Marciano the heavyweight GOAT

Lol I will type this again and then put you on ignore. There are weight classes for reasons. Nobody is above logic. Marciano never beat a modern heavyweight. Marciano would be consider a small cruiser weight by today's standard. Also Ali admitted to losing to Ken Norton all three times. The greatest doesn't lose to the same fighter three times. Joe Louis beat who now? A bunch of slow unskilled usually smaller guys back in the 40's? Boxing has evolved kid.

Now you are ignored too.

 

Even if you want to use "legacy" he still isn't a top 15 heavyweight because he wasn't a heavyweight by modern standards. If you want to compare him to other 180 pound fighters he still wouldn't be in the top 15. Marciano's legacy is him beating a old Joe Louis who himself is overrated, A old Jersey Joe Walcott who is also overrated.A old Archie Moore and a old Ezzard Charles.

If you want to compare Marciano head to head to 200 plus pound heavyweights then Marciano isn't even in the top 1000's. Marciano is so bad skill wise that even guys like Butterbean would destroy him. Even low level guys like Charles Martin and Dominic Breazeale would beat him. I can't imagine Marciano beating any top cruiser weight. To be honest with you I can't imagine Marciano beating any legit 175 pound fighter seeing the fact Marciano got gift wins over 180 pound Roland LaStarza and 170-180 pound Ted Lowry.

 

I've spent all day trying to recover from the shocking and depressing news that I have been put on ignore.
You ruined my Christmas, you big meanie.

 

How many were available that were title shot worthy?

 

Was Rocky considered a POC in his day?

 

Probably a worse position than where the Latino community is today in the States. Better than 1950s Latinos or African Americans, though.

 

There really was not much more Marciano could of done to up his standing as a ATG. He clean out his era and retire undefeated. You cannot get much better than that. He does have a argument, like Louis or Ali does.

 

I'm not sure.

All I know is that a champion's all time rating is based on who they beat and what the condition was of the guys he beat. It's indicative of a relatively mediocre era if the top 5 guys are all older and heavily shopworn.

I guess you could compare it to how LeBron didn't have extremely tough competition in the east. Yes LeBron did what he was supposed to do, but how many hall of fame top 10 players would struggle to do what LeBron did in the east?

 

Valdes
Baker
Walls
Would you pick Cockell over them?

 

There is always going to be another challenger... I've seen it said many times that Marciano retired to avoid Floyd Patterson, which is ludicrous.
Marciano retired when Floyd was not yet a top 10 heavyweight. (We can speculate about that fight, but it was never a reality.)
Rocky was short and prone to cuts, had a bad back and hated Al Weill, but you can't argue that he did pretty much all that was required of him at that time. What was left, realistically? Some say he lost even BOTH fights to 'Tiger' Ted Lowry, but there will always be naysayers.
He did what he had to do, in his era. You can't take that away from him.
Matching him against a Wlad Klitschko or Lennox Lewis is madness. I think most would agree. But The Rock was absolutely the man in his era. Leave it at that.

 

It’s hard to rate him higher then number 3. His wins over Charles x 2 Walcott x 2 and Moore are great wins but he does not have much on his resume besides that.

If he had of stayed around and beat Patterson and Liston a case could be made imo.

 

No argument can be made

 

I think people overlook just how subjective "greatness" is, at least as most people use the term around the forum. It's not a fact in the same way that Washington crossing the Delaware or terminal velocity is.

Somebody interested in arguing from an ethical standpoint, for example, might rate Floyd Patterson as #1 because he shows the best evidence of (generally) not wanting to damage his opponents. Maybe a Catholic moral philosopher might take this stance.

Somebody who cares 100% about head to head -- one of the few "objective" metrics in the narrow sense that there's probably a right answer to who would have beaten whom -- might rate Fury, Lewis, Ali, Louis, Tyson, Holmes, or Klitschko as the GOAT. Depending on what they make of boxing's evolution.

Perhaps the person values wider social significance, and boxing's ability to give opportunities marginalized groups. Johnson, Ali, and perhaps Louis would make the list. (Where Louis's inclusion or exclusion would again depend on a value judgment toward his accommodationalism.)

Maybe the poster is a racist, and loves Jeffries for trying to enforce the Color Line. Or the opposite: the poster prioritizes fighting racism so heavily that he/she gives Schmeling a nod for -- so the story goes -- protecting two Jewish boys on Kristallnacht.

Or the poster wants a fighter who most encapsulates his era, entering the wider cultural context as a mythic figure. Try Dempsey, Louis, Ali, Tyson, and a few others.

How about the guys who contributed most to the development of the sport? Sullivan is probably your man. Maybe some of the other pioneers as well.

Until someone can prove that one set of criteria is objectively correct to use, I'm won't laugh people out of court who rate Marciano as the GOAT.

That's why I've limited myself in this thread to imagining criteria that would get Marciano there, without ultimately approving or disapproving of the criteria.

 

I am far from LeBron fan, but very few all-time greats were consistent enough for over a decade to do what James accomplished.

 

Ehhh on the walls. The other two would have been more interesting even if they hadnt lost to Moore and others so often