Is there anyone who could school 67 Ali?

I love how you assume my intentions and state it like fact (like the reasons why I "don't like to consider southpaws") lol. This is the whole root of the problem, you're creating points to argue against - you could probably have a whole debate by yourself, don't even need any opposition.

 

"Pointing out a fighter was old and past their best aren't excuses, they are facts."

Relatively old yes (though Foreman and Tyson certainly weren't, funny how you glossed over that!) but "past their best" is far more subjective and open to interpretation. No one denies that fighters must eventually decline with age, that's biology but some athletes have been in their primes at 20, others at 40. And even if a fighter is past his prime at say 36, it's impossible to quantify how far past (especially considering that intangibles like ring IQ and mentality can't be technologically measured) and whether it's far past enough to make a significant difference.

"Ironically, an even older version made the fight even closer in the rematch"

Which undermines your point about Holyfield being past prime age/wise-wise in fight 1 if he still had that performance in him, plus beating Lewis-conqueror Rahman over 3 years later after another 5 punishing wars. In fact, you've previously said that the Holyfield who fought Byrd was on par with the Wlad that Fury beat! Based on Fury making Wlad look awful. But Fury also made Wilder 2, Chisora 2 and Whyte look far worse than they ever had before, even against quality fighters like Ortiz, Vitali, Usyk, Joshua and Povetkin. Fury's got a habit of doing this because he's a phenomenal fighter. Wlad wasn't on a poor run of form as the even older, clear underdog Byrd version of Holyfield was, Wlad was still a dominant champion who was heavily favoured to win, in his backyard. Against a Fury who was making his world title debut and had only gone 12 rounds twice previously (Chisora 1, Kevin), to Wlad's seven, so arguably not "prime" himself.

It's also irrelevant that Holyfield did better in the Lewis rematch because the question wasn't whether there was a fighter who would ALWAYS school young Ali, it's about whether there are fighters who COULD (plausibly) school a young Ali. And there are a number of good reasons why the fighter who does worse in the first fight can have advantages in the rematch. A one-off fight is a very different dynamic to a two fight series or a trilogy and I take the initial question as being about a one-off fight.

Great fighters have got schooled in or around their primes so I don't see why Ali couldn't be, especially against types of fighters he never fought at any point and didn't exist, like Lewis, Wlad, Usyk, Fury. Prime Holmes would also have a massive unfair advantage based on his years of sparring Ali, whereas young Ali would have zero experience of Holmes.

 

Jim Jacobs,owner of the largest fight collection in history,made a close study comparing
Sugar Ray Robinson's handspeed to that of Muhammad Ali.It was found that Ali had faster
hands than Sugar Ray.So I doubt that either Tyson or Patterson matched Ali's handspeed.
What about Ali's uniquely dazzling,brilliant footwork ? Definitely unmatched by any other
heavyweight.
With respect,your assumption that Ali is overrated just doesn't make sense.

 

With respect you are using a very flawed argument.Yes across the broad span of world class sports,
performances have improved.However we are specifically addressing the prowess of Muhammad Ali
in comparison to that of other heavyweight-champions.
There has simply been no heavyweight-champion either before,or since,Muhammad Ali that combined
his superlative handspeed, dazzling footwork,granite chin,ring iq,or unbelievable stamina.
I'm asking this question in genuine curiosity-do you really think Oleksandr Usyk equals Ali
in the above qualities ?
Do you genuinely believe,for instance,that Usyk could fight Joe Frazier for 14 brutal,fast-paced
rounds in a temperature estimated to be 125 fahrenheit ? ( re the Thriller in the Manila )

 

Anything is possible. And if there was or is such a fighter, I’m guessing that chances are it’s probably someone none of us would pick to do it…someone with a stylistic attribute that could have been Ali’s kryptonite

 

I am the one who said they matched his hand speed, which they did. And what Jacobs said is irrelevant, he was biased towards Ali.

 

Wouldn't say the worst as Williams certainly didn't get any better as he aged.

Williams was quite obviously a shell of himself against Ali, but what seldom gets mentioned is that even other contenders like Chuvalo struggled greatly with even this version of Williams, taken the distance, and rocked on numerous occasions.

Mac Foster, a huge puncher in his own right took longer to KO an even further depleted Williams, and struggled in both their bouts, rupturing his ear drum in the first bout, and according to the ring (who actually rated that round, the fifth best round of the year) the losing end of a fierce exchange before unleashing a murderous left hook to end things in the rematch.
So I don't buy that this win is unimpressive, solely because of Williams condition. Nobody replicated it, before or after.

 

The delusion is overwhelming.

 

"his superlative handspeed, dazzling footwork,granite chin,ring iq,or unbelievable stamina"

This was true in the 60's, it's not true by modern standards. Remember how many people thought that Wlad was slow? When he was actually extremely athletic, quicker than Lewis despite being slightly bigger? Emmanuel Steward also said that Wlad was "significantly superior to Ali in a number of technical respects" and Ali was Steward's 1st or 2nd "greatest" boxer along with Louis.

I don't consider Joe Frazier to be some kind of monster when Usyk has twice successfully navigated a 6'6, 240-245 lbs athletic, accomplished heavyweight titlist who has more than enough firepower to destroy Frazier in 2 rounds as 6'3, 217 lbs Foreman did.

If young Ali was the kind of Marvel superhero you make him out to be then he shouldn't have been going life and death with Cooper or having a highly competitive fight over 11.5 rounds with 6'1.5, 73 inch reach, 195 lbs, 31% KO ratio, 0 KO's in his last 5, suspect-chinned Euro champ and German LHW amateur champion Mildenberger. Replace Mildenberger with Usyk and I honestly believe that 1966 Ali loses every minute of every round. He may have even got stopped on accumulation and exhaustion, having been previously KO'd by a southpaw in the amateurs (his only ever clean KO defeat).

 

It's reality, whether you like it or not.

 

"Highly competitive" is a bit of a stretch for Ali-Mildenberger. Mildenberger won maybe two rounds in the course of being beaten to a pulp. It was certainly a lot less competitive than Usyk's hard-fought decision against the ageing, frequently defeated fringe contender Derek Chisora.

 

Ali was never KO'd clean.

 

Ali also never fought prime Sullivan without a moustache.

 

What evidence is there to suggest Jim Jacobs was biased towards Ali ? Why was the opinion
of Jim Jacobs irrelevant ?
As well as being the very shrewd,successful manager of the young Mike Tyson,Jacobs (as I have
previously stated ) accumulated the world's largest fight collection.
So I repeat both questions-what evidence exists that proves Jim Jacobs was biased towards Ali ?
Why is the opinion of Jim Jacobs irrelevant ?

 

It could be compared to Usyk-Bellew with the the difference that I don't know if Ali was behind at any point and that Ali hadn't faced a southpaw before (at least not in the pros) while Usyk of course had faced a lot of conventional fighters.