Anthony Joshua is the most overrated Heavyweight in history

This thread is original...

 

Amen

Gifted gold
Bought his first belt
Lost to McDonald's then won a rematch which is his claim to being a X2 champ and he ran around the ring boasting about it like it was an achievement.

 

I don't think anyone "rates" Joshua above his commercial value

 

Exactly - guys putting him into the ATG category and/or talking about H2H fights with the greats were definitely overrating him, but he was still the clear frontrunner of a fairly weak era (until Fury returned and it became debatable).

But he wasn't even the most overrated of the era... It's impossible to be the most overrated ever when you have contemporaries who are more overrated.

There have always been guys rating Wilder as his equal, or even superior - and that's still the case now even though the general opinion of both of them has dropped... Despite Wilder having made 0 unification fights and despite Wilder's best win not even being good enough to make Joshua's top 3... You'd have to rate Wilder so far beyond his resume to even consider making that case that it's simply not credible.

And even setting aside Wilder...
Joyce getting rated as a top top contender for beating a prospect was more OTT.
Bakole getting rated as a top contender for beating a prospect was more OTT.
Ortiz getting rated as a legit contender for having beaten an overrated gatekeeper and clearing out gods waiting room was more OTT.

There is zero question that AJ is or ever was more overrated than any of these.
None.

And that, alone, means AJ cannot be the most overrated ever.

 

Adam smith commentary tried to make AJ sound like Mike Tyson on crack.

 

Both things can be true at once:

1. Anthony Joshua had a solid run between 2016 and 2019, unifying 3 belts, defending the titles a few times, and headlining a number of big stadium fights

2. Anthony Joshua is significantly overrated when you compare his hype level to his actual body of work, benefitting from (admittedly very effective) Matchroom marketing, to the point that there are still boxing fans who believe Joshua to be a top heavyweight even now in 2026 when he's shown no evidence of this for many years

 

Ratings move around and there are also historical rankings which have to be considered
Dubois is doing well and facing top fighters at this current time for example
Often with these threads, they become about Fury and Joshua
Fury won world titles Nov 2015
Joshua won a world title Apr 2016

So looking at the Ring annual rankings from 2016 and the contenders around and who fought who at some point

-----------------
2016
Tyson Fury, Champion

Wladimir Klitschko
Deontay Wilder
Kubrat Pulev
Luis Ortiz
Anthony Joshua
Joseph Parker
Bermane Stiverne
David Haye
Andy Ruiz Jr.
Dillian Whyte

Fury fought 3 of the above
Joshua fought 5 of the above
----------------------
2017
Tyson Fury, Champion

Anthony Joshua
Deontay Wilder
Joseph Parker
Alexander Povetkin
Luis Ortiz
Kubrat Pulev
Andy Ruiz Jr.
Dillian Whyte
Dominic Breazeale
Jarrell Miller

Fury fought 2 of the above
Joshua fought 6 of the above
--------------------
2018
Title Vacant
Anthony Joshua
Tyson Fury*
Deontay Wilder
Dillian Whyte
Luis Ortiz
Alexander Povetkin
Joseph Parker
Jarrell Miller
Adam Kownacki
Kubrat Pulev

Fury fought 2 of the above
Joshua fought 4 of the above
-------------------------
2019
Title Vacant
Tyson Fury*
Deontay Wilder
Anthony Joshua
Dillian Whyte
Luis Ortiz
Andy Ruiz Jr.
Alexander Povetkin
Joseph Parker
Michael Hunter Jr.
Adam Kownacki

Fury fought 2 of the above
Joshua fought 4 of the above
--------------------------
2020

Tyson Fury, Champion

Anthony Joshua
Deontay Wilder
Alexander Povetkin
Dillian Whyte
Luis Ortiz
Andy Ruiz Jr.
Joseph Parker
Michael Hunter
Oscar Rivas
Oleksandr Usyk

Fury fought 3 of the above
Joshua fought 5 of the above
--------------------------
2021
Tyson Fury, Champion

Oleksandr Usyk
Anthony Joshua
Deontay Wilder
Dillian Whyte
Joseph Parker
Andy Ruiz Jr.
Luis Ortiz
Joe Joyce
Filip Hrgovic
Frank Sanchez

Fury fought 3 of the above
Joshua fought 4 of the above
---------------
2022
Oleksandr Usyk, Champion

Tyson Fury
Deontay Wilder
Anthony Joshua
Joe Joyce
Andy Ruiz Jr.
Dillian Whyte
Luis Ortiz
Joseph Parker
Filip Hrgovic
Frank Sanchez

Fury fought 3 of the above
Joshua fought 4 of the above
Usyk fought 2 of the above
--------------------
2023

Oleksandr Usyk, Champion

Tyson Fury
Anthony Joshua
Zhilei Zhang
Joseph Parker
Filip Hrgovic
Frank Sanchez
Jared Anderson
Joe Joyce
Deontay Wilder
Agit Kabayel

Fury fought 2 of the above
Joshua fought 2 of the above
Usyk fought 2 of the above
Interestingly Chisora fought 6 of the above
-------------------------
2024
Oleksandr Usyk, Champion

Tyson Fury
Daniel Dubois
Joseph Parker
Zhilei Zhang
Agit Kabayel
Martin Bakole
Anthony Joshua
Filip Hrgovic
Fabio Wardley
Efe Ajagba

Fury fought 1 of the above
Joshua fought 3 of the above
Usyk fought 3 of the above
Dubois fought 3 of the above
------------

With the above for Fury it is 4 different opponents
8 fights
5 - 2 - 1

With the above for Joshua it is 9 different opponents
11 fights
7 - 4 - 0

With the above for Usyk it is 3 different opponents
6 fights
6 - 0 - 0

With the above for Wilder it is 6 different opponents
10 fights
5 - 4 - 1

I think re all of above may not be accurate but you can look through

There are other fighters who have passed through the top 10 like C Martin for example

 

He's the most overrated in history if you basically don't know jacksh** about boxing or have any sense of history. Which you have proven you don't.

 

That's not exclusive to British. Americans probably do it more.

 

When you agree with NoChin, that says a lot more about you.

 

That's a nice breakdown.

In fact, if you go back to the 2013 Ring Annual ratings, which is the year BOTH Deontay Wilder and Tyson Fury entered the Ring top 10 ratings ...

Deontay Wilder fought in 12 fights with EIGHT different opponents (as Helenius and Arreola are both included as the year began in 2014 - and Arreola remained until 2015) and Wilder's log goes up to 7-4-1.

And Deontay's just two questionable long counts by the referees in Fury 1 and Fury 3 from being 9-3 overall. And he gets the Usyk fights, instead of Fury.

Shows how bad referees can have a big impact on a career.

Wilder's just two referees' snap judgements away from being the 'big win" leader in that era.

 

AJ can't box everyone can see that and he's mentally fragile

Basically a bodybuilder with a decent straight right hand.

 

41 year old Vlad who hadn't fought in two years
24 year old Parker
39 year old Povetkin

That's the height of the resume. It's not as good as fanboys make it, but it's not terrible.

Joshua is certainly massively overrated. The variety of losses and his results in the past 8 years show that. The gold medal was not legitimate. That said, he was a top 3 HW for a few years. He was never definitively #1, but it would be unfair to say he was never top 3.

 

Next thread: AJ fans are the most deluded of all time

 

@NoChin this what we call a "headshot"... Time to close this thread.