When he was a young man at the top of his profession, Larry Holmes often said he would not make the mistake made by so many other great fighters who overstayed their time.
”They won`t have to tell me when to retire, I`ll know,” Holmes, then heavyweight champion, told anyone who would listen. ”I don`t want to hang around and end up like Joe Louis or Muhammad Ali.”
Holmes is now a 41-year-old grandfather, and the voice of reason within him has been shouted down. The voice Holmes now hears tells him he can return to his halcyon past, that he somehow has eluded the aging process that eroded the grace and vast talent Louis and Ali once brought to their work.
”Muhammad Ali, Sugar Ray Leonard, George Foreman, Larry Holmes-we`re all different people, different fighters,” said Holmes, who won the heavyweight title in 1978 and held it until 1985. ”We shouldn`t all be lumped together.” Holmes (48-3, 34 knockouts), who ends a 38 1/2-month retirement Sunday night against a beefed-up cruiserweight named Tim Anderson (25-13, 13 KOs) in a hotel ballroom, clearly believes he shouldn`t be lumped with Ali, perhaps the quintessential example of a fighter who hung on too long, or Leonard, who looked old and tired at 34 in a failed challenge of World Boxing Council super-welterweight champion Tim Norris.
No, when Holmes looks into the mirror these days he sees a younger, better version of Foreman, who, at 42, is guaranteed a $12.5 million payday against undisputed heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield on April 19.
”I think Foreman will knock out Holyfield,” Holmes said. ”Then I think he`ll knock out (Mike) Tyson.
”Now, who`s left in the wings after all that happens? No one but Larry Holmes. And I have the style to beat George.”
In Holmes` rose-colored vision of what must be, he again will rise to prominence on the strength of three or four victories before the end of 1991, the first couple against journeymen such as Anderson, the last against a ”Top 10-rated” fighter.
”Where I made a mistake in the recent past was always looking for a big fight, a big-money fight, instead of doing what I had to do to get back in top condition,” said Holmes, who frequently ballooned to 270 pounds during extended periods of inactivity. ”When I fought Mike Tyson, I`d been off two years and I had only two months to get ready.”
The last time we saw Holmes in a fight that counted, on Jan. 22, 1988, he was felled like a redwood in the fourth round of a brutally one-sided showdown with Tyson, who was then 21. It was Holmes`s third successive loss, after 48 consecutive victories, and he grudgingly acknowledged that he no longer had what it took to swap punches with an opponent so youthful and dynamic as Tyson.
And now? Holmes has filed away and cross-referenced a thousand excuses for his two defeats to Michael Spinks and one to Tyson. They range from a conspiracy born of the public`s desire not to see him break the late Rocky Marciano`s record of 49 successive wins to promoter Don King`s insistence that he fight before he was prepared.
”I`m coming back to get back what I lost (the heavyweight championship),” Holmes said. ”It`s a dream of mine, but I know it`s a dream that can come true.”
Ali, for whom Holmes once was a sparring partner, also believed he was immune to the ravages of age. At 38, he was a totally shot fighter the night of Oct. 2, 1980, when he offered feeble resistance to an in-his-prime Holmes. Ali did not come out for the 11th round, and Holmes had tears in his eyes as he looked across the ring at his battered idol.
Despite the noticeable decline in his ability toward the end of his career, Ali, justifiably, remains a legend. Holmes never was accorded the same level of adulation, mostly because he couldn`t match Ali`s charisma. But who could? For pure boxing skill, though, Holmes isn`t too far down the list of the sport`s greats. He could dish it out, and he could take it.
Perhaps the most compelling memory of Holmes is the eighth round of his Sept. 28, 1979, fight with Earnie Shavers. Quite possibly the hardest puncher in boxing history, Shavers floored Holmes with a crushing right hand.
Arms thrust over his head, Shavers was convinced he had just become the new heavyweight champion. No one he`d ever hit that solidly had ever risen in time to avoid a knockout. But Holmes lurched to his feet at the count of nine, made it to the end of the round and ended up stopping Shavers in the 11th.
”I always thought Larry had great recovery powers,” said Davey Pearl, who refereed that fight, ”but what he did against Shavers was amazing.”
