Does Usyk's last performance affects his ranking on an ATG