Joe Louis v Al McCoy - McCoy was a 180 lb. Fighter who had lost 3 out of his last 4. His last 2 losses before the Louis fight was to light heavyweights Babe Risko v Tony Fisher - Fisher had a record of 7-11 with 7 NDs. And lost his last 2 fights. What business did he have fighting for the middleweight title?
Holmes and Tyson vs M.Frazier were terrible mismatches. But the one that sticks out in my mind is Gatti vs Gammache. Gatti looked like a middleweight compared to Gammache who looked like a lightweight against him. Every time Gatti landed something substantial on him Gammache would go down. And than the knockout was one of the most brutal ones caught on film and it ended Gammache's career. My fault , thought it was a championship fight.
I've always wondered that myself - I looked into it recently & according to this article in the NY Times, "Fisher's home-town popularity won him the title chance. His outstanding performance was a decision triumph over Lou Halper last Summer." Ironically, according to this post-fight article, both the crowd size & Risko's performance ended up being disappointments as "the Syracuse fighter didn't add to his prestige and won little if any glory before a disappointing crowd of 2,500 fans who turned out for the city's first indoor middleweight title bout."
Wasn’t that also a PPV/CC fight? Let Leonard carry the heavy load going up a division to beat Kalule while Tommy was feasting on a cupcake.
I’d dispute that one. Roman was ranked I believe (going off-hand), & Foreman had just taken a very large step up in class the fight before. Immediately after winning the title, he’d earned a fringe contender. It’s not like Holmes who made an entire title reign of carefully managed opposition.