Rocky Marciano has a very good case for #1...

How would he deal with someone like Tyson?

 

Foreman, Liston and Lewis would hurt him badly.

 

...........Unless someone can show me Marciano's results in a Vo2 max. test, any claim that he has "the greatest stamina in boxing history" is really a rather silly claim. There is no way to tell that.

The rest of it is just fanboy stuff. Great fighter, for sure, but.......

 

Which rounds did you see Ali "cruise" against Frazier? I can't remember one round in their three meetings where Frazier let Ali have an easy time. Ali did slow down in some rounds, but that didn't mean Frazier did.

I wouldn't be at all surprised if Frazier's punch output was better on average than Marciano's. Manilla is said to be the HW title fight with most punches thrown, and this when both guys was well past their prime.

As for Ali-Marciano... Anything a 38 year old Walcott could do, a prime Ali could do way better.

 

Be sure that there is a reason I clicked on this thread, and that is to rofl.

:rofl

That is all.

 

A monster two-handed puncher like Foreman given "little chance". ALL heavyweight punchers always have a chance.

 

He ws faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive and able to leap tall buildings in a single bound ... atsch .... there is nothing like Marciano fans .. they think he was a messiah ...

Rocky was a great crusierweight ... a warrior, great power, chin, heart and stamina ... however guys, he was human.

 

And Ali is a God.

 

I believe you might be thinking of a certain US politician...

 

Tyson, Foreman, Dempsey and Frazier would give The Rock hell.

 

Rest by sured that Liston, Lewis and Holmes would all school Marciano.

Foreman and Tyson would probably TKO him. Dempsey likewise.

 

As much as I truly respect and admire Rocky Marciano, I think awarding him the position of #1, is a very difficult case to make. Granted, he is the only heavyweight champion to have never lost a pro match, defeated several hall of famers in convincing fashion, and at one point, had the the highest win/Ko ratio ever, until Foreman surpassed it. All of the above acheivments have cemmented Marciano's place in my personal top five, but I can't see rating him as number one. While the man certainly had quality as opposed to quanitity on his side, 7 title fights is not that many when compared to the resumes of Joe Louis and Muhammad Ali. Addtionally, I think those two men defeated a larger number of all time greats who were at or near their primes.

 

It's the FIGHTS/KOs ratio that matters, not wins/KOs. Otherwise, a guy who's 3-10 (3 KOs) has a higher knockout percentage than Foreman or Marciano. Marciano has the highest knockout percentage of any linear heavyweight champions.

Marciano had fewer title fights than Ali and Louis, but they had far more "throw-away" title fights than he did; Marciano had only one semi-throw-away title defense, that being the Cockell fight, which was still against a legitimate contender. Ali and Louis made a substantial portion of their title defenses against guys like Bob Roper, Richard Dunn, an old, shot-in-the-gut Cleveland Williams, etc. who were clearly not qualified challengers. Thus, I think the overall "substance" of Marciano's title reign as compared with Ali's and Louis' is much closer than an unadulterated "number-of-title-fights" statistic would lead one to believe.
Of course, even still, Ali and Louis had far greater top-tier longevity than Marciano did, with Rocky only fighting at the elite level for about five years in total, whereas they each had a span of three times that length in which they were competing near the top. If one places great emphasis on longevity, then yes, it is difficult to place Marciano ahead of Ali or Louis. I, too, place a good deal of emphasis on longevity, and so I also rank Ali and Louis ahead of Marciano; however, if one's criteria are slightly different, I think an all-time #1 ranking for Marciano is entirely reasonable. Surely it can't be unreasonable to rank the only undefeated heavyweight champion in history who had the most consecutive wins and highest knockout average of any linear champion, was 7-0 with 6 knockouts in world title fights, and defeated all of the top four to five best opponents of his era in clear-cut and decisive fashion as the greatest in history. For me, he's #4, but if one is being objective, I think the case for placing him as high as one wishes has to be seen as reasonable.