much more of a crowd pleaser than was Eddie Mustafa, Saad seems to have the higher standing of the two Muhammads nowadays. But if you had that same opinion 25 years ago when both were holding the titles, you're very likely in the minority with that opinion. Not a huge difference between the two from the boxing public, but by virtue of his win over Saad, as well as his generally percieved to be better overall skills at the time, Eddie was given slightly more credit in the boxing mags (and on tv) as the better light heavyweight of the two during that time.

Don't forget that these two were tentatively scheduled to unify the title in February 1981 as part of Harold Smith's MAPS "THIS IS IT" card at Madison Square Garden.

Other fights off the top of my head (it's been a long time so I'm going by memory) were Hearns-Benitez, Cooney-Norton, Pryor-Mamby, and Arguello-Kenty.

Eddie vs Saad held the most appeal for me on that card and I was leaning towards Eddie (ever so slightly) to repeat his prior win over Saad. Saad always came back, but never against a puncher like Eddie.

Eddie vs Qawi is another interesting potential match-up that unfortunately never occurred. I remember Qawi interrupting the Eddie-Spinks II cancellation press conference with alot of pushing, restraining and trash talk between Eddie and Dwight.

Apparently that led to nothing.

[Yogi]

It's not like benitez was shot either, when he fought hamsho. He only had two losses and he was using hamsho as a stepping stone to get a fight with hagler down the line. Its too bad hamsho ended benitez's run as a credible fighter cuz his career went downhill after this fight.

Would u admit that guys like rocky graziano, randy turpin and bobo olson are overrated. They are in the hall of fame, but i wouldnt use the word "great" to describe them.

Bennie Briscoe, charley burley and hamsho are proly the 3 best to never win the strap at 160.

Hey, there's probably only a few people in the whole world who got a better view of a "shot" Benitez than I did, as I was sitting ringside for his last(?) fight against that clubfighter in Winnipeg, and uh...One of the worst memories of my life as a boxing fan.

The Benitez that Hamsho fought & defeated was likely slipping at that point in time and was also fighting in a weight division that he probably had no business being in, but he was still a high enough quality of fighter to say that Hamsho deserves his share of credit for winning that one...especially in the manner in which he did so, as from memory, that was a one-sided win by Hamsho as he basically outmuscled & outmauled for much of the fight with Benitez' back against the ropes/corner.

Ok, in order to answer your question regarding Graziano, Turpin, and Olson being overrated...where are they rated?

I don't think I've ever found somebody who's rated them on a all-time top 10 list, or even a top 20...Nobody that I've encountered considers them a "great" middleweights on par with the other great middleweights in history, although all three of them accomplished things that are plenty worthy of great respect, and each are worthy of rememberance through the ages, whether that be in the IBHOF or not...

But if you're asking me where I'd rate them...I don't know for sure, but off the top, I think I'd personally have to take an all-time middleweight about 50 deep before I'd find room for those guys.

Burley's one of the very best to never win the title in this division, but I can't quite agree with the other two (less so on Briscoe, who I've always been a big fan of)...Holman Williams, Mike Gibbons, and Les Darcy are just a few that have a better historical standing to me than does Briscoe or Hamsho in this division.

[Yogi]

Don't forget that these two were tentatively scheduled to unify the title in February 1981 as part of Harold Smith's MAPS "THIS IS IT" card at Madison Square Garden.

Other fights off the top of my head (it's been a long time so I'm going by memory) were Hearns-Benitez, Cooney-Norton, Pryor-Mamby, and Arguello-Kenty.

Eddie vs Saad held the most appeal for me on that card and I was leaning towards Eddie (ever so slightly) to repeat his prior win over Saad. Saad always came back, but never against a puncher like Eddie.

Eddie vs Qawi is another interesting potential match-up that unfortunately never occurred. I remember Qawi interrupting the Eddie-Spinks II cancellation press conference with alot of pushing, restraining and trash talk between Eddie and Dwight.

Apparently that led to nothing.

Yeah, I certainly do remember that card being talked about, as that potential card was HUGE news back then and got more than it's share of ink in the mags and such...

I think you pegged the card too from how I remember it, with Pryor/Mamby the only one that I can't recall to memory (that's not to say that it wasn't planned for that event...just don't have a memory of it, that's all). An Eddie/Saad fight would have been of the the two or three most appealling matchups on that card for me (****, who are we kidding...they're ALL very appealling), but knowing how big a fan I was of Arguello and knowing my then-overrated opinion of Kenty, that's probably the one that I was most looking forward to on that card.

Hey, did they show that press conferance on the television that night of the scheduled Spinks/Mustafa rematch?

I'm just asking because I don't recall too many details in regards to that scheduled rematch between Spinks & Eddie...I remember it was a Friday night, just because I/we were at the age when Friday nights actually meant something to us, and a fight's cancellation could go a long way in ruining that. But beyond that, I don't recall too much from the television, except tuning in, seeing the names up on the screen with the ring in the background, and immediately having the announcers describe the cancellation of it being a title fight due to Eddie being "overweight", as well as them then saying that a ten round non-title fight was being considered and was based entirely on Spinks' approval...A wait and a total cancellation by the announcers soon followed.

[SABBATH]

Hey, did they show that press conferance on the television that night of the scheduled Spinks/Mustafa rematch?

I'm just asking because I don't recall too many details in regards to that scheduled rematch between Spinks & Eddie....

The press conference wasn't shown but I read about it.

Eddie has actually taken Spinks to court to get his rematch and title shot. Eddie had weighed 3 lbs over the limit the day of their first fight and having to shed those pounds had weakened him and cost him the fight according to Eddie.

For fight #2 Eddie had weighed 175 the day before the fight on his own scales. The night before the fight he went with a DC boxing Commisioner to weigh himself on the official scales and found they were locked up and undergoing calibrations. These were the same scales used for Joe Louis vs Buddy Baer in 1941. Eddie claims he ate nothing from the day before the fight until the next day's weigh in.

The next day Eddie officially weighed 177 1/2 while Spinks weighed 174 1/4 (high for Spinks who usually weighed around 172-173 for title fights and even as low as 170 for the David Sears defence). Eddie refused to lose any more weight and stated that the scales were inaccurate. The scales were later tested by Bert Sugar using bags of flour and were found to be be inaccurate by approximately 2 lbs.

The two fighters initially agreed to a 10 round non title fight with their purses being cut in half (now $500,000 to $75,000. Spinks spoke to trainer Eddie Futch who told him that Eddie would present "more of a problem" and "would have been stronger at 177 1/2" and advised Spinks not to fight and Spinks took that advice and Butch Lewis scheduled a press conference to be held at 7:00 PM the night of the fight to announce the cancellation.

Things got goofy when Eddie showed up at the press conference accompanied by a Brooklyn biker gang going by the name of the 'Assasins'. Eddie attempted to tell the media that Spinks has no heart and Butch told Eddie to leave. Eddie told Butch to "get outta my face" while Security attempted to intervene and Butch's father John who was pushed took a swing and decked an officer. Butch jumped up on a chair to see what happened then jumped back down while Eddie continued to yell at Butch. The Assasins tried to intervene while Eddie's mother tried to pull Eddie back. Dwight Qawi who was with Butch then jumped in pointed his finger at Eddie and warned him to get away. Hotel management then called the police who showed up and restored order by removing Eddie from the press conference.

"Muhammad does not deserve a ****in' fight. I'd be stooping to his level." -Michael Spinks at the press conference

[Yogi]

Great post, my friend, and thanks for all that.

And you know, out of all that the only thing that clicked on in the ole' memory bank was your mention of Eddie's relationship with those gang members, because I do have a vague memory/reminder of reading the magazines afterwards with that being mentioned.

Like you said in an earlier post, Eddie vs. Qawi would have been interesting and best on best I'm really not sure who I would have favoured, although I think Eddie certainly showed the skills capable of the using the same gameplan Spinks pulled off against Qawi with sucess, and that's by using a patient & disciplined outside game behind a consistent jab and occasional hard right hand counter to keep him honest...But then again, Eddie had a common tendency to just give rounds away by not working nearly hard enough, and that may be the difference in the outcome of what I would view as a close distance fight.

[brownpimp88]

Technically, greg haugen has done enough to make the hall of fame. I mean he beat camacho, pazienzia, an old mancini, jimmy paul and a decent fighters like jacobsen. Graziano and turpin are really on his level.

Hell, pernell whitaker has defeated many guys that have a shot at making the hall of fame. He already beat ATGs like chavez and nelson, ramirez is in the hall of fame. Mcgirt, vasquez, paez, roger mayweather, haugen all have a shot at getting in.

[QueensburyRules]

I am in the process of writing a letter that will be sent to Muhammad Ali. I feel startstruck just writing it and have no clue what to put in it.

I assume that some of you guys have written to boxers/famous people before.

Please could you guys help me along with it so I don't sound like an idiot.

All help appreciated.

- -Maybe Ali answers in his afterlife.

He was too swamped in real life, but he'd yak with everyone in his spars where he held his court for the people.