Bob Foster v Evander Holyfield

Light heavy

who wins

I can see a great great fight with Evander winning on points but getting badly hurt along the way. The left hook of Foster was murderous when it landed ie Quarry but for me Evander's heart see him through a tough classic match up.

PS I know Holy fought at Cruiser so catchweight?

Holyfield could hang with the biggest of men. If he could avoid being dead at the weight he would win.

Holyfield

I think at Lightheavy, Holyfield gets KO'd as can't see how he could make 175lbs and be anything other than a shell. If at a catchweight he is comfortable with or Cruiser I'd probably agree with you ONETWO.

Holyfield started off as a Light Heavy and won the Bronze Medal at the Olympics @ Light Heavy

Holyfield did start of as a light heavy but he never weighed as low as 175lbs. He was always around 177-178lbs and by the eighth fight of his career he was a cruiserweight (yes, I boxrec'd).

If Holy had met Foster during the first eight fights of his career, then I'd have to lean towards Bob. Holyfield too inexperienced.

Boxrec? And I thought you knew your stuff Atila.

I think you have to see this as a fight at the original cruiser limit of 190 or 185 catch weight and even then holy just too strong for bob. Perhaps not a fair comparable, but foster despite bring a terrific light heavy, struggled whenever he stepped up and fought bigger guys, so even at 185 I'd fancy holy to stop him.

Agree with those who say that this really needs to be at a catchweight to make a proper judgement on it. 185 seems about right.

Also agree that Holyfield would win. Foster's got a puncher's chance, I guess; Holyfield shipped quite a lot of leather. But Foster's power just never quite looked the same once he went north of Light-Heavyweight, and Holyfield's got the kind of chin that can stand up to serious fire power.

Holyfield great technically and has his own impressive attacking arsenal for Foster to worry about - don't underestimate how fast Holyfield was as a Cruiser. Foster gives it a good go but I can see Holyfield taking him apart and stopping him in the middle to late rounds.

Foster's heavyweight exploits do make me wonder about him as a fighter sometimes, all the other truly great 175lbers were able to compete against the big men something he couldn't. Spinks 'beat' Holmes, Moore beat Valdes while Tunney and Charles won the title yet Foster was getting trounced by the likes of Folley and Terrell.

Can see your point hammy. Some think he dominated a weak era and gets over-rated. But turn it on his head and if he'd never chanced his arm against heavies his stats would be damn impressive.

I think it was just a combination of his lanky frame and fighting style. He kept guys his own weight at distance with that jab, but wasn't that elusive. He could handle light heavies' punches but not heavies and compared to jones/spinks etc he wasn't too hard to find.

Agree with most of what milky said, Hammersmith.

I think what set Charles, Spinks and Tunney apart from Foster in terms of also being able to flourish above 175 was that they were adapters, whereas Foster wasn't really. I've not seen a great deal of Foster's Heavyweight fights, only the Terrell and Frazier bouts (was never really interested in watching the Ali one for whatever reason). In fairness to Bob, there was nothing in the Terrell fight really going in to the seventh, but his lack of adaptability meant he was trying to fight a guy 20 lb heavier than him the same way he fought at Light-Heavy, with that mechanical stalking style, meeting them head on for a tear up. He was just over-powered as much as anything else.

He was a late replacement for one of his early Heavyweight losses and in some cases they came relatively early in his career, but he relied a lot more on his chin than Charles, Spinks and Tunney did and wasn't good at playing the matador to bigger guys like they were either. He gave it a go against Frazier, but it just wasn't his style so he was in a bit of a catch-22 as a Heavyweight; too small to be successful in just trying to overwhelm guys and blast them out (and in fairness, most of the Heavies he was matched with had pretty good chins) and not really that much kop on the back foot.

It's interesting that Moore, who also had a relatively leaky defence compared to the above guys and the most likely guy along with Foster to have a tear up in any given fight is also a league below Charles, Spinks and Tunney as a Heavyweight. Moore and Foster found out a lot sooner than the other guys that you need to make sure you're protecting that chin if you're moving up from 175!

I agree that at a catchweight, Holyfield wins. Too big too strong.

I did read or see an interview with Foster years ago who said that he always had a problem putting on weight to fight at heavy. With all the drugs and PED's that are available now he might have found it easier if he was fighting today.

Its easy to say that Foster could not live with the Heavyweights, but lets be fair he was unlucky enough to be around with the greatest era of Heavyweights in history. No former L/H comes up and does any better against such quality bigger men.

hogey wrote:Its easy to say that Foster could not live with the Heavyweights, but lets be fair he was unlucky enough to be around with the greatest era of Heavyweights in history. No former L/H comes up and does any better against such quality bigger men.  

Its a good point.

Ali seemed to play with him tho. I think Ali put him down like 7 times and made him look like a 2 fight novice and not the tremendous puncher from the LH division. Obviously at the time the real money was in the HW scene so its no wonder he went up.

Not sure Ali played with him onetwo. Think foster annoyed him because he keep hitting him! In between the numerous knockdowns foster did ok.

Unlucky to be around in Ali/frazier's era yes, but he was sparked by terrell and foley amongst others who were decent but not ATG stuff.

Foster always looked quite vulnerable at a higher weight that LH. Holyfield wins this on points. Don't think he has enough to stop him but on size bullies him for most of the fight

Foster could still consider himself a little bit unlucky, especially compared to Michael Spinks. When he challenged for the heavyweight title it was against a young 26 year old Joe Frazier, Spinks got to challenge a 35 year old past his best Larry Holmes. I don't think Spinks would have beaten a younger Holmes. Timing is everything.

Of course unlike Spinks, Bob's reputation wasn't left in tatters after a 93 second demolition job where it's still unclear whether or not Spinks literally soiled himself.

... He was walking funny during the fight... Always assumed he was the knee brace... But you've got me thinking

I just watched Tyson v Spinks. Spinks to me at least, didn't actually look that scared. His tactics were probably to make it past the first couple of rounds until Tyson slowed a little. Unfortunately for Spinks, he just couldn't keep Tyson off him in that first round.

At the time I remember watching him during the ringwalk and before first bell and wrote off his chances completely because I thought he looked terrified. Haven't seen the build up against since, but did catch the fight a while back... He didn't freeze up and capitulate as badly during the fight as I'd remembered, but still pretty embarrassing.

As an aside, spinks was a nervous guy... Said he was scared before all his fights but that those nerves kept him focused. Nerves are generally a good thing if at a level you can control them, but they can freeze you up and/or tire you out if you can't.

Given the majority of Tyson opponents were petrified, and that spinks was always scared, he must have been experiencing a whole new level against Tyson. How much difference that made to the result is guesswork, given it was pinnacle, peak Tyson against a pumped up light heavy

At least Spinks did the sensible thing after losing...he retired and stayed retired.

... Well he was never going to top those earnings per second