Was Holyfield the last dominant respected American HW?

Even though he's associated with the late 80s-90s era he actually fought so long that he was in championship fights as late as 2008, years after his rivals had retired.

 

Yep, there was also Byrd and Toney but they weren't anywhere near as dominant at heavyweight

 

No. Wilder was.

 

Holyfield was never dominant though.

His first reign lasted 2 years and during that time he showed plenty of vulnerabilities struggling against old Holmes, old Foreman, Cooper.

His 2nd reign lasted 3 years but he only had like 3 fights during that period.

I respect Holyfield for his fantastic resume and achievements.

But he was never dominant at Heavyweight IMO.

 

He was never respected like he should have been. Kind of hard luck.

 

He was never respected the same way as Holyfield.
People respect Evander for the way he fought and kept on coming back.
He came along in a great era.
Wilder never really captured the heart of the fans like EH , he just had that rep for knocking out guys, mostly unknown tbh.

 

Fair or not, never felt like Wilder was respected as a HW champ.

 

Wilder deserves more respect. Not as much as Holy but a lot more than he gets.

 

100% correct

 

That's rose tinting. He was a PED fueled, headbutt machine who couldn't string together much of a title reign.

 

He had a much longer reign than Holyfield ever had and had global appeal in the social media era for knocking guys' heads off.

If Wilder weren't respected, there's no reason why the Chisora fight would've been such a big deal.

 

He wasnt fighting Szpilka and Duhaupas.

 

Never lineal.

 

That isn't even close to the question. But Briggs was lineal after Holyfield if you're into invisible belts.

 

He was fighting Bert Cooper and Michael Moorer.