Better All-Around Fighter: Primo Carnera or Riddick Bowe?

Bows by far.

 

Carnera was good enough to break into any top ten. For all but the most exceptional champions it is Career timing that has a lot to do with who becomes champion.

Carnera was certainly good enough to do what he did in the 1930s. He’s not beating Frazier, Ali, Liston, Foreman, Holmes or Tyson but I don’t see why he can’t win an alphabet belt in any era. He’s big enough. Primo fits right in today. He could pick up a title right now if Charr and Charles Martin can do it.

 

with a broken ankle and he was stopped on his feet. I’m not saying Carnera could have won but It could be that most champions would look bad with a broken ankle?

knocked out multiple times by multiple fighters? Is this really intellectually honest?

This is an exaggeration isn’t it? Primo was stopped 5 times in 102 fights!

I don’t think he was ever out cold or counted out in any of those 102 fights.

 

On Carnera, I would only say that he was big on size; small on ability. Even against opposition, who were physically over-matched, by huge margins (e.g. Tommy Loughran at 186lbs - outweighed by 6st.), Carnera was being pushed. Opponents, who were big enough to close that physical gap a little and had a bit of skill, were beating Carnera.

With regards the broader question on '30s contenders, I suspect there were several guys from the period, who might have made their impression, to varying degrees, on the '70s. Things get trickier in the '90s because we start to see big, mobile heavyweights appearing, with skills, at a greater frequency.

Either way, there were much more talented fighters from the era than Carnera, who could fit into whatever modern division they needed to and they would do comparatively much better than he, which I'm guessing is the crux of your question.

 

Credit to him for remaining conscious but the fight was stopped because he kept bouncing off the canvas like a yo-yo nearly every round (more than ten times according to some observers).

Most champions dont go down ten times in their entire career, let alone one fight. Louis floored him 3 times and then there are the far less examplary fighters who stopped him. Either way, my point remains. He was koed/tkoed/dropped whatever you want to call it multiple times by multiple fighters. He might have even beaten Floyd Pattersons knockdown record and that says a lot.

What source do you have he broke his ankle? If it happened before the fight, his managers were morons and if it happened during the fight you cant take credit away from Max for incapacitating his opponent. But again, proof?

Doesnt matter if it was 5 times in 20 fights or 5 times in 500 fights. When you are stopped multiple times by multiple fighters it usually means you dont have the greatest of chins.

The most durable heavyweights (ali, baer, holmes, holyfield, bowe, tua, vitali, foreman, mccall, etc) were either stopped only once while fully conscious or were never stopped at all and got right back up if floored. Its pretty easy to categorize fighters based on chins--its one of the few things fight fans argue the least about.

 

The ability to absorb punishment is one of those things that can be markedly change over the course of the fighters career for the negative.

 

True but in this case we have Primo being stopped four times in the space of 2 years before the age of 30 so Cobra's comment is correct.

Primo was labeled right from the early days as being not able to take a punch. He had plenty of heart tho i reckon, he kept getting up and going again. He seemed to be one of those guys that could be put down but not out for the count.

 

Yeah, I think it might have been due in part to his defense, and relative lack of power permitting opponents to tee off.

 

“After undergoing thorough exam and X-rays, at the Columbus hospital, it was indeed revealed that Carnera had broken his ankle. In addition to the break -a clean chip off the anklebone- it was discovered Carnera had torn ligaments in the ankle. Primo said he injured the leg in the first round when being felled by one of Baers shots. After the exam his leg was put in a cast and Dr Panoni told the press he was doubtful primo would be able to meet Baer in a proposed September rematch” - Page 145 Primo Carnera: the life and career of the heavyweight boxing champion by Joseph S. page.

 

Spinks would beat Carnera, Bodell has a good shot,as does Clark.If the crude Urtain could land he ko's Carnera but he was very rough around the edges.

 

I very much doubt this account.

 

I can’t blieve you think Carnera was that bad. I’m starting to see now why you get so angry if you actually think Carnera can’t beat Urtain.

To my eyes it’s much easier to presume carnera (who beat the man who drew with Max Schmeling) isn’t going to lose Jose Urtain than it is to hope he can’t win that fight.

 

Why would you doubt this? Joseph S Page has wrote a very well researched book here. It’s all documented.

Years later When they were both retired Max Baer and Primo Carnera boxed an exhibition and Bear took a beating. Primo schooled him. Baers exact quote was “I’m glad this was not for the title”

 

I think on this point, his research is suspect. Carnera showed no evidence of an injury, until the later rounds of the Baer fight and his team were all too keen to offer up the ankle "alibi", without prompt, to explain the absolute caning Primo had just taken.

Not many were buying it. Baer himself estimated that the ankle injury had likely occurred in the 10th round, based on Carnera's movement, up until that point.

It's also worth noting that Dr. Fanoni was Carnera's personal physician.

This seems an irrelevance.

 

In the very report you posted, Choke, it says the ankle injury was due to Baer dropping him in the first round. You cant hold it against Baer that his power was so staggering he broke the ankle of a man twice his size!