Friday, July 11, 2008


Leon Spinks (born July 11, 1953 in St. Louis, Missouri) is a former boxer. He had an overall record of 26 wins, 17 losses and 3 draws as a professional, with 14 knockout wins. While still an amateur, he also became a member of the United States Marine Corps. Spinks went from being heavyweight champion of the world to being homeless in little more than a decade.[citation needed]

He won the gold medal in the light heavyweight division during the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, alongside brother Michael Spinks, who also won a gold medal in those games. Two years earlier, at the inaugural 1974 World Amateur Boxing Championships in Havana, Cuba, he captured the bronze medal.

Along with Michael, Sugar Ray Leonard, Leo Randolph and Howard Davis Jr., Spinks was a member of what many[who?] consider to be the finest United States national boxing team.

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