sport news The Cooney and Holmes show that divided a nation: Forty years on, boxing ... trends now
To this day any chat with Larry Holmes inevitably turns to Las Vegas and October 2, 1980, when he administered the most dreadful of the beatings deemed to have inflicted Parkinson’s on Muhammad Ali.
It is a subject to be approached with the utmost tact. ‘So, what are your thoughts after all these years about that night at Caesars Palace?’
The pause is lengthy, the stare searching. Then Holmes, on a tour celebrating the 40th anniversary of his controversial fight with Gerry Cooney, puts hand on heart and says: ‘It still burns inside me, right here. He was my friend. Neither of us wanted that fight.’
It is forty years since Gerry Cooney's controversial fight with Larry Holmes in Las Vegas
Ali had been warned of his first signs of dementia. Holmes, who had once been his sparring partner, had long since succeeded his idol as world heavyweight champion.
Both knew the danger for Ali. But when promoter Don King came calling, the money talked. It was $8million which Ali badly needed and $6million for Holmes, who had no option but to defend his title.
As soon as it became obvious that Ali, for all his shows of defiance, had not even so much as a puncher’s chance Holmes began calling on the referee to stop it. Come the tenth of the scheduled 15 rounds, with Ali lolling helpless on the ropes, those entreaties were heeded by Muhammad’s corner as they signalled the only stoppage of his career.
Holmes wept as his hand was raised. Now he says: ‘We remained friends until he died. Saw each other whenever possible. Spoke when we could. One of the finest men I’ve known.’
Such is often the way with boxers, especially after they share historic clashes in the ring. As it is now with Holmes and Gerry Cooney, who met in a fight which caught up both of them in America’s racial divide.
The Larry and Gerry show is on a speaking tour to celebrate the 40th anniversary of their thunderous collision in that same temporary casino arena on June 11 1982.
Holmes and Cooney met in a fight which caught up both of them in America’s racial divide
We talk on the UK leg of that journey towards Saturday’s due date of June 11. Cooney, the naturally quick-witted entertainer who has turned that valiant defeat into a successful media life after heavy punching. Holmes the brooding presence which is mostly mischievous but still fuelled in part by gnawing resentment that by being known as Ali’s help-mate he is not always given the recognition his own greatness deserves.
‘It made me very proud,’ says Cooney, ‘to go 13 rounds before losing to one of two best heavyweights of all time.’
Holmes raises his right index finger and says: ‘The number one.’
While his is not a name often mentioned today when fans younger than I ponder the greatest ever fighters, Holmes ranks by critically informed assessment as the third best of all heavyweights. Behind only Ali and Joe Louis.
He was also possessed of the most potent, perfect jab . A piston of shuddering accuracy which dominated his fights and pounded the faces of his rivals as he set up the KO.
That weapon is so revered that King, still promoting at 90, has come calling him again. To teach that fundamental element of the noble art to his WBA regular world heavyweight champion Trevor Bryant in time for his defence of that title against London’s reborn dynamite puncher Daniel Dubois. By exquisite coincidence that fight takes place in Miami on the June 11 date of the Holmes-Cooney anniversary.
Holmes ranks as the third best of all heavyweights behind Muhammad Ali and Joe Louis
King and his money - ten million dollars each – were instrumental of course in the making of that match. One which The Don marketed with his customary Barnum and Bailey flamboyance and shameless exploitation.
King sold Cooney as The Great White Hope, constantly stirring the boiling cauldron of America’s racial prejdice. Holmes was subjected to vile insults and sinister death threats by the more extreme of the so-called moral majority, who were desperate for one of their own to sit once more on the heavyweight throne which is still the symbol for many of that nation’s manhood. The African-American community rallied angrily behind Holmes, all the more fervently after he had to move his family out of their home for their protection until the fight was over.
Cooney had earned what would be his only world title shot by knocking out some-time Ali nemesis Ken Norton, who Holmes had defeated by a split decision four years earlier to begin his long, record reign as champion.
What had taken Holmes 15 brutal rounds to accomplish, Cooney achieved in just 54 seconds with one of his sledgehammer left
