The changing landscape: Top 10 Heavyweights by Decade

That's just where the chips fell to be honest. When putting it together I noted that it didn't do justice to fighters like Tyson, so I included the purple colour.

You could call it a flaw in the design, but these are not my top 10s but those of Ring magazine. I recognize it gives preference to longevity rather than peak achievement in a decade.

Regarding your second point, I have seen people rank Holyfield ahead of Lewis in ATG lists due to his achievements in the 90s. But you'll notice Lewis is second in the 90s and third in the 2000s. Personally, as a childhood fan of Lewis I wasn't impressed to see him behind Holyfield, but I wasn't going to insert my feelings into the design to get my favourite guys to the top.

Accepting that I don't have the knowledge to accurately chart every top 10 by decade for 100 years, I needed some way to choose the top 10 fighters of each decade. And this seemed a somewhat popular method that a few people had used before me.

Though I do acknowledge I made adjustment to the 1920s to give better recognition to the black heavyweight champions. And 2021, should probably be updated (at year end).

So, this isn't me saying you are wrong to have Tyson second in the 80s, far from it.

 

Oops, this a bit of a late reply, but I didn't use Ring Ratings for the 2021 top 10. I think it's fair to say (as you hint at) that they are widely recognized to have gone off the rails due to change of ownership.

 

What the hell has Yoka, Hrgovic, and Makhmudov done in the pros for them to be classified as top 10 fighters ? And Wallin ? LOL

 

I don't just consider high level pro wins, I ask who do I think would win head to head. In the aftermath of the Whyte loss, Povetkin was still a top 10 or even a top 5 heavyweight in the rankings when in reality that version of Povetkin isn't top 30. Hrgovic is a no-brainer as he's being ducked by everyone in the IBF rankings who doesn't have something better going on (Usyk, Joyce). Yoka is more dubious as I've watched more amateur footage of him since and his chin is suspect, he also got gifts over Joyce and Hrgovic at the 2016 Olympics but he's a tall, rangy, athletic SHW with skills and power. Makhmudov is slow but he's a SHW tank with a good amateur pedigree and enormous power, compare his win over Rice to Ajagba's. Wallin would school Ruiz and outwork a tenacity-lacking Parker, Whyte would be a 50-50. Past the top 6 it gets too fuzzy for me to make confident assertions: Fury, AJ, Wilder, Usyk, Joyce, Hrgovic in no definite order.

 

Top level fighters define how skilled a fighter is at world level. These guys can look like monsters against bums then get folded by somebody like Whyte or go life and death with Joseph Parker LOL. just because they look skilled and they're big heavyweights does not mean they're top 10. H2H is based off of top wins in addition to skill and physical attributes anyway. They do not qualify for top 10 unless they prove themselves.

 

Maybe you'd have Povetkin above Hrgovic but I don't think that reflects reality, higher ranked fighters like Hunter know better because they're ducking him. If Hrgovic was to fight "top 10" Parker, Ruiz or Ortiz the bookies (who generally get these things right) would make Hrgovic the favourite.

 

Who has Parker in the top 10 ? And Ruiz would absolutely not be the favourite based on his latest performances and Ortiz is old as hell although that is a fight that needs to be made. Hrgovic vs Ortiz and we can see how good Hrgovic actually is. Povetkin is not in the top 10 because he retired. Hunter is ducking Hrgovic but in that case you ever thought that it's just a case of avoiding a high risk low reward fight ? Hunter did talk about stepping in as a tune up for Fury last year and from what i can tell Hrgovic isn't as good as Fury. Also who else is ducking Hrgovic ?

 

Ring have Parker at 5, WBO at 4, IBF at 5, WBC at 6. It's another problem with the rankings; they don't consider the circumstances like whether you won via gift decision or a lucky punch. I didn't say Ruiz would be favourite, I clearly said that Hrgovic that would be favourite despite Ruiz being ranked much higher (Ruiz at 6, 5, 8, 4, 6 vs Hrgovic's 14, 4, 11, with the rest outside the top 10/15). Povetkin only retired a couple of weeks ago, the mess we saw against Whyte was top 5-8 ranked before he retired, yet that didn't remotely reflect his abilities did it? The reward for fighting Hrgovic was 60% of the purse, getting a big scalp and being mandatory for a world title shot against AJ but the risk for Hunter was apparently so high that he's fighting some old cruiser journeyman instead. He said he'd KO Hrgovic but then pulled out so clearly Hunter's talk is cheap. You haven't been following the situation but the IBF sent out letters to everyone who's free in the top 15 (Martin, Parker, Kabayel, Yoka, Ruiz, Ortiz, McKean, Wallin, Zhang, H. Fury, Bakole) and no one wants to fight Hrgovic.

