Would Wladimir Klitschko have been as successful without his illegal holding tactics?

He clinched for a reason. Because when pressured he didn't know what to do other than grab. He would have even more tkos on his resume that's for sure.

 

He would have surely taken more shots but no one in this thread has thus far offered a list of opponents he would have lost to. Clinching or not, the likes of Byrd, Brock, Chambers, Chagaev, Ibragimov and Jennings had near zero chance (not to mention Mormeck, Pianeta, Leapai, Rahman, Austin etc.). Povetkin would have had a chance but a small one.

 

Good job, Tony!

You can ref Canelo - GGG 3 in Sept.

 

The same "if refs enforced the rules argument" could be levelled at plenty of other world champions length of reign, it is only illegal if you are caught and penalised, or refs know and always referee precisely to the rules.

 

Nope.

But what if Ali couldn't do the same? How about George Foreman's pushing, guard manipulation, and forearm charge (he did this thing where he'd bend forward, tuck his head down, cross his arms in front of his head, and ram his opponent; see his fight with Qawi as an example)? How about Larry Holmes's stiff-arming, framing, and shoving opponent's heads with his forearm?

Many champs have used mild rule breaks to their advantage.

 

He would have been a better version of Amir Khan, probably been a 4 time heavyweight champ with a few more tko/ko losses but also many more ko wins.

 

He hates Klitschkos, cause they are fighting to defend Ukraine - simple as that

 

He still would have been successful. Just would have had to work harder. He got lazy with doing it and aside from Povetkin he wasn't too overt about it.

 

I wasn’t thinking of necessarily losing to “not be doing as well”. But he did lose to Puritty, Sanders and Brewster. The guy was capable of losing to mediocre opposition. Totally overrated boxer. Very good, but protected and reigned over poor opposition. Vitali much better.

 

Probably not.
But the same counts for other big names like B-Hop, Holyfield, Ward, Ruiz and of course Ali.
All of them mentioned obviously quite a bit worse as Wlad with their tactics, either mentioned, swept under the rug or sometimes weirdly praised.

All of them (except Ruiz) would probably have been succesful without those tactics, including Wlad, because of their obvious talent. But less, or even far less.

 

Sanders and Brewster were dangerous because they were aggressive punchers, which was the main reason why prime Peter had so much success. In theory Haye would have been dangerous but he was more concerned with not getting KO'd than winning. A lot of the guys Wlad beat were stylistically overmatched. All but Fury lacked the size/athleticism/skill to outbox him and not many had the power + ability to land to have a good chance of cracking his chin.

 

Although I think W. Klitschko was very good, he is still wildly overrated. If you're going to reign over crap, and hope to be regarded as a legend, you'd better not get knocked out multiple times by mediocre opponents and resort to jabbing and grabbing (or outright cheating like against Povetkin). W. Klitschko is a bit of a joke and it is possible that the guy ducked Dereck Chisora, of all people.

Totally manufactured. Look at the contracts, too. He had everything his own way even against crap opponents who were either old, short or generally hopeless.

 

Likely yes. He was a huge puncher. But didn't have top punch resistance (see Joshua, Anthony) and Manny trained him to fight as he did.

Ask the same question about Ali, a style Wlad utilized very effectively.

 

These critiques are valid but overrated relative to who? Along with his brother, he was head and shoulders better than his opponents for close to a decade. From this era, Usyk, AJ, Whyte, Ruiz, Parker, Joyce, Makhmudov, Hunter, Kabayel, Bakole, Kownacki and Hughie have all had tough fights with or lost to Klitschko era contenders.