Word: bonavena
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1970-1979
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...three and one-half years, Ali was not allowed to earn a purse at the only work he knew. The banishment cost him his fighting prime. Finally, late in 1970, he began to get some bouts: he tuned up by beating Jerry Quarry and Oscar Bonavena and then challenged Joe Frazier for the title on March 8, 1971. He lost, but three months later scored a bigger victory in another arena. On June 28, 1971, his conviction was overturned by the Supreme Court, which ruled 8 to 0 that the draft board had improperly denied Ali's claim for exemption...
...phantom punch" of the second Liston fight?with cumulative volleys rather than one deadly shot. Now he seems to set himself more. Trading on 10 to 15 more Ibs. of bulk and 1¼ more inches around the biceps, he hits like a true heavyweight. The seemingly indestructible Oscar Bonavena got that information the hard way in December, when Ali exploded a ripping left hook in the 15th round and dropped the blocky Argentine in a heap. Oscar wobbled up only to be decked again and again, giving Ali a T.K.O. victory. It was the first time that Bonavena had been...
...time last week's bout began, it was clear that Ali had never met a man quite like Bonavena−either outside the ring or in it. An unorthodox, wildly swinging club fighter. Bonavena is a granite block of a man who had never been knocked out while winning 46 of 54 fights. He is so crude he can make the classiest opponents look bad. Heavyweight Champion Joe Frazier found out the hard way: in the process of winning two decisions from Oscar, the champ was flattened twice and had to suffer through 25 punishing rounds...
...recorded for a nontitle bout. Ali, who forsook his limousine for the subway so he could accompany the "little people" to the fight, turned out in red trunks and white shoes with dangling red tassels ("Bulls don't like red," he explained). Like a matador, he toyed with Bonavena through the early rounds, circling his lumbering opponent and stabbing him with jolting lefts. Oscar, a 6-to-1 underdog, kept wading in, pounding away at the body until, by the eighth round, Ali was noticeably slowed. In the ninth−the round Ali predicted he would knock out Oscar...
...ahead on points, Ali coasted through the late rounds until a few of the fans began booing and filing out of the Garden. They should have stayed. In the final round, Ali caught Oscar with a crunching left hook to the jaw that sent the Argentine to the canvas. Bonavena struggled up at the count of eight, and Ali decked him again. At that point, Bonavena's corner tossed in the towel. No one saw it, and Oscar wobbled to his feet to be dropped again by an Ali flurry. The three knockdowns constituted an automatic T.K.O...