Who are some fighters who are appreciated by die hard fans like us but Underrated by the general public? Michael Spinks is the first one who comes to mind. Us die hards love him but the general public remembers him best for his one sided loss to Tyson. Its pretty unfair since Spinks was a natural light heavyweight, not a heavyweight.
Wladimir Klitschko for me. Labelled as dull, boring, robotic & fought in a weak era. This perspective has truth to it but for me he is massively underrated and judged quite harshly on his 3 loses earlier in his career.
Boxing in general is underrated by the general public these days, at least in the USA. But you reap what you sow.
I learned a lot of respect for certain guys doing the five best wins for each champion and contender but three that come to mind that I underrated are Jimmy Bivins Ernie Schaff Buster Douglas Most general public never heard of the first two
Sounds silly, but I'd say 'Sugar Ray Robinson.' Not underrated as a boxer, but surely he should feature in the greatest athletes arguments, along with Pele, Roger Federer, Tiger Woods, Muhammad Ali, Carl Lewis, Serena Williams, Michael Jordan, Wayne Gretski, etc, etc. Doesn't seem to be...
I’m guessing TVs started becoming more of a household thing by the 60s (correct me if I’m wrong) which might explain why a lot of the older athletes of yesteryear get overlooked
I assume that you're referring to the "general public" of the so called "boxlng community" and not the larger random general public. As far as the "boxing general public is concerned, their ignorance and disregard to the greats of the past is to be expected, hence, that's why you have a "classic forum" like ours here. Insofar as the larger "general public is concerned, their knowledge of boxing in general is negligible at most, and is almost completely nonexistent, which indicates that boxing is a dying sport,..if not already dead. Call the coroner.
The General Forum might as well be the general public, since their scope of boxing is limited to Floyd, Canelo, Pac, Fury, Wilder, GGG, and Loma.
Holyfield’s slowly going down that road. He’s now seen by a lot of fans as just some steroid cheat who beat a past it Tyson because he was head butting. Don’t see too many people focusing on his career and accomplishments aside from the Tyson fights nowadays.
Quite a few , I'll start with the usually hated Camacho Sr. Because of his behavior later in his career the drug issues , etc most underrstimate how good he was. At Jr.lightweight I wouldn't favor any fighter at that weight to beat him. Including Mayweather Jr. He was one of the most physically gifted WITH great skills fighters I've seen in the last 40yrs or so. Saoul Mamby. Some how he just won. Wasn't pretty. Bobby Chacon, another fighters road to greatness side tracked by drugs and personal demons, but very skilled when focused. The mentioned Ray Mancini, Kim's death at his hands took something from him ( Which it should've, he was normal, it took something from me just watching it live on CBS.) I don't believe Bramble beats him if Kim didn't die. B.Douglas had all the tools needed for greatness except the biggest tool . Desire. E.Dejesus he probably beat a lot of the Lightweights considered great. He happened to come along when the greatest lightweight in history was their. The wrong time. J.Mugabi boxing is 90% mental 10% physical, for him to go 11rds with the best Middleweight in history in a war of attrition, than for him getting K'oed after by the fighters he lost to, it show Hagler broke something in him. Something he never got back. W.Benitez usually the odd man out in the fab 4 competition, however he was much more effective against Duran, Hearns and Leonard , than Duran was against Benitez, Leonard and Hearns. Most posters main complaint is he didn’t fight Hagler, that means Haglers didn’t fight him. Just the way some choose to look at it. It should be the Fab 5.
Don’t know if his name has already been mentioned but I’ve always felt Mike McCallum was underrated even back when he was active.
I would actually argue that Ray Mancini is probably OVERrated by the general public since he was a name the garden-variety sports fan might recognize and hence would think is a great fighter. Such was not really the case, but it's become fashionable here to deride him as a "bum" or "glorified clubfighter." When I see that, I immediately know that the poster in question has a tendency to skim the surface of things, and adhere to catchy hipster opinions of the month and spout them as if they thought it up themselves, and try so very hard to show that they are in possession of certain knowledge that goes above and beyond the general populace and so we should respect their "outside the box" thinking and acknowledge their depth. It's nauseating.
