Boxers most consider great, that you don't

I think Manny Pac was and still is vastly overrated, for an elite fighter he made loads of mistakes in the ring, he never had a good jab, against taller opponents he would often lunge, he always left his rear hand low when he threw the jab, his head movement was nowhere near as good as Duran`s a fighter he is often unjudstly compared to. DLH lost a large percentage of hos big fights and was awful at lightweight until he developed more defense, he right hand wasn`t thrown enough.

 

Julian Jackson and Carlos Zarate and Wilfredo Gomez, spring into my mind...not so much that they were not great...I just don’t see them nearly as great as others do.

 

He was awful at lightweight? In which fights?

 

Basically all the "H2H beasts", basically a group of fighters that get way too much credit for how they did in pretend fights on forums. Don't get me wrong, they're generally very good fighters, but I don't get how people weight imaginary achievements over real ones.

Like imagine you're rating using two different cars for long distance travel, car A and car B. Car A you drove for 5 years, you went coast to coast across the United States in it, drove across mountain roads, across desserts, forest tracks, crashed it a couple times, and it kept going. Yeah some bits broke, and maybe you had to fix it a few times, but it kept getting the job done for years. Car B felt great running errands to the other side of town and back for a couple years, and then you wake up one morning, and it explodes into flames. Basically H2H beasts are car B.

Terrible analogy I know, but I thought it was funny.

 

De La Hoya
Mosley
Cotto
Tyson

All very good fighters no doubt but not great.

 

I've had this argument before with others about Leonard but frankly it's beyond my comprehension how anybody could not view Leonard as an ATG. The man beat Hearns, Hagler, Duran and Benitez when they were all in their prime or in Duran's case only slightly past it but still an elite fighter.
The guy is a top 10 ATG borderline top 5 on almost every list of the greatest that I've seen.

 

Ismael Laguna- Very fast, but otherwise sort of pedestrian.

 

Wow top 5 is severely overrating him IMO... first I have him as the 2nd rated Sugar Ray, and the second rated Leonard. I have not done a list in a few years (and not sure I have the time or desire to do so again) but throw in Langford, Greb, Charles and Armstrong and I see no case for top 5...nor do I see him rated there often??? Top 10 seems a reach. I would say more like top 15-20 range, but we all have different opinions, which is what makes this fun....sometimes lol

 

Battling Jim Johnson.

 

But who actually argues that the H2H beasts are “greater” than the more accomplished fighters?

The problem is that a bunch of people in this forum seem to think that “greater” fighters should automatically be favored to beat non-greats h2h. I don’t have to think David Tua or Ibeabuchi or Luis Ortiz is “great” to favor them to pound out the majority of the men who’ve been lineal heavyweight champions.

 

Just the heavyweight division alone:


Jack Johnson (people put him in their top 5... I rank him 16th)

Lennox Lewis (ditto with Johnson, I rank Lewis 9th iirc).

James Jeffries (I can't believe people him in the top 20. I rank him below Sullivan ffs)

Larry Holmes (best win was against Shavers... Had to go to war with Ken Norton... People still think he beats Foreman and Marciano?)

Mike Tyson (don't need to explain this one, most agree with me here)

Wladimir's Klitschko (ditto with Holmes. People actually are starting to bring him into the GOAT discussion and put him in their top 10, Vitali took on all of his real challengers ffs.)

A few others at different weight classes:

Floyd Mayweather (my God... People actually think this man is the goat)

Manny Pacquiao (shouldn't be near your top 5 p4p of all time)

Ray Leonard (ditto with Floyd Mayweather. Stop ranking him above Robinson)

Archie Moore (I don't know what goes through people's minds when they rank him over Ezzard Charles and Rocky Marciano)

Tua and Ike (they aren't the greatest non champs of all time like they're hyped up to be)

Julio Cesar Chavez (great but not top 10 p4p material)

 

1 I would love to see your top 20 HW list? If you care to share?

2 if most people agree with you that Tyson is overrated...wouldn’t that by virtue make him fairly rated or underrated by consensus?

 

Most people HERE agree with me. On places like YouTube and Twitter... Different story.

Oh boy gonna have to dig up that list, it's somewhere on my Google docs

My top 20 heavyweights:

Honorable mentions to James Jeffries and Ron Lyle, who barely missed the top 20.

20. Harry Wills

19. Vitali Klitschko

18. Max Baer

17. Floyd Patterson

16. Jack Johnson

15. Gene Tunney

14. Ezzard Charles

13. Wladimir Klitschko

12. Joe Walcott

11. Joe Frazier


10. Mike Tyson


9. Lennox Lewis


8. Evander Holyfield


7. Sonny Liston


6. Jack Dempsey


5. Larry Holmes (note, I swap him and Dempsey alot)


4. George Foreman



1c. Rocky Marciano


1b. Joe Louis


1a. Muhammad Ali

 

Turnabout is fair play:
Tier 1 (1-2) Louis Ali
Tier 2 (3-4) Holmes Lewis
Tier 3 (5-6) Wlad Foreman
Tier 4 (7-9) Frazier Holyfield Tyson
Tier 5 (10-11) Marciano Johnson
Tier 6 (12-15) Liston Dempsey Bowe Vitali
Tier 7 (16-19) Schmeling Patterson Walcott Charles

20 Wills