BoxRec

Let's examine Muhammad Ali's first 9 title defenses of the World Heavyweight Crown against Larry Holmes's first nine.

Does Larry Holmes has a case to be the greatest heavyweight champion ever?

Let's compare their first 9 title defenses.

If you think that Holmes's first 9 title defenses were better than Ali's first 9, then, why Ali is considered by many as the greatest heavyweight champion ever?

I don't recall off the top of my head who each man's first 9 defenses were, but I know Ali has the edge.

He's got Liston, Patterson and Cleveland Williams in there.

The best for Holmes in his first 9 defenses at least name wise is the Shot version of Ali he faced.

It's actually quite amazing that Ali had an even fiercer list of challengers for his 2nd reign.

I discount Ali-Liston 2; I think it was a dive. I'd take Shavers and Weaver to beat any of Ali's title defense victims from the 60's on the night Ali beat them. Does Ocasio beat Brian London ? Does Berbick beat Cooper ? Fascinating matchups, imo.

Holmes having Shavers, Berbick, Weaver, Ali and Leon Spinks in his first 9 is definitely a pretty solid start to his reign.

I believe Snipes and Cooney are in there as well.

The Back 9 definitely belongs to Ali though.

At least list them lol. Ali for me

ALI
Sonny Liston
Floyd Patterson
George Chuvalo
Henry Cooper
Brian London
Karl Mildenberger
Cleveland Williams
Ernie Terrell
Zora Folley

HOLMES
Alfredo Evangelista
Ossie Ocasio
Mike Weaver
Earnie Shavers
Lorenzo Zanon
Leroy Jones
Scott LeDoux
Muhammad Ali
Trevor Berbick

Evanglista, LeDoux, and obviously that version of Ali were not very good. The obese Leroy Jones did absolutely nothing in the fight against Holmes.

Zanon actually had skill but he had a glass jaw.

Ocasio wasn't bad. Nobody thought Weaver was anything going into the fight, but he turned his career around with a good performance against Holmes.

There was nothing particularly great about Berbick but he was decent.

The only fight where there was any doubt going in was the Shavers fight. You never knew what you were going to get with Shavers. Holmes already beat him easily once but had a lot more trouble in the title fight.

Obviously Liston and Patterson were great fighters. Terrell was probably the next best at the time of the fight. He was coming off some good wins.
Folley, Cooper, Chuvalo, Mildenberger were all good fighters.
Williams is hard to judge because he was making a comeback.
London was the worst of them. He was probably as good or better than some of Holme's opponents.

What is amazing is that they each did this 3 years time! Ali missed time because of the hernia operation before the Liston rematch.

It's not really a huge gap either way for the first 9 defenses for either man.

But on the back 9

Ali

1. Ron Lyle
2. Joe Bugner
3. Joe Frazier
4. Jean Pierre Coopman
5. Jimmy Young
6. Richard Dunn
7. Ken Norton
8.Alfredo Evangelista
9. Earnie Shavers


Holmes

1. Gerry Cooney
2. Randall "Tex" Cobb
3. Lucien Rodriguez
4. Tim Witherspoon
5. Scott Frank
6. Marvis Frazier
7. Bonecrusher Smith
8. David Bey
9. Carl Williams

Huge gap between the 2 of them there. Ali has 2 Hall of Famers and 4 other major contenders of the era on his list.

Holmes has 2 titlists, and 1 major contender in Gerry Cooney and 1 solid fringe contender in Carl Williams.

Wepner ?

I must've skipped him somehow. Not sure how I did that.

This is why i wonder if we are too generous to Larry Holmes.

Tyson beat Bey, Frazier, Ribalta, Fergurson, Berbick, Smith, Thomas, Tucker, Briggs, Holmes, Tubbs, Spinks, that's 12 World title challenges, yes not all of them were title fights with Tyson but they fought other fighters for the bel, he did all this in his first 3 years as a professional.

Ali was shot when he fought Holmes, People say Holmes was past it when he fought Tyson.

If we diminsh Tyson win over Holmes, we have to diminish Holmes win over Ali.

People argue that Holmes would beat Tyson, Holmes, Bowe and Lewis in his prime, but fact he never beat anyone as good as them.

Ali, Frazier, Foreman, Spinks, Bowe, Holyfield, Lewis, Douglas, Macall all have bigger wins than Holmes.

The Holmes that Tyson beat definitely had more left in the tank than the Ali that Holmes beat. Plus Tyson looked better in getting the job done as well, but they may have been because Holmes was holding back on Ali some given their past history.

I do consider Tyson's win over Holmes to be one of his best whereas I don't necessarily consider Holmes' win over Ali to be one of his best.

Klee Gluckman wrote: ↑03 Aug 2026, 18:53.

Tyson beat Bey

Who did you mean as he didn’t fight Bey?