Larry Holmes was not one of my favorite fighters by a long shot but he kept boxing on the sports page. He had one of the best jabs in boxing but that fight with Cooney was exciting and I liked Cooney but he was a gigantic version of Oscar Delahoya, a converted southpaw with little power in his right hand. Shavers was relearning how to fight because he had zero endurance until he met Ali. Mike Weaver sent him to the canvass giving him a good scare and another guy sent him out of the ring with aright hand and I cannot remember his name but but it was on prime time and Holmes was probably the only heavyweight champ to fight on prime time, 800PM. He fought people that were put in front of him and many were past their primes but they were contenders and he fought the who's who of heavyweight boxing during his era and Ali was already washed up. He was a good fighter and there is no way he was great but he won and he was robbed in the Spinks rematch and I liked Mike. I often wonder if we should just say the great ones had great fights instead of saying they were great because in the scheme of things a lot of fighters had off nights too. Larry made it seem he was on more than he was off because Larry was not afraid to put it on the line and he said some things that did not make people of the old school era happy showing that you can't win them all. One remark made the night of the Spinks fight made many people unhappy and the price of jock straps went up.