George Foreman vs. Shannon Briggs George Foreman vs. Shannon Briggs George Foreman vs. Shannon Briggs was a professional boxing match contested on November 22, 1997 for the "Lineal" heavyweight championship. After capturing the WBA and IBF titles from Michael Moorer late in 1994, George Foreman would forfeit his WBA title and make only one defense of his IBF portion, narrowly and controversially defeating little-known German fighter Axel Schulz on April 22, 1995. Though the IBF mandated a rematch between the two, Foreman decided against it and chose instead to forfeit the title. As he had not been beaten for either title, Foreman remained the "Lineal"
Boxing in the 1950s and Floyd Patterson emerged as the youngest heavyweight champion in history (coincidentally, he beat Moore for the title left vacant by Marciano). Patterson remained the youngest heavyweight champion in history until November 22, 1986, when a 20-year-old Mike Tyson defeated the 31-year-old WBC Heavyweight Champion Trevor Berbick by TKO in round 2. The dark side of boxing once again emerged: Jake LaMotta alleged at a hearing that he had thrown a fight with Billy Fox in exchange for a try at the world Middleweight title, and Jim Norris, an important promoter of the time, was associated with Blinky Palermo and