“Everybody in Here Could Beat…”: Larry Holmes at Crossroads With Muhammad Ali, Ken Norton and Joe Frazier While Talking About Mike Tyson in Forgotten Clip

It’s been over 35 years since Mike Tyson defended his Heavyweight title against former champion Larry Holmes. For the youngest Heavyweight champion, though, the fight was about more than just keeping his belts. For him, it was avenging the 1980 defeat of Muhammad Ali at the hands of Larry Holmes. So sometime after that loss, besides Ali, ‘The Easton Assassin’ sat alongside other greats, like Joe Frazier and Ken Norton for a discussion.

A short clip of the boxing legends’ conversation appeared on social media last month. The footage featured the quartet discussing the top-selling hot property in boxing at the time: Mike Tyson. Larry Holmes spoke about the person who handed over his professional career’s only early stoppage loss. But other guests, as it appeared, stood in tangent to his views.

Time Capsule: Larry Holmes and Joe Frazier share insights on a young Mike Tyson

So when the host said, “We can’t get through this without talking about Mike Tyson, so let’s bring up his name.” An immediate response came from Larry Holmes: “Who?” The host then clarified that he was talking about the boxer who had fought him last. The host wondered if they could have defeated Mike Tyson in their prime. Holmes replied, “Everybody in this room here would have been able to beat Mike Tyson… You would have never heard of him.”

Then, pointing toward the first man who handed over Ali’s first professional defeat, the host emphasized that probably Joe Frazier disagreed. The former world champion said, “Well, I think that the young man has something that, you know, we all had ourselves decided that he’s there and he’s doing the job he’s sacrificed, and yeah, he’s the marksman. If you look at this young man… when he throws punches, he’s not throwing punch for the heck of it; there’s a cause and reason and believing that he’s right on target.”

Holmes immediately interjected that all of them followed almost similar methods. Frazier continued, “….but this guy is the marksman.”

The static view

The clip is bound to intrigue many. Even a few years ago, he claimed that the then-world Heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua could have knocked out a prime Mike Tyson. Larry Holmes came to the fight on January 22, 1988, after a gap of two years. But the devastating fourth-round loss to Tyson saw him going for another break until 1991.

Read More: Mike Tyson Reveals Real Reason He Worshipped Muhammad Ali

After that, ‘The Easton Assassin’ remained active through the decade. Two of his attempts at the world title didn’t succeed. Finally, after his seventy-fifth match on July 27, 2002, Larry Holmes hung up his gloves for good.

Do you think what Holmes said about defeating Mike Tyson in their prime could have been possible? Please share your thoughts with us in the comments below.

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