After looking at the career and record of Terry Mims, I can’t help but wonder how he would have fared if he would just had stayed in the cruiserweight division. Mims who is from Cleveland had 29 fights in a career that spanned from 1977 to 1989. He ended up with a losing record but sometimes records are deceiving.
Mims won his first seven fights after turning pro. One of them was a first round KO of veteran Vic Brown. He also outscored Lima, Ohio heavyweight Rufus Brassell. Terry then decided to test some stiff competition and this resulted in six straight losses to Leroy Boone, Michael Dokes, Duane Bobick, Harry Terrell, Randy Mack and Tex Cobb.
In 1980 Terry scored a major upset with a shocking first round knockout over world ranked Italian heavyweight Alfio Righetti. After that victory Terry’s record is spotty at best. He was halted by Domenico Adinolfi. Then in 1982 he was taken out by rugged Bernard Benton. In 1984 he lost to then undefeat heavyweight prospect Carl “The Truth “Williams. Evander Holyfield beat Terry in 1986 on his way to the cruiserweight championship. In 1987 he lost to another heavyweight prospect in Canada’s Willie DeWitt. Then Mims scored another upset by out dueling former heavyweight champ Leon Spinks over ten rounds. Knockout losses to Taoufik Belbouli and Siza Makathini led to Terry calling it quits in 1989.
Mims final record was 13-16-0. He posted eight KO’s and was stopped himself on ten occasions. Please take into account that many times he took on much bigger men. Also factor in that he met five world title claimants and four men who challenged for a piece of a world title. Like I said…Sometimes records are deceiving.
Terry was a good frend of mine, I was a police officer when I met Terry, we had a little run in, I wont go into what it was about, it was very minorTerry never reach his protential becaues he was hurt in a motorcycle accident and was told he would never walk again. He was bed ridden for over a year. But he wouldnt give up, and he struggle till he was up and walking again, and then he resumed boxing, but he never was the same.I lose contact with him over the years, I wish him well…Johnny Johnson,CPD ret
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