Who was the greater heavyweight?

Hayes career is all smoke and mirrors, he's more talk than substance, and the Klitschko fans were more than happy to jump on the hype train in order to manufacture a "great" win for their hero, but what did he really do? Like really?

Barret, Harrison and shot Ruiz are nothing to brag about. They've been relegated to gate-keeper status by then and have been dropped, stopped and beaten by everyone of note and then some.

Valuev was an okay win, but Chagaev and a 137 year old Holyfield looked equally good fighting him so what does that really tell you?

Wlad is his only opponent of note and promptly exposed him as a fraud. Haye instantly went into survival mode and was bullied into a world of fear. Dropped the decision and was content with winning like 2 rounds. That's okay I guess, but guys like Jennings and Ibragimov did equally well. Peter had Wlad flopping around the ring gasping for air every second. Why does nobody pin these guys against other ATG's like they do with Haye?

The Chisora match was the cream on the top. Haye did win that, but make no mistake; the 5 rounds it did last, it was an absolutely hellacious conquest for Haye, and it showed what level he was really on when he actually fought current contenders and not washed up has-beens. It also leaves little doubt that he did duck Fury, who humiliated Chisora and would have done the same to him. Fury is underrated as hell, while we're at it.

 

at HW

haye won one title, and made 1 ok/decent defence and 1 appalling defence

spinks was lineal, and made 2 at least decent ones, 1 weak one.


its clear spinks was more skills to accommodate the bigger weight transition. but who was the more better hw? spinks.

 

Derek Chisora and Nikolay Valuev were still better wins than beating that woeful version of C00ney.

 

The bottom line.

 

You left Chisora off, probably his best win. Pretty much agree w everything else

 

You could swap them and they'd probably get tsimilar results. Haye wouldn't definitely edge Holmes, but a lot of people don't have Spinks winning both. On the other hand, he likely wouldn't totally embarrass himself against Tyson.

 

Better foot work and power...a solid 220 if he need be not a weaker 200 pound one. Spinks didn't have easy anything with holmes! He lost as far as I see those fights.... Haye has unprdicatbility/better explosive power at different angle and could possibly force Holmes backwards and reach over Spinks.

 

Tyson would beat all 3 on the same night if he really had to.

 

Yea I guess... but C00ney had a name for himself..the way I see it is that C00ney would still beat Valuev at 6'7 C00ney had reach and could really hit,Valuev never fought a giant who can punch and box decent .Chisora doesn't have a C00ney place in boxing...I still would go with Spinks even though realistically Haye went 12 with Wlad,he never really fought to win,and if you x out holmes on spinks resume then maybe I would pick Haye...but on paper spinks I think has the better resume.


H2H I have NO doubt Haye wins and in all likely hood k.os spinks inside 7 rounds.

 

Exactly:good

 

I agree with the "smoke and mirrors" comment above regarding Haye's heavyweight career.
They were very clever the way they manoeuvred him through.
Beat the mediocre Barrett, then win a belt against the giant which always should have been attainable but it could be argued he lost.
Defended against a shot Ruiz and a hopeless and shot Harrison.
Then when he should have laid it all on the line against Wlad, like a Louis,Marciano or an Ali would do he chose to just survive and last the distance and pick up his huge payday thus conning the public who'd bought into his hype.
Ironically his best win is against the moderate Chisora when he came back.
Spink's first win over Holmes surpasses anything Haye did at heavyweight.

 

C00ney wasn't at his best but he'd shown over the previous few years that he could come off lay-offs and destroy fringe contenders like Eddie Gregg and Phil Brown.
There are a lot of after-the-event excuses for C00ney that minimize what Spinks did to him.

 

Yep. :good

 

And rightfully so.. When C00ney met Spinks in June of 1987, he had boxed all but ONE round within nearly three years and that one round came 13 months earlier. He showed up at a career high weight and it was visible around his mid section. There was no focus or tenacity from C00ney at any point in the Spinks bout, certainly nothing like we saw in previous outings. Lastly it was widely talked about how C00ney had been spending much of the past five years since losing to Holmes and little of it good. A prime C00ney would have beaten anyone Haye fought and probably even Haye himself... Hell he might even have beaten Spinks on the right night, though I say that with no real conviction.. But Derek Chisora was a much more lively opponent who was fighting actively and taking on some of the top men of the division and either winning or giving gallant losing efforts.. Valuev sucked but at least he had the imense size and durability to survive for 12 rounds against pretty much anybody. While I still believe that Michael Spinks had a better heavyweight career than David Haye I stand by my point that it was marginal.