gates wrote:I saw both fights if Enery had not cut his or Clay did not cut his eye he would have won
If he had been more skilled, quicker, bigger and better able to take a punch he might have been better than Ali. But he wasn’t so he wasn’t. Enry gave it a good go in both fights but at best the fights were level when Ali stopped him. They are on youtube, watch them.
Interestingly he predicted he would beat Enry in 5 in the first fight and looked to be coasting in the first 4 rounds. In those days Ali was known to ensure his predictions would come true by carrying opponents. Did the referee stop the fights too early? No, they were fair stoppages before even half the fight was over. Is there any indication in Copper’s record, of being a good English heavyweight in an average era, that he could beat Ali? No. The best win of his career was against Folley on points, a defeat that Folley avenged with a KO in round 2.
Apart from that, every time Cooper stepped up in class, he lost, as his defeat to Johansson (KO in 5) and Patterson (KO in 4) indicate. Throw in defeats against B grade opponents like Erskine, Bygraves, Richardson etc and it shows Enry was a good solid English heavyweight, end of broadcast.
As for the punch, Ali was always pulling away from punches and leaning back and light on his feet so could be caught which Cooper did. Had the punch been 2 minutes earlier and Ali not landed on the ropes, who knows? But that’s coulda woulda shoulda. What did happen was Ali then came out in the next round and stopped Cooper, in the round he predicted. Cooper’s punch wasn’t half as powerful as Frasier’s in 1971 and Ali was down for 2 seconds from that too. Whatever you think of Ali as a fighter he could take a punch.
gates wrote:
and as for beating Sunny Listen we all know that was a set up . You would never have knocked that man down with a feather he did , did he that fight was a fix both fights were fixed thats why he was killed in an alley
The second fight KO looked dubious I’ll grant you that but the first fight was on the level. Liston was a mob fighter. There was no way they could control Ali who was under the influence of the Nation of Islam so why would they throw the HW championship of the world. It is the richest prize in sport, how much could you make fixing a fight in comparison? And BTW Liston wasn’t killed in an alley.
gates wrote:
Also Clay never had a fruit & veg shop that was open again on the Monday after Henry Copper was one of our greatest sports men fighting for peanuts still operating a shop . Who out of all the boxers has ever done that .
OK in so far as it is relevant I’ll go on the record and say that Cooper was the greatest ever heavyweight who also owned a fruit and veg shop. Also you kind of make my point there, how come Cooper was fighting for peanuts if he was the equal or better than Ali?
gates wrote:
Clay was given the tittle and could not even knock out Patterson even when he was falling in front of him from exhaustion .
I assume you are talking about the first fight when Patterson lasted until the 12th rather than the second when Ali stopped him in the 7th. If you knew your boxing you would know that Ali deliberately carried Patterson to torture him because he kept calling him Clay before the fight. He did the same against Terrill. It was very cruel but neither was Willie Pep but they were still great fighters. That said Ali’s ko % is much higher than Cooper’s against a far higher quality of opponent.
gates wrote:
Dont knock our greats that in them days put up class for penny's . The statue is well deserved same it could not of been in front of his old shop.
I’m not knocking him, he well deserves his statue but I was just picking up on your statement that Cooper could have been HW champion except for cuts. That is why I listed Marciano, Patterson, Johannson, Liston and Ali. These were the champions while Enry was a contender. Who could he beat? He lost to Patterson, Johannson and Ali, Marciano or Liston? His manager Jim Wicks avoided both because he knew that they wouldn’t just beat Cooper, they would hurt him, maybe permanently. Wicks was a good manager for Cooper because he cared about him. I like many liked Frank Bruno but I never deluded myself that he was a grade A heavyweight or stood an earthly against Tyson.
gates wrote:
As for Clay i still used to get up & watch the fixed fights some were good with foreman & Fraser
So every fight of Ali’s was fixed? Him and Fraser sure dished out a lot of punishment in fixed fights! If you knew anything about boxing you would know that Frasier hated Ali and would have never thrown a fight against anyone especially Ali.