“This is going to be a great weekend,” said former world heavyweight champion Larry Holmes. “I don’t know if I have been nominated yet but I fully expect to be. My record stands up to anyone’s and you have to look at the quality of the guys I fought. I think the fight publically recognizes that I am one of the ‘Greatest Ever’ and I hope they will vote for me. But more importantly, this is a celebration of all our achievements and the sport of boxing.”
“There is no sport tougher than boxing and there is no sport with so many globally known athletes. I want to be in the same place with all these other great fighters. This isn’t going to happen again. This is special and we realize that.”
As a professional heavyweight, Holmes won his first 48 bouts, beating, among others, Muhammad Ali, Ken Norton, Earnie Shavers, Tim Witherspoon, Gerry Cooney, James "Bonecrusher" Smith and Trevor Berbick. As champion, Holmes successfully defended his title 20 times, second only to Joe Louis who had 25 defenses. He fell just one short of matching the record of Rocky Marciano, who retired undefeated after 49 wins in 49 bouts.
Panamanioan Roberto Duran held world titles at four different weights - lightweight (1972-79), welterweight (1980), junior middleweight (1983-84) and middleweight (1989). He was the second boxer to have fought in five different decades. He finally retired in January 2002 at age 50 (having previously retired in 1998) following a bad car crash in October 2001, with a professional record of 119 fights, 103 wins with 70 KOs.
Thomas Hearns was an 8-time world champion professional boxer in six different divisions and was the first ever quadruple world champion in boxing history. He would also become the first ever quintuple and sextuple champion in history winning World titles at welterweight, super welter, middle, supermiddle, light heavy and cruiserweight. He is widely considered as one of the greatest knockout artists of all time. He fought 21 current, past or future world champions in 22 world title fights. In 67 fights Hearns had 61 wins, 48 by knock out. As a fighter, his aggression set him apart, controlling fights with his incredible reach, power and great boxing skills. He lost only one decision in his entire career, at the age of 35.
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