‘Money’ Mayweather is often regarded as being one of the best fighters of all time, proving his credentials throughout his outstanding professional career which spanned for 21-years between 1996 and 2017.
He won world titles in five weight classes throughout his tenure, defeating the likes of Canelo Alvarez, Oscar De La Hoya and Manny Pacquiao along the way, before he eventually announced his retirement from the sport shortly after he defeated Conor McGregor in 2017, walking away from boxing with an unblemished record of 50-0.
As for heavyweights, the names often mentioned in the conversation for greatest ever are boxing icon Muhammad Ali and ‘Iron’ Mike Tyson.
Despite this, Mayweather believes there is one heavyweight who ranks even higher than both, revealing in an interview with Fat Joe that he believes Larry Holmes deserves the title as being the greatest heavyweight of all time.
“If we gonna go heavyweights, I’m gonna be honest I gotta go Larry Holmes. Do you want me to give you the breakdown? Cause Larry Holmes beat everybody in his era. When he got beat by Mike Tyson, he got beat by a young, hungry champion and he came out of years retirement.
That man had the basic fundamentals. He had the jab. And even right now he’s still living a great life cause he made smart investments. So he was good from the beginning of his career till the end of his career. And he came back and beat a lot of young guys too. Even though Tyson got him, he beat Ray Mercer.”
Holmes, who is best known as ‘The Easton Assassin’, reigned as the world heavyweight champion between 1978 and 1985, defeating the likes of Ali, Earnie Shavers and Trevor Berbick during his dominant reign.