The Great Heavyweight Debate: Muhammad Ali vs. Joe Louis - Who's the HW GOAT?

One could make the same arguments for Conn having no chance against Louis considering that Louis had kayoed Lee Ramage twice, decisioned Pastor, kayoed Pastor and kayoed Henry Lewis in one round. Yet Conn was competitive up until he slowed down from exhaustion and Louis picked him off.
I understand what you mean when you say that Conn wouldn't have the speedy footwork advantage over Ali, nor any power or weight advantage but his chin and skill would have him see the end. Unless you think Ali would be a better pressure fighter than Louis in this occasion.

 

But really how more more impressive "Are" they"
If you look at styles, Foreman and Baer pretty much swing for the fences hoping for a knockout. Norton gave Ali fits, like Godey gave Louis the same type of fits, the thing that parts em is Ali never really figure out how to master Norton's style where Louis destroy Godey in the rematch. No one matches Frazier style wise on Louis's victims, but even an old Louis still push green Marciano.

 

Watch the Thrilla. Ali became a pressure fighter for much of that fight. If you make him trade he will trade.

 

It's Ali for me, and I admire Louis more. It still comes down to 1a and 1b, and which one goes where. Louis had amazing amount of defenses and some astounding records, but Ali was extremely relevant if not a defining figure in two different eras and faced a murderer's row of fighters, one which was not exactly available for Joe, though his names are actually far, far better than the bum of the month label would suggest.

It's a choice between who is more inspiring: Captain America or Superman. Both fighters embodied pure heavyweight greatness.

 

He faced Jones in an exhibition in 1966 and schooled him, so that gives us an idea of how peak Ali would do against him. Jones was on the slide then tbf, but one thinks he'd be motivated for that exhibition.

 

There's a YouTube of it and an article on the internet. The article said he was so outclassed he forfeited any shot at a rematch.

 

Being motivated isn't really much when you're way past your best and less than 2 weeks before you've lost every round to Thad Spencer.

 

I really don't understand the arguments these guys make about Ali "struggling" with Jones. Jones landed a few good punches early in the fight. Ali adjusted and took over after that. If they had fought again a month later, Jones wouldn't have laid a hand on him, IMO. Jones had his moment and then it was over. Don't get me wrong, Jones was a good fighter, but he was too small to compete for long as a heavyweight. Conn would have had the same problem with Ali. Billy was too small, especially since Ali's foot and hand speed was arguably just as fast, if not faster than Conn's.

 

Common sense tells me, and watching Ali fight. Ali got dropped hard by Cooper right before he beat Liston but that sort of thing was never happening again after he came out the other side of their two title fights. Jones just wasn't that good and fighting an Ali of a couple of years later would show that up. It's no big perceived stylistic dilemma or crippling weakness.

Ali has some height on Conn and plenty of reach as well. He'd light Conn up as the rounds went by with flashing straight punches. Conn didn't even rise above the light heavyweight limit in his most important heavyweight fight ever. It's simply too much to give away. Evidently he was much more suited to troubling a guy like Louis which can be seen on film.

 

It's clutching at straws. If one wants to be hyper critical Joe is the easy one to tear into. He had solid trouble with multiple guys at his best and some of them just weren't much chop.

 

It's not a good reflection on the state of the division is it. Lewis beat Ettore, who was on the fringes of the ten 2 out of 3, all fought in the first half of 1937. Ettore won just two of his next seven fights, and they weren't noted victories.

The only fight Risko won in a 5 fight block starting with John Henry was over a guy who had 24 losses to one win. He was a durable spoiler at his best and his best was long long gone.

Elmer Ray at the career stage John Henry fought him was 11 wins, 9 losses and 8 draws. He was still losing to guys with 2 fights 2 years after fighting Lewis. He was years away from making his noise. As a matter of fact i don't think he hit the ratings for another 7 years. Throwing him forward as a name is more than a little disingenuous and Risko is in a similar boat.

So we are left with close and sometimes controversial fights with Ettore, who was fringe 10. Not bad, not amazing.

Neither Lewis nor Conn were really heavyweights. Patterson aimed for the division early and stayed there for good. Conn and Lewis had hugely successful and long careers at the lower weights. They flirted with heavyweight at the end of their careers. There's a huuuuuge difference.

 

Ettore was recently rated in the top 10. Risko had beaten Max Baer and Jack Sharkey. Ray was still green and hadn't hit his stride but if Lewis was as useless as you make him out to be he wouldn't have gotten past any of these guys.
Clearly Lewis knew how to work around his vision issues. He had beaten Al Gainer recently too, on top of those guys i just mentioned.

Patterson achieved more at heavyweight because he stuck around after Liston beat him. Lewis retired and Conn was forced to stop due to WW2 and after the rematch he retired. He was never the same after the 4 years off.

 

I'm sorry but Ali's resume clears very hard, the list goes on for very long.

Liston x2, Patterson x2, Terrell, Quarry x2, Bonavena, Ellis, Bob Foster, Norton x2, Frazier x2, Foreman, Lyle, Bugner x2, Young (astrick), and Shavers.

 

Neither. There's pros and cons about any of the heavyweight champs throughout history. You can make a case for some of them but there is no clear cut winner in that discussion. Not for me anyway.

 

1) Would liked to have voted for The Brown Bomber. Voted for Ali.

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2) You can only fight the guys who are there to fight. Can't dock Louis for not literally fighting Liston, Frazier, Norton, Foreman. If Joe's opponents weren't quite that impressive (though one could debate M Baer, Schmeling or Walcott vs. Norton), that itself is not Joe's fault.
Basically, one can ask two very similar questions: 1) did 'X' treat his best competition as one might expect a great champion to treat them? (This includes whether 'X' fought them at all, and applies to the opponents as a group as well as individually -- that is, even a great champion in their prime doesn't have the fight of their life every bout, and even a great champion experiences some flux of general ability over a period of time ; as phrase I believe I read Ted Spoon once use: quality of performance in light of quality of opposition -- or, similarly, as I once read of baseball great Henry Aaron saying, you look at how dominant a guys was and you look at how dominable his situation was.
Our knowledge of a boxers ableness begins in his effect upon and relationship to his opposition, so it is critical to have an understanding of that opposition. At the same time, it's not logically impossible (if improbable) that the greatest boxer ever might have appeared in an relatively undistinguishd era.

Ali certainly fought the best of his time (aside from fighting Holmes a bit outside of that viable window). Louis largely fought the best there was to fight, aside from Ray and Bivins. Even such criticism is moderated by the WWII moratorium on championship bouts, when the claims of Ray and Bivins stood highest, and the extreme demand ($1,000,000 gate) for a Louis-Conn rematch.