Whenever we argue, fans think of two things: the great heavyweight boxer and the heavyweight who should have achieved more than he actually did; many of us think of David Tua. Almost 11 years have passed since the fight of the powerful (it’s deadly to see), stocky Samoan, and exactly 15 years ago “Tuaman” scored his last knockout. What a blood-curdling display of brutal punching took place on this day in 2009.

Dubbed the “Fight of the Century,” the Kiwi-style clash between Tua and Shane Cameron was a fight that was years in the making, but ended in the blink of an eye when it finally happened. Cameron, who was 23-1 and never stopped, won strongly. Before the fight happened, Tua was inactive – almost two years of inactivity. This and the fact that Cameron was five years younger than the man led some fans and some experts to believe that this case could go either way.

Instead, he was in rock-solid shape, as quick and correct as when he flattened good guys like Michael Moorer, Obed Sullivan and, apparently way back in the days of the Cameron fight, John Ruiz (that KO is still considered one one of the most spine-chilling scenes ever seen), Tua was about to turn back the years.

At the age of 37, Tua missed out on becoming a world champion, or at least that’s what they thought. After wasted months and after Lennox Lewis had a solid lead in what turned out to be Tua’s only chance to win the world crown, it seemed that Tua was destined to be remembered as one of the best large men who had ever they didn’t rule the world. But the ruthless display in which Tua demolished Cameron made many of us rethink.

Tua came out like crazy, which meant business, and caught Cameron with a few bombs early. Swinging painful sledgehammer hooks with both hands, Tua took down “The Mountain Warrior” twice in the opening session. Cameron never recovered or got into a fight, but somehow he managed to get out of the round. But Tua, always a clinical finisher, ended his compact night’s work in round two, and his violent attack forced the third fighter to stop the fight.

Tua came back for a while. Unfortunately, for some reason, Tua was unable to capitalize on his modern active. He earned a dull decision victory over Friday’s Ahunanya before drawing with Monte Barrett. Tua was then defeated by Barrett in a rematch and then defeated by Alexander Ustinov, ending his once oh-so-promising and assured chance at a career of world domination. Through it all, Tua, blessed with both a huge chin and the power to break both arms, was never stopped.

It truly is a mystery to many of us why and how Tua can look so deadly and powerful in a fight, and then prove to be listless and relatively harmless in another. On this day 15 years ago, Tua seemed to be back on track. Instead, “Fight of the Century” gave us the final, sizzling KO of Tuy. Tua’s final record is 52-5-2(43).

Cameron continued to fight until 2014, a year after Tua’s last fight, and interestingly, Cameron scored an ugly KO victory over a man Tua couldn’t harm in Barrett. Cameron then lost three on the spin and retired with a record of 29-5(22).

To this day, the Tui shortcut attracts many viewers, especially on YouTube. Tua truly was an exceptional boxer!

Earlier this year, the satin white shorts that Muhammad Ali wore during his third and final fight (see war) with arch-rival Joe Frazier were auctioned and were expected to fetch around $6 million. The man, who wore shorts, “came as close to death as I’ve ever seen” during the fight. Someone, somewhere, now has a piece of history from the fight in which both warriors of the ring (with one massive “W”) gave up a piece of themselves.

It was 49 years ago that the fight that never gets antique, that never becomes a fight that cannot be written about… again and again… took place in Manila, Philippines. And the 14 rounds of pure hell that Ali and Frazier endured, a fight so packed with almost unimaginable action, drama and turning points, remains at the very top of the great bar standard when it comes to truly great fights.

Together with true bad blood, these two kings gave it their all in a fight that challenged the world heavyweight title, but also much more. The loser of this particularly fierce competition (wild in and out of the ring) will have to endure the pain forever of knowing that he was defeated by the fighter he had the hardest fight against, the fighter he HAD to beat the most to ensure his eternal greatness.

And although Ali, 48-2(34), made the mistake of believing that Joe was almost shot and therefore had to train less than diligently, while “Smokin’ Joe” was slaving away in training camp, his thoughts were focused on the fight and nothing like that like, say, the fun Ali had when he was able to spend quality time with his lover, “The Greatest” was able to reach deep into his tanks when the time came. And how Ali had to do just that.

Ali got off to a quick, determined start as the 33-year-old was expected to pull out Frazier (32-2(27)) and head home (or his hotel). But Frazier, although he bent several times, was stuck there. And then Joe came back. From rounds 6 to 10, it was Frazier’s fight. A few years younger than Ali but more torn and exhausted, Joe’s vision was questioned, the former champion had gone to his well, and there was a lot of hatred for Ali down there.

Frazier, quite simply, was beating up on Ali during these rounds, with the challenger’s hooks and more hooks doing particular damage to Ali’s body. Sometimes, as he sat in the corner and allowed himself a brief respite from the hell of Frazier’s ever-looming, flailing, indiscriminate punches, Ali was close to fainting. Ali later said he wanted to quit before round 10. But he could never, ever quit, and eventually, when Frazier’s face swelled up grotesquely and his “good eye” deteriorated, the greatest heavyweight to ever do it grabbed him for the claws. way back to the top.

Eddie Futch is eminent for not allowing his almost begging fighter to go out for the 15th and final round. To this day, fans wonder what would have happened if there had been a fight in the last three minutes. Frazier was almost completely blind, but may have been less physically devastated than Ali. Ali, informed by Angelo Dundee that the fight was over, briefly stood up, then weakly and with an open mouth raised his hand in a gesture of triumph, before falling to the mat, leaving his most demanding opponent to forever snarl and mock it. he was actually the better fighter of the two.

There hasn’t been a more epic, more brutal and, unfortunately, more devastating heavyweight title fight since. Whoever owns Ali’s shorts, covered in blood, sweat and tears, should fully understand and appreciate the level of courage – pushing human endurance to the limits – the man who wore them was capable of that early morning (Manila time) 49 long years ago .

Both greats made the critical mistake of continuing to fight after Manila when neither really had anything left to fight for. Or something to fight for. Together, Ali and Frazier should have closed the show on each other.

At ONE you often hear state-of-the-art fans debating who is the greatest British player of all time. Most of the names that appear are those of men whose professional careers took place over the last 30 years. There seems to be a view that state-of-the-art fighters, due to access to better training resources and improved diets, are better than their counterparts from 50 or 100 years ago. They are not.

Tough times breed tough fighters, and former champions often had to struggle with physically demanding jobs as well as a career in the ring. Few of them could afford to live solely on boxing earnings, and most of them worked full-time throughout their professional career. Many of them were, for example, miners, and today there would be few people willing to do this type of work.

Ted “Kid” Lewis is, to me, the greatest warrior to come from these shores in the pre-World War II era. His only rival at that time was Jimmy Wilde. Ted was the British Featherweight Champion at the age of 19 before moving to the States where he really made a name for himself. After winning the world welterweight title in 1917, he returned to Britain and within 12 months won a further three British titles at welterweight, middleweight and airy heavyweight.

At the time there were only eight weight classes and Ted won the British title in four of them, which was a remarkable feat. Ted grew up on the mean streets of London’s East End during the Edwardian era and had to struggle to survive as an immigrant Jew from Eastern Europe. He had nearly 300 professional careers and fought through the toughest times of all, on both sides of the Atlantic.

In February 1922 he boxed Tom Gummer from Rotherham in a 20-round match at Brighton Dome. In his previous two fights, Lewis had defended his British middleweight title against Johnny Basham, winning the European title in the process, and then won the airy heavyweight title with a 14-round victory over Boy McCormick. Gummer’s fight was scheduled for the British and European middleweight titles, but Gummer was overweight and the fight ended without a title.

Gummer knew a thing or two about strenuous times himself. Having lost his father at the age of eight, he took up boxing so he could bring home extra money to support his mother. During the Great War he served with the Lancashire and Yorkshire Regiment and was wounded twice in action and was awarded the Military Medal for bravery in the trenches.

After demobilization in 1919, he resumed his boxing career, winning the British middleweight title in 1919 in a fight against Jim Sullivan at the National Sporting Club. He was Lewis’s great rival, although much less well-known, and a fight between the two men became inevitable.

Lewis was a good athlete as well as a great fighter and refused to accept confiscation from Camp Gummer when their fighter was overweight. He was disappointed that he wasn’t defending his titles, but decided that revenge was best sought inside the ring. He was in devastating form that evening.

Immediately engaging in combat with Gummer, BN reports that “Lewis looked determined and most perilous, attacking fiercely from the gong and rushing in with his head down to deliver a barrage of body blows.” Gummer hit the deck with a count of nine midway through the first round, and Lewis wasted no time with him anymore, driving the Yorkshireman to the body, weakening his guard, and then nailing him with a finishing left hook.

In his next competition, Ted suffered his worst ever defeat, losing in one round to Georges Carpentier when he was hit by a shot when he did not defend himself, thinking that the referee had called a “timeout”. Lewis, a welterweight, would be anyone’s opponent today, and he’s an all-time great.