Gerrie Coetzee, a South African heavyweight boxing champion who rejected the epithet “nice white hope” and criticized apartheid, incomes the respect of Nelson Mandela, died on Jan. 12 at his dwelling in Bloubergstrand, a suburb of Cape City. He was 67.
The trigger was lung most cancers, his longtime supervisor, Thinus Strydom, stated.
After shedding bids for the World Boxing Affiliation title in 1979 and 1980, Coetzee avenged himself in 1983, when he knocked out the beforehand undefeated Michael Dokes. Gerrie (pronounced herry — rhymes with “merry” — with a guttural “h”) Coetzee (pronounced coat-SEE-uh) grew to become Africa’s first world heavyweight champion.
In that period, white South Africans may nonetheless be described by The Washington Submit as a “beleaguered minority” for whom Coetzee’s makes an attempt at boxing glory represented “an opportunity at a nationwide vindication.”
As an alternative, Coetzee’s fame labored towards apartheid. His 1979 bid for the title introduced the primary racially built-in crowd — 81,000 folks — to Loftus Versfeld Stadium, in Pretoria.
When The New York Instances canvassed folks within the Black township of Soweto for his or her views of the combat — which pitted John Tate, an African American, towards an Afrikaner — even supporters of Tate continuously praised Coetzee.
“Coetzee is a greater fighter and a extra principled man,” one schoolboy advised The Instances. “Tate is simply right here to gather a handbag.” In distinction, he continued, “Coetzee will use the title to talk out towards apartheid.”
Coetzee did precisely that at a information convention earlier than the combat. “What actually makes me blissful is for Black, brown and white folks to just accept me as their fighter,” he stated, including, “Folks ought to be handled on benefit and never on race or shade.”
Worldwide sporting contests typically barred South African athletes, making Coetzee one of many nation’s few worldwide athletic stars. Each white and Black South Africans crowded round radios in the course of the night time to listen to broadcasts of his fights overseas. One listener, an newbie boxer in search of distraction throughout an imprisonment of 27 years, was Nelson Mandela.
He despatched Coetzee a letter of encouragement earlier than the Dokes combat, and Coetzee replied by sending a videotape of his victory, Mr. Strydom stated. For a photograph shoot throughout one in every of a number of conferences, the 2 males confronted one another in a boxing stance and smiled.
Coetzee’s independent-mindedness was not solely ideological. In interviews, he countered expectations for an expert pugilist, talking softly about boxers who had intimidated him. Within the ring, he knowledgeable opponents in a matter-of-fact tone that he would knock them out. He took breaks in coaching to work as a technician at a good friend’s dental laboratory.
When Coetzee traveled, he referred to as dwelling daily to verify on the well-being of Wendy, a companion he at all times wished at his aspect. Wendy was an English cocker spaniel he had purchased when she was a pet.
Coetzee’s spouse “wasn’t too eager on Wendy within the mattress,” he advised The Instances in 1982. “She was afraid of fleas or ticks, however I stated, ‘Overlook it — my Wendy is a clear canine.’ Now she loves Wendy as a lot as I do.”
Gerhardus Christian Coetzee was born on April 8, 1955, in Johannesburg. He grew up in Boksburg, a close-by mining city. His father, Philip, was a automobile mechanic who ran an area newbie boxing membership; his mom, Meisie (Vu Vuurs) Coetzee, was a homemaker.
Gerrie was a shy boy not significantly inquisitive about boxing, however his father paid him 50 cents per week to spar. By 13, he had received a provincial bantamweight title.
He went professional in 1974 and boxed whereas finding out to be a dental technician on the College of the Witwatersrand. He graduated in 1976.
He rose to fame in June 1979 when he confronted off towards Leon Spinks, who a yr earlier had fought Muhammad Ali in two high-profile bouts, profitable the primary and shedding the second however briefly gaining the standing of undisputed heavyweight champion.
In what an announcer referred to as an “wonderful upset,” Coetzee pulverized Spinks, knocking him down 3 times within the first spherical. The decisive blows got here from Coetzee’s proper hand, round which a mystique grew. He fractured it many times, and a 1978 operation fused his metacarpal bones right into a everlasting fist, main some to name the hand “bionic.”
In 1979, The Washington Submit quoted a physician saying Coetzee’s proper hand “may punch a gap in a brick wall.”
That yr, Coetzee had the prospect to grow to be World Boxing Affiliation champion, a title that Ali had vacated by retiring. As an alternative, John Tate handed Coetzee his first skilled defeat. In one other title bout the subsequent yr, Coetzee was knocked out by Mike Weaver.
That match haunted him.
“I noticed the punch coming, I noticed the gang clearly after I was down, I heard the referee counting, however my legs simply wouldn’t reply to my mind,” he advised The Instances in 1981. For 3 nights he didn’t sleep, replaying the scene in his thoughts’s eye, he stated.
After Dokes beat Weaver in 1983, Coetzee received a closing shot on the title. In that combat he was the aggressor, driving Dokes to the ropes for a lot of the combat. Within the fifth spherical, he gave Dokes the primary knockdown of Dokes’s profession and, within the tenth spherical, he used his left hand to prop Dokes up whereas pounding him together with his proper, sending him conclusively to the mat.
Crucially, Coetzee displayed new energy in his left hook, which he used to arrange the devastating punches of his notorious proper fist.
On the pinnacle of his profession, Coetzee was one in every of three claimants to the title of world heavyweight champion, together with Larry Holmes, the Worldwide Boxing Federation titleholder, and Pinklon Thomas, the holder of the World Boxing Council’s belt. Schism reigned till Mike Tyson grew to become the undisputed boxing champion in 1987.
Coetzee misplaced his title belt to Greg Web page, who knocked him out in 1984. His profession in prime time ended ignominiously, with a first-round flattening by a brawny and targeted Frank Bruno in 1986.
Coetzee married Rina Steyn in 1976. She survives him, as do their son, Gerhard; their daughters, Lana and Tana Coetzee; two brothers, Jansie and Flip; a sister, Gerda van Aswegen; and 7 grandchildren.
A part of Coetzee’s picture as a determine of racial comity got here from his friendship together with his sparring accomplice, the African American boxer Randy Stephens, and his worship of Ali. Throughout a stint within the military, Coetzee spent most of a month’s wage on a duplicate of “The Biggest,” Ali’s 1975 memoir.
Coetzee and his spouse had been invited to his hero’s resort room within the late Seventies. When a TV crew confirmed up, Ali started taunting Coetzee, crowing that he may beat him “to the moon” and suggesting that Coetzee’s spouse was most likely a extra expert fighter than Coetzee.
However Coetzee most popular to dwell on what occurred when the crew left. “He was good once more,” he recalled to The Instances, “and poured us some tea.”
