Hagler pre Duran? Hearns post Duran pre Hagler? Foreman post Frazier, Norton? I personally ranked Hearns post Duran pre Hagler over Foreman becuz of the advanced technique he employed on the hapless, hopelessly physically overmatched little pudgy Duran, along with his vastly improved speed. It was ON PAR with past Hagler performances. Hagler, who was seen as "no longer progressing" was now on the downslide while Hearns was on the upslide and now progressing. Hagler, post Sibson, Scypion, Hamsho, Lee, could do no wrong and apparantly had no weaknesses. How ironic that those performances were the last we would see of Hagler's peak, too good to last
Liston pre Clay Tyson pre Douglas Out of those listed I would stick with the big boys and say Foreman post Frazier. Once the 0 goes the aura of invincibility is never the same. Hearns and Hagler support was pretty evenly split leading into their fight so I doubt you could say Hearns had an aura of invincibility around him. Hagler pre Duran was a bit like the Klits at present. An elite in an era that back then was percieved to be pretty average at the weight. I think that the fact that his greatest anticipated opponents came from lower weight classes suggest he was not considered to be unbeatable. There were only muted murmurings of him fighting the Qawi, Saad and EMMs rather than the hype of the Fab 4
By that definition the only guys who could be considered are undefeated. Your example had Heaths during a specific period and after some defeats. Leonard post Hagler pre Norris was magic.
but Hearns had reached level of supremacy seldom reached. Pre Sugar Ray Leonard, Tommy didnt have that same respect cuz the smart money including myseelf knew he wasnt going to beat Sugar and Knocking off tomato cans didnt means as much as it does to general sports fans ask anyone if they didnt give Roy Jones ultimate respect based on the one loss on his record late 90s. record aint all that much as how u are performing Klits being compared to Hagler? Hagler was a super elite whereas the Klits are nothing special.
to the less informed general sports fan that canot discern improvement, mayhap. As I recall, Hearns had but one loss post Duran pre Hagler same w Leonard, pre Norris,, - one loss. dont know how the" washed up" part comes in. Norris just made him look washed up. It was the SPEED that beat him
I never used the word washed up so I have no clue where that came from. But more to the point seeing, as this is boxing, only the casual fan would believe in an 'aura of invincibility' as stated. Ray fits.the bill.
Invincibility? on LEONARD??? When it comes to him the term that comes to mind is "ducking", "avoiding", "excuses", "thin resume", "setting low standards"
Liston pre Clay. You had to been around then to understand how invincible Liston was regarded. The general consensus was that he was there until he chose to retire. No one could beat him. Times were different then. The HW champion was probably the highest regarded athlete in the world. Everyone knew who the champion was. When Tyson-Douglas came along that wasn't the case. Not a lot of people knew and most didn't care.