Curious case of Maxie Smith
Boxing historian
I WAS recently scanning through an old copy of The Ring magazine from April 1974, and my mind was jogged by something that I had forgotten about. The light-heavyweight ratings that month listed the following: Champion – Bob Foster, 1. John Conteh, 2. Len Hutchins, 3. Tom Bogs, 4. Victor Galindez, 5. Maxie Smith.
I suspect that five of those names still mean was not quite so kind, for at no time in any of their ranking lists did Maxie appear in the world top 10. , at the time a weekly rival to , rated Maxie at number 24 at the back end of 1973. So, what was it that Nat Loubet saw in Maxie to rank him so highly?
