Spinks Proves Far Too Fast for Tangstad : Norwegian Challenger Is Beaten on a TKO in the Fourth Round

Perhaps the Norwegian politicians who banned professional boxing in that country in 1980 knew what they were doing after all.

Norway’s European heavyweight champion, Steffen Tangstad, failed to evoke any memories of Ingemar Johansson at the Las Vegas Hilton Saturday night, tumbling meekly to the canvas in front of International Boxing Federation champion Michael Spinks.

Spinks, for all his frequent awkward, stumbling moves, is a very quick heavyweight--certainly much too quick for the slow-footed, slow-handed Norwegian. Tangstad looked every inch the 7 1/2-to-1 underdog he was before 5,832 who paid $1,109,000 to watch Spinks improve his record to 30-0 and gain a spot in the tournament that is supposed to yield an undisputed world heavyweight champion, sometime in 1987.

Spinks, 30, is unbeaten in a decade. He last lost a bout at the U.S. Olympic team boxoffs in 1976, to Kenneth Grooms. And Saturday’s was one of his most effortless victories in the streak.

“My sparring partners really worked me hard for this one,” he said afterward. “They all told me I’d have no trouble with this guy.

“With my style, I’m a hard guy to hit. And when you start fishin’ against me, that’s when you get in trouble.”

Spinks said Larry Holmes never tried that, but still lost twice to Spinks.

“If Larry had taken the chances that Tangstad took tonight, I probably would have gotten Larry out early, too,” he said.

Surprisingly, Tangstad came out winging. He caught Spinks with a couple of decent hooks in the first round. He even showed a respectable jab. But he was painfully slow, and Spinks’ quick, hard left jabs were on target from the outset, and they clearly bothered the Norwegian.

After all, Leon said it would be so.

Spinks: “Leon (Leon Spinks, Michael’s brother and a former heavyweight champion) came to me before the fight and said, ‘Michael, come out in the first and nail him immediately with one-twos. He’s a tall guy and tall guys hate getting hit with jabs.”

By late in the first, Tangstad was retaliating with wild hooks after each peppering by Spinks’ jab.

The jabs were more frequent in the second. By the end of the round, Tangstad, 6-2 and 214 3/4 (Spinks weighed 201), seemed on the edge of panic. He’d used all his weapons, had achieved nothing, and his quicker opponent was beginning to step on the accelerator.

In the third, Spinks, growing in confidence, moved in closer and began connecting with short, hard left hooks. Back-to-back jabs and a following straight right dumped Tangstad on his pants in his own corner just before the bell. He used the top rope as a guide when he shakily returned to his feet.

He went down again in the fourth from a left hook. He climbed painfully to his feet and looked through glazed eyes in the general direction of a few hundred saddened, but flag-waving Norwegians.

Referee Richard Steele gave the challenger a generous standing-eight before Spinks put him down for the final time seconds later with a looping right and a left hook, at which point Steele waved him off.

“He was a strong guy, but he couldn’t hit me,” said Spinks, who’d shaved off his mustache between beating Tangstad and meeting with reporters to talk about it.

Tangstad, a bandage over his right eyebrow and making probably his final appearance in a major U.S. fight, said he’d pack up, go home, then prepare to defend his European title, probably in Copenhagen.

He seemed disappointed that he had failed to duplicate the shocker pulled off 27 years ago by another Scandinavian, Ingemar Johansson, who knocked out Floyd Patterson to win the heavyweight championship. Tangstad talked of returning to Norway, to see Tex, his four-month-old son he hasn’t seen in six weeks.

“I did the best I could,” he said. “He was better than I thought. His speed really surprised me. He had some power, too, obviously. But he was just too fast for me. I felt good after the first round, but my trainer (Johnny Brown) told me I was falling into a pattern, to be careful of him.

“Michael is a very difficult fighter to beat. He’s awkward, and it’s very hard to figure out his style.

“No, I won’t quit boxing. I am still the European champion, so I will defend that title.”

In another IBF world title bout, Bobby Czyz of Wanaque, N.J., won the light-heavyweight championship by stopping Yugoslavia’s Slobodon Kacar.

The 5-10 Czyz (Pronounced: Chez) was whacking away freely on the 6-2 Kacar’s rib cage from round one through round five, when referee Joey Curtis stopped it after Kacar, nearly defenseless, had been knocked down twice.