Cape Town — The death of former heavyweight world champion Gerrie Coetzee has rocked the boxing fraternity more than 30 years after he created history when he defeated American Michael Dokes to win the WBA belt, a conquest regarded as one of the greatest sporting feats in South African history.
Coetzee passed away on Thursday afternoon and was 67 years old.
A giant has fallen. The Boksburg Bomber🥊has succumbed to illness. Almost exactly 40 years after his great triumph - winning the WBA heavyweight championship by 10th-round KO against Mike Dokes - Gerrie Coetzee has died aged 67. One of my boyhood heroes. RIP. pic.twitter.com/XOeyYAlAeR
— Clinton van der Berg (@ClintonV) January 12, 2023
His daughter, Lana Coetzee told IOL Sport her father succumbed to cancer.
“We found out he had cancer last week,” said Lana, adding that “everything happened so quick ... it was an aggresive form of cancer”.
“As a human he was second to none ... he always talked about his boxing matches against Mike Schutte, he remembered everything, as it happened.”
The late hard-punching heavyweight boxer leaves behind a loving wife, Rina, three children and seven grandchildren.
“He loved us so much, he was a family man through and through,” said Lana, breaking into sobs.
“He was stern when he had to be, but his heart was very small. He was the light in our lives, it feel so unreal,” she said.
Last year, it was announced that a film on Coetzee’s life, named Against all Odds was to be made. Initially, it was set to star Liam Hemsworth as Coetzee, but that was later changed to South African MMA star Dricus du Plessis.
Filming of the biopic on Coetzee’s life, directed by prominent South African filmmaker Koos Roets, will wrap-up this year.
Roets told IOL Sport on Thursday evening that Coetzee’s interview for the biopic was already filmed.
“He was so excited for this film, he really was. I remember him as this big teddy bear, with the kindest heart.”
IOL Sport