 

Yeah well thats those rankings. Not mine. A logical person would not have Parker in the top 10 now that he got a gift decision against part it Chisora. And same thing with Ruiz. But who has Hrgovic beaten ? And Povetkin retired after getting Covid and getting dismantled by Whyte in addition to his old age. He's done so no He's not in my top 10 anymore and he was dropped out after getting low diffed by Whyte. And he still retired as of NOW so whats you're point.

I see, we'll see whats up, we'll see how good Hrgovic is when he fights one of those guys. That doesn't change the fact that you simply can't put him in the top 10 based on eye tests, because he's fought nobody yet. He looks skilled but so did Parker when he was on the come up, Hrgovic hits harder but Parker is a lot quicker. We'll see what the future has in store

 

Your particular rankings are not relevant here, I was concerned with the official rankings and how they do not reflect reality and posited an alternative H2H list which I believe is more accurate. The best judge of who's likely to win a fight are the bookies and Hrgovic in a neutral venue would be favoured against anyone not named Fury, AJ, Wilder, Usyk or Joyce. That makes him top 10 for me and if you disagree go ahead and name 10 heavyweights now who you'd favour to beat him, I believe you've already ruled out Parker, Ruiz and Hunter. I didn't have Povetkin in my top 10 before he lost the rematch while I believe you did because it was clear to me that he was shot and managed to land a lucky punch on Whyte's dodgy chin. The bookies rate Hrgovic very highly not just because he's looked extremely impressive against journeymen, has been touted as a future world champion by Wlad and Fury among others and is being ducked by every contender out there but because of his 1st rate amateur pedigree and performances in the semi-pro world series of boxing (started young, lots of KO's without ever being KO'd, stopped or even knocked down) which is a good (though not perfect ofc) proxy for your potential in the pros.

"Hrgovic hits harder but Parker is a lot quicker"

That's a nice way of obfuscating when Parker didn't have a fraction of Hrgovic's amateur success. It's also funny because they actually fought in the amateurs and Hrgovic dominated Parker, whose speed advantage didn't come close to bridging the gap in size, skill and power.

 

In the grand scheme of things you're rankings aren't relevant either and quite baseless because all of those prospects you listed haven't done anything significant in the pros. I responded to YOUR rankings and i was very confused as to why you had those guys in the top 10 when none of thse prospects as of NOW besides Usyk and Wallin did nothing noteworthy in the pros but even Wallin shouldn't be in the top 10 when his claim to fame is giving Fury a tough fight which says more about Fury than Wallin. trust me your list is even worse than theirs. Not more accurate, could your list be more accurate in the future ? Yes but now ? No. Also "lucky punch" LOL do you have a clue about boxing ? He set that uppercut up and KO'd Whyte. Here's who I'd favor over Hrgovic. Joshua, Fury, Whyte, Joyce, Usyk, Wilder and fights where im not sure who the favorite would be are Parker, Chisora, Ortiz and Kabayel, actually thats kind of funny because resume wise Kabayels is better than Hrgovic's. I'd need to see more of Hrgovic before I'd put him in the top 10. I used to favor Hrgovic over Parker but now im not so sure. Still haven't seen Hrgovic fight anyone other than bums in the pros

Having a good ameture record is good but not always indicative of having major success in the pros. Remember Jorge Luis Gonzalez ? 6'7 super heavyweight that had a solid ameture background and beat Riddick Bowe and look what happened to him in the pros LOL. to make a statement like that you need to back it up with real world feats, not because Fury or anyone else thinks he's going to be the next Vitali Klitschko. Hrgovic is Talented and on the eye test he's a dolid fighter, definitely a potential top 10 and could very well become a top 10 in the future, but as of now he hasn't done anything to warrant a place in the top 10. For all you know he could loose to Whyte or Dubois or get a gift decision against Chisora like Parker. Don't count your chickens before they hatch

 

Have you actually seen Hrgovic fight? He is the real deal. The man would beat Fury for sure since Fury's kryptonite is big and strong men with solid fundamentals and good punch resistance who throw punches in bunches and have good power. If Wallin packed dynamite he would have won. He landed something like 7-8 punches during the match that would have been legit knock out or knock down punches if they had some power behind them. Like the punch he stunned Fury with, if Wilder would have landed it Fury would be on the canvas for sure.

With Wilder it's no question. He already dominated him in sparring when he was something like 20 years old. He would brutalize Wilder.

With Joshua it's 50/50. It would be fireworks for sure, their styles match up well.

 

Hrgovic would not beat Fury, Hrgovic is very reliant on his height abd uses it to lean back all the time. He may walk Fury down but it he doesn't have the speed or the punch selection then he likely wont tag Fury