Cooper gets forgotten, he was one of the guys who fought similar to tyson and was a good fighter. His Holyfield knockdown was why the idiot boxing press thought that Holyfield would lose to Tyson, not knowing that the Holyfield who'd show up for Mike would be a totally different
one of the worst as far as that. Just a mental thing, looked sensational and kayoed every single guy right up to Buster Douglas, then struggles with two old men before losing to a peak Bowe. Give him something to prove and you have a dangerous fighter, give him a fight he's supposed to win and he'll make it tough for himself and make excuses afterwards about how he had a flu, hurt his shoulder, had hepititis, had a hurt back, or a hole in his heart. One great thing about Mike Tyson, when he was supposed to win big in his prime, he almost always won big, none of this knockdown drag em out brawls.
Ring Magazine had Moorer in the top 5 every year from 1992-1998. He was #4 every year except for 1997 where he was #3.
other than Holyfield, the guy didnt really beat a single world class heavyweight fighter, and Holyfield was terrible that night, stumbling around
They may've had him Top 5 rated all of those years but he wasn't really one of the major players for long. We know this because he was KO'd by a 45 year old Foreman only 6 months after he upset Holyfield. Then he lost the Holyfield rematch by stoppage a few years later. He also wouldn't have beaten any of the other major players in Lewis, Bowe or Tyson.
he didn't want to fight any of them, imagine picking a grandad as your voluntary defence, and then losing
In other words, how could he have legitimately been ranked Top 5 for so long when he refused to fight the other 3 biggest names of the era? Makes no sense. It'd be like including Ruiz in the Usyk/Fury/Joshua/Wilder era.
I'm sure he was, bowe too, the boxing press has an agenda, they are there to sell the sport and it's fighters. I have seen that since I was a kid who grew up reading hundreds of boxing mags.
nah, that's typical boxing business. If you get the title you try to take a soft fight to make a few bucks before you risk it all again, that's not uncommon, Riddick Bowe fought Jesse Ferguson and Michael Dokes before rematching with Holyfield. That's smart business wise and fighters are typically passive enough to leave that stuff to the Rock Newman's of the world. One thing we have to give credit to Lennox Lewis for was he said right from the start of his reign, "I don't want no Mickey Mouse fighters" and he proved it. No heavyweight, not even Ali was as aggressive about finding the best to fight.
Sure they were, but I think there was more at play there, you have to remember he also looked like a journeyman against Bert Cooper. Holyfield was flakey. Ali in his second incarnation made tons of fights harder than they should have been for the same reasons (probably) just not being ready upstairs and in Ali's case, it was no secret that he just stopped training for most of those years, or training like a man in his position should be. That was tragic in that he took all that punishment that he wouldn't have had to take if he was in A-1 condition for every fight. His excuse was that had he trained for a Bob Foster or a Jurgen Blin like he did for a Foreman or Frazier that he'd have been dead by the time he got to the Foreman fight. Just an excuse, he just got lazy like all old athletes do. Facts are that he was not in condition for most of his fights in the seventies and it hurts his legacy. People are still online today talking about, "how can he be the greatest when he lost to Norton 3 times and Leon Spinks and got gift decisions all throughout his career?" Only hurt himself.
