This is one of those fights that I always mean to get but somehow end up postponing. I was wondering if anybody has any comments on it.
What I know is that it was Page's first loss and was held in the undercard of the Holmes-Cooney extravaganza.
It is my understanding that Page suffered a broken right hand in this bout (not to mention a shattered ego) and that he had a scaled at a career low 220 lbs.
What about the reports that Page's mouthpiece was knocked into the press row by a Berbick left hook?
At worse I guess this fight proved that Page could indeed take a heavyweight wallop. In his very next fight he was dropped on the seat of his trunks at the Astrodome by "Quick" Tillis, before he got himself together and stopped him.
Greg Page vs Trevor Berbick
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Riddick Bowie
- Heavyweight
- Posts: 931
- Joined: 19 Jul 2003, 07:25
i have the fight, and i recommend it fully, as well as another fight from that same undercard, quick tillis v earnie shavers.
basically greg page came in 220 but proved he had more power and fought better when he was chubby. kind of like when he narrowly lost to david bey at a drained weight, then came in fat v the more formiddible gerrie coetzee and dominated and whacked him out.
trevor berbick was a big tough powerful nut. he could take a punch and was built like an ox. although his game was crude when he was in the right frame of mind (ali, tate, thomas and page) he was very hard to beat, unless you were an all time great like holmes or tyson.
people piss on berbick because of his tyson fight (which is generally the only fight they have ever seen of him) and are too ignorant to look over his pedigree.
in this fight, page came in trim and ready to fight, but so was berbick. essentially what happened is that berbick took some stiff whacks of page but roughed him up and overpowered him. roughed him up is the best description.
page broke his right hand on berbicks head in the 2nd rd, which made things difficult. in that same rd, berbick stood on pages foot knocking him into the corner post and unleashing on him.
a couple of times berbicks heavy punching shot pages mouthpiece into orbit. page could always take a punch. in his prime he fought heavy hitters like berbick, witherspoon, bey, coetzee, snipes, et al, none of them ever made a dent in him.
in the end berbicks relentlessness won him in the fight. like the tate, ali and thomas fights he was just in the mood and attacked his man like a pack of starved dogs and with his power he was too much.
good fight, check it out fella. one of many entertaining rumbles page was involved in in his career.
basically greg page came in 220 but proved he had more power and fought better when he was chubby. kind of like when he narrowly lost to david bey at a drained weight, then came in fat v the more formiddible gerrie coetzee and dominated and whacked him out.
trevor berbick was a big tough powerful nut. he could take a punch and was built like an ox. although his game was crude when he was in the right frame of mind (ali, tate, thomas and page) he was very hard to beat, unless you were an all time great like holmes or tyson.
people piss on berbick because of his tyson fight (which is generally the only fight they have ever seen of him) and are too ignorant to look over his pedigree.
in this fight, page came in trim and ready to fight, but so was berbick. essentially what happened is that berbick took some stiff whacks of page but roughed him up and overpowered him. roughed him up is the best description.
page broke his right hand on berbicks head in the 2nd rd, which made things difficult. in that same rd, berbick stood on pages foot knocking him into the corner post and unleashing on him.
a couple of times berbicks heavy punching shot pages mouthpiece into orbit. page could always take a punch. in his prime he fought heavy hitters like berbick, witherspoon, bey, coetzee, snipes, et al, none of them ever made a dent in him.
in the end berbicks relentlessness won him in the fight. like the tate, ali and thomas fights he was just in the mood and attacked his man like a pack of starved dogs and with his power he was too much.
good fight, check it out fella. one of many entertaining rumbles page was involved in in his career.
Thanks, Neil.
I agree with you that most people's assesment of Berbick is unfair because they think of the man who was trying to defy gravity against Tyson.
And yes, Page was in a lot of entertaining matches in the early-mid 80s. The next fight with Tillis that I mentioned I have seen a few times and always enjoy very much .
For this one Page (although he came in at a hefty 238) came out as usual dancing around looking to spear Tillis with his left jab, at the time second only to Holmes' jab in my opinion.
By the end of the second round Page was backed into his corner bobbing and weaving under and away from Tillis' shots. But then a solid right caught Greg on the jaw and dropped him just moments before the bell.
Angelo Dundee (Tillis' cornerman) sprang through the ropes and started shouting at his fighter: "Do it!, Do it now!! This is your big chance!!, Dont blow it for chrissakes, dont blow it!!!"
But he blew it...By the 4th Page went back up on his toes and Tillis punches began to lose speed and snap. Page was timing him and landing on him with fast counters.
Then Tillis managed to buckle Page by the sixth with a wicked left hook but by the end of that round he looked exhausted.
The seventh was all Page and in the eighth he went right hand crazy, finally laying Tillis on his back. He started to rise, but Dundee was already on his way through the ropes.
I agree with you that most people's assesment of Berbick is unfair because they think of the man who was trying to defy gravity against Tyson.
And yes, Page was in a lot of entertaining matches in the early-mid 80s. The next fight with Tillis that I mentioned I have seen a few times and always enjoy very much .
For this one Page (although he came in at a hefty 238) came out as usual dancing around looking to spear Tillis with his left jab, at the time second only to Holmes' jab in my opinion.
By the end of the second round Page was backed into his corner bobbing and weaving under and away from Tillis' shots. But then a solid right caught Greg on the jaw and dropped him just moments before the bell.
Angelo Dundee (Tillis' cornerman) sprang through the ropes and started shouting at his fighter: "Do it!, Do it now!! This is your big chance!!, Dont blow it for chrissakes, dont blow it!!!"
But he blew it...By the 4th Page went back up on his toes and Tillis punches began to lose speed and snap. Page was timing him and landing on him with fast counters.
Then Tillis managed to buckle Page by the sixth with a wicked left hook but by the end of that round he looked exhausted.
The seventh was all Page and in the eighth he went right hand crazy, finally laying Tillis on his back. He started to rise, but Dundee was already on his way through the ropes.
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Riddick Bowie
- Heavyweight
- Posts: 931
- Joined: 19 Jul 2003, 07:25
Re: Greg Page vs Trevor Berbick
Broncano wrote:This is one of those fights that I always mean to get but somehow end up postponing. I was wondering if anybody has any comments on it.
What I know is that it was Page's first loss and was held in the undercard of the Holmes-Cooney extravaganza.
It is my understanding that Page suffered a broken right hand in this bout (not to mention a shattered ego) and that he had a scaled at a career low 220 lbs.
What about the reports that Page's mouthpiece was knocked into the press row by a Berbick left hook?
At worse I guess this fight proved that Page could indeed take a heavyweight wallop. In his very next fight he was dropped on the seat of his trunks at the Astrodome by "Quick" Tillis, before he got himself together and stopped him.
Berbick basically outmuscled Greg, and Greg didn't have the strength or skill to get inside to Trevor.He came on in the last seconds of the first, and that was his last hurrah.