January 2002 - July 2006 - The Jerry Quarry Foundation

guys in it was staggering in its arrogance. Given that Frazier had been decked
by Bruce and Bonavena, Joe was no shoe-in against those guys. Of course,
after he won the title we had the farces that were the Daniels, Stander and
Ellis fights. Ellis hadn't won his last four fights but Joe opted to take him
on. There were lots of other guys out there. Shavers, Lyle, Norton, Mac Foster,
et al.Joe only had 37 fights. In his last 10 fights, he lost four of
them. The five fights he had against Top Ten Greats (Ali and Foreman), he lost
four of them and was stopped three times. Against Foreman he couldn't stand up
longer than 45 seconds before falling down again.You can't argue with
facts, Howard.SteveWhile I think you are wrong, I won't argue
with you. I have too much respect for your past and that overrides any urge to
set you straight about Kent being wrong and unfair. |
|3/5/05 04:31:02 PM|angelo|dc||funktron@yahoo.com||||10|I do respect Kent as a
journalist and enjoy his writing here and on the Eastside site. I do disagree
with him though about Frazier. Perhaps most glaring of all is the fact that
Frazier had under 40 fights and lost 4 of them and had a draw---not a great
winning percentage considering it's relatively few fights, including just as
many "soft touches" on his schedule as anyone else (probably more). It's one
thing to say he had a rough and tumble style and that shortened his career and
another thing to say that his "in prime" period was short---but the record and
timeline do not lie. His greatness, if it exists, is based primarily on one
fight (Ali, 1971) and especially one knockdown in that fight, and in my opinion,
greatness that doesn't make. You could also make a case that his loss in
Manilla showed signs of greatness---but I think like Norton's loss to Holmes, it
showed courage, determination, guts and yes, brutal skills, but not greatness.
In individual sports, as opposed to team sports, the greats don't just come
close, they win. Yes, Frazier had the huge win over Ali, but suffered after
affects from that fight that in my mind, shortened his title reign and career.
He also had two crushing knockout losses to Foreman where he never got
untracked---and in the first loss, didn't show any sign at all, not for a
second, of even being competitive. Bobick was KO'ed by Norton, finished on his
feet, but still became a laughing stock. Meanwhile, Frazier looked drunk, dizzy
and ate canvas about a dozen times against Foreman and no one said a word. It's
well documented that Ali has Parkinsons, probably expedited by boxing and surely
contributed to by the fights with Frazier---but it didn't stop him from winning
back his title, holding it awhile and fighting the long line of
contenders/challengers that for some reasons, whatever those reasons were, Joe
never quite managed to fight himself.|
|3/5/05 05:23:25 PM|Fan|Fandom||Fan@Fandom.com||||10|What does employment status
have to do with boxing knowledge? Noam, are you saying that Frazier fans are
unemployed as a whole and therefore can actually use facts to back up their
arguments because they have more time? If this is your premise, it's one of the
most asinine things I have ever seen posted here. If it's not your premise
please clarify.|
|3/5/05 05:25:13 PM|Fan|Fandom||Fan@Fandom.com||||10|Noam, I see you said some
of the groupies not all. I still want to know what you meant though.|
|3/5/05 05:29:15 PM|Massimo |Roma||4||||10|The Ali-Frazier fights are the Mc
Enroe-Borg of boxing. Since these two fighters have quitted their careers, maybe
we have no hope to see anything even close again. Ali-Frazier 1,3 are both in my
top 3 heavyweight fights of all time.I think it's not a coincidence that
Frazier was involved in both these fights (or in both of these fights). Joe
Frazier was a decent fighter. In particular Ali'-Frazier 3 is like the Borg-Mc
Enroe Wimbledon final in 1980. When tennis was a great sport... And when boxing
was a great sport.I long for yesterday.|
|3/5/05 05:30:18 PM|Kent|La Habra, Ca||kentallenent@aol.com||||10|Noam, that is
flat out not true that I was rude to you after Forest's Job comment about me.
It was after you made the "balls" comment that I responded in kind and YOU OWE