Leon Spinks

Leon Spinks
Data
Birth Name	Leon Spinks
birthday	July 11, 1953
place of birth	St. Louis
Date of death	February 5, 2021
Place of death	Henderson
nationality	US-american
Weight class	Heavyweight
style	Left delivery
size	1.85 m
Combat statistics as a professional boxer
Struggles	46
Victories	26th
Knockout victories	14th
Defeats	17th
draw	3
Profile in the BoxRec database
Medal table
Olympic medals 1 × 0 × 0 ×
Olympic games gold Montreal 1976 Light heavyweight World championships bronze Havana 1974 Light heavyweight

"Neon" Leon Spinks (born July 11, 1953 in St. Louis , Missouri , † February 5, 2021 in Henderson , Nevada ) was an American boxer, two-time world heavyweight champion and an undisputed heavyweight boxing world champion .

Life

Leon Spinks had six siblings, including the future boxer and Olympic champion Michael Spinks . His father left the family in 1957 and his mother Kay had to support the family with six sons and one daughter alone, in the notorious Pruitt-Igoe residential project in northern St. Louis. Spinks attended school through 10th grade. He then joined the Marine Corps and became a member of the all-marine boxing team .

He and his wife, Brenda Glur Spinks, had three sons; the professional boxer Cory Spinks and Darrell Spinks, who was also a professional boxer from 1995 to 2000. His son Leon Calvin Spinks was shot dead in St. Louis in 1990.

Spinks died of complications from cancer at the age of 67.

Amateur career

Leon Spinks won the national light heavyweight championship three times in a row from 1974 to 1976. At the 1974 amateur world championship in Havana , he took third place, going against the Russian Karataev k. o., At the Pan American Games in Mexico City in 1975 , he finished second when he was defeated by Cuban Rene Pedroso .

In 1976 he achieved his greatest success as an amateur when he won the gold medal at the Olympic Games in Montreal . During the tournament he defeated Abellatif Fatihi, Morocco (knockout 1st round), Anatolij Klimanow , Soviet Union (5-0), Ottomar Sachse , GDR (5-0), in the semifinals Janusz Gortat , Poland (5-0 ), and in the final the Cuban Sixto Soria (T. K. o. 3rd round). His brother Michael Spinks also won gold at these middleweight games.

His record was 178-7.

Professional career

In 1977 Pressure Fighter Spinks switched to the professional camp. It only took him seven professional fights to get a championship fight. This is unusual but not a record, because Pete Rademacher made his professional debut against Floyd Patterson in a world title fight.

On February 15, 1978, he boxed as a ten-to-one underdog against Muhammad Ali and surprisingly won the WBA and WBC belts. Ali didn't take Spinks seriously in the run-up to the fight. In the course of the fight Ali tried his " rope-a-dope " tactic, but Spinks never got tired and in the end won on points. "I underestimated him," admitted the aging Ali, then 36, after his surprising defeat (as quoted in: Der Spiegel 38/1978, p. 222). With only eight fights as a professional boxer, this is the fastest title win in heavyweight history and is also regarded as one of the greatest sensations in the history of professional boxing.

The WBC now insisted that he defend against Ken Norton first , but preferred to allow Ali a lucrative rematch. The WBC belt was awarded at the green table Norton and so Spinks and Ali boxed on September 15, 1978 only for the WBA crown, which Ali was able to win back with a point win.

In his next fight, Spinks went k against Gerrie Coetzee in the first round. However, knockout victories against Alfredo Evangelista (multiple World Cup challenger) and Bernardo Mercado enabled him to challenge the now reigning WBC world champion Larry Holmes on June 12, 1981 . However, he had no chance in this encounter and already went k in the third round. O.

Subsequently, he won no more significant fight. In 1986 he got another title chance against the WBA cruiserweight world champion Dwight Qawi , but here too Spinks lost prematurely. Between 1986 and 1988 he only won one in ten fights, which led him to end his career for the time being.

In 1991, however, he returned to the ring and played thirteen more fights against insignificant opponents until 1995, when he finally resigned.

Web links

Commons : Leon Spinks  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Leon Spinks in the BoxRec database
• Leon Spinks in the BoxRec Encyclopaedia
• Leon Spinks in the database of Olympedia.org (English)

predecessor	Office	successor
Muhammad Ali	Heavyweight Boxing Champion ( WBC ) February 15, 1978 - March 18, 1978	Ken Norton
Muhammad Ali	Heavyweight Boxing Champion ( WBA ) February 15, 1978 - September 15, 1978	Muhammad Ali

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Leon Spinks, former heavyweight boxing champ, dies at 67 usatoday.com February 7, 2021
2. ↑ Leon Spink's Biography. In: thefamouspeople.com. Retrieved February 7, 2021 . 
3. ↑ Leon Spinks' Son Is Fatally Shot. In: nytimes.com. July 23, 1990, accessed February 7, 2021 . 
4. ↑ Leon Spinks is dead. In: spiegel.de. Der Spiegel GmbH & Co. KG, February 7, 2021, accessed on February 7, 2021 .