1990s Heavyweight Division vs Todays - RING ratings of both

Doesn't matter 1990 was a dreadful year for HW boxing, almost as bad as recent years...

Holyfield/Tyson was a huge propsed superfight that fell apart...

Tyson/Douglas was historical but hardly a good reflection on the year when the unbeatable Champ gets dominated by a no hoper in the hugest upset in history that couldn't even sell inthe states(hence the suave Tokyo location).

Holyfield wins the title against an obese version of Douglas...and as a result was never viewed as as a credible Champion. Nobody thought that Evander was a great HW than, he was considered lucky to move up in such a weak era with the division cleaned out and the belts off Tyson. lol Funny how that goes.

Ruddock got that ranking from KOing an overweight Dokes who had no business being in the rankings in the first place. He has as many question marks as the young guys in the current top 10. Same goes for Bowe after Tubbs.
And Mercer who had just went life and death with gate keeper Bert Cooper.
The stuff you are saying about Helenius, Dimitrenko, Chisora, and the like now, was being said about these guys than...

Spoon and Tucker...really just place holders because of their name and past accomplishments. Neither was doing much at this time of note. Tyson h ad completely raped the division by this time, and Ring was really struggling to fill up the places. Hence, Williams totally deranged #2 ranking the year prior.

We are looking at that 1990 list in retrospect and what some of these guys went on to accomplish, not as people looked at it in 1990. If the fighters in the current rankings go on to do stuff, years down the road, than we might look at this in a different light. Its all about context people, I can't stress that enough.

 

Right! that's why looking back and only recalling past fighters best night that were some times still many years in the future or many years in the past, then comparing that to today's fighters worst night is stupid. But thats way its so hard to have an argument with nostalgia....

 

The 90s heavyweight era was mostly ****. Great bunch of fighters, but a disgraceful level of ducking and boxing politics to ruin it.

 

You can't really argue with this, you just can't.

 

Also, anyone who picks Bowe over Adamek is only really thinking of 95 Bowe. 91 Bowe was a green kid just starting out.
Adamek is a 47 fight vet who knows how to fight.

 

On the face of it, anyone who thinks today's list is better than that 91 list is out of their mind.

That being said, it's tough to compare years like that because in the 91 list, those guy's careers are done(except Holyfield...and his should have been 10 years ago.) Their legacies, for better or worse are already written. Today's crop can still go either way.

We could revisit this thread in 3 years or more and have a completely different outlook.

I don't think it will happen, but it could. I think that 91 list, which is particularly strong, will be tough to beat.

 

The 90's list is FAR better. Ray Mercer would kill Boytsov. Old Foreman would have his way with Povetkin. Holyfield would KO Wlad and cut Vitali to shreds,have him running.
Imagine Helenius face when Tyson came into the ring. KO all day.

 

Wow at how insecure some of the Klit fans/Eastern Euros are.

 

Fantastic post which is full of facts. I find that when a good post that has irrefutable facts pwns people they tend to call someone a troll and just say you are wrong without being able to defend their opinions.

Once again good post :good

 

Thank you!

 

The thing that made the 90's era so great, was that not only was the talent pool quite deep.. they all fought each other as well, it made for some great fights.

 

the 90's dominates. the heavuweight division needs something to bring it back to life. its pretty terrible to watch these days.

 

Not really. 91 only looks ok in hindsight. In 91 almost none had fought each other and few had even fought anything other than cans...fact...

 

thats your opinion. to me the 90's shits all over what we have. Noone on that list from the 90's would lose to their equally ranked counterpart of what we have now.

 

Well again your only thinking in hindsight..