Videos of the Week – George Foreman

I can’t believe I haven’t put any boxing videos on this site. The old fights from the 1970’s were great stuff especially in the Heavyweight division, Muhammed Ali, Joe Frazier, Ken Norton and of course, George Foreman. When he first began, George was an angry fighter and took out his wrath on opponents. Just look at his fight against Joe Frazier in 1973 and you’ll see that he wanted to end his fights quickly, using the knockout and not wanting to waste any time.

“Down Goes Frazier! Down Goes Frazier! Down Goes Frazier!” – Let’s watch the fight in Kingston, Jamaica on January 22, 1973 and it was called by the legendary Howard Cosell on ABC Sports. All of the six knockdowns by Foreman. Completely devastating.

Early in his comeback, George fought Gerry Cooney on January 15, 1990. Up until this fight, George had for the most part, fought tomato cans, but I remember thinking going into this fight and thinking no way could George beat Cooney, but watch the knockdown and then the knockout and it was mind blowing Back when ABC actually had a sports department, Dan Dierdorf and Alex Wallau called this for Wide World of Sports.

“It happened! It happened!” – The surprising knockout of Michael Moorer on May 11, 1994 to give George the Heavyweight title for the first time since 1974 when he lost it to Muhammed Ali in the Rumble in the Jungle in Zaire. Trainer Teddy Atlas told Moorer not to get close to Foreman in the last three rounds, but Moorer wouldn’t listen. To me, Jim Lampley’s call of the knockout is one of the best calls in the history of sports television. And listen to HBO analyst Gil Clancy criticize George until the knockout.

You have to have the background on the fight, the excellent HBO boxing documentary, Legendary Nights which goes into The Tale of Foreman-Moorer. This is Part 1.

Part 2

And Part 3 – Michael Moorer calls bullshit on Foreman’s vision of the knockout, but Michael, you lost. Shut the fuck up.

Great stuff. Watch for more boxing videos in the coming weeks.