FotC Frazier vs Wlad (Chagaev fight)

Wlad scores a flash knockdown in the fourth round, ends up bloody and stumbling in the 6th and brutally stopped.

 

You don't see Joe pounding from the inside out? The hooks to the body....

Even though Wlad was a more than formidable physical specimen and an ATG for sure, I think he'd torque Joe off and that would pretty much spell the end. Looking back over Smoke's fightography, he seemed to like guys like Wlad.

Wlad did have the kind of punch that could demo Joe, of course. But the driven nature of FOTC Joe is just too inexorable a force imo...

 

Frazier by KO...

 

I really like Joe Frazier but Wlad is so big that he’d literally just lean on him, the same is true of Lennox with say Marciano… eventually inside fighting can become impossible as the size of the opponent reaches silly proportions (as it is with Wlad) Muhammad Ali who wasn’t even overly good at legitimate clinching defanged him. Wlad also punches much sharper and conclusively then GF, mismatch IMO.

 

i wouldn't be shocked if Wlad stopped Frazier early. I don't think Wlad's punches were any harder than Foremaan. A bit faster but not quite as heavy.

That being said, Wlad was a very very heavy hitter. If he lands a big straight right hand on Joe's chin, it could result in a brutal knockdown for which even Frazier would not be able to recover from.

The one advantage Joe has is that Wlad was conservative when throwing uppercuts while Foreman threw better uppercuts than anyone. That being said, Wlad is so big and powerful that its quite realistic for him to stop Frazier early.

 

I see an interview with Byrd where he spoke about fighting both the Klitschko brothers. And he was very impressed with Wladimir's power he said he hit atleast 3x as hard as Vitali.

I'm not a fan of Wladimir and I love Frazier as a fighter but as I've said numerous times Frazier is a bit of unknown quantity against real big hitters. He never really defeated a notable KO artist like Shavers, Lyle, etc.

Wladimir would tower over Frazier and has the power to do him some serious damage.

Frazier wouldn't just be able to walkthrough Wladimir's punches and I think the size/reach disadvantage for Frazier aswell as the serious power Wladimir has would be a big issue for Frazier.

 

For my 0.2 I think Frazier had a good chin, he ducked into punches and got hit coming in that’s hard to wear and he did it with Ali who is considered an underrated puncher, Bonavena could smite people of all people Ellis the former 160lber had real, REAL good pop… with GF he wasn’t disconnected entirely from his senses more beaten into submission and that was still after a shot to the back of the head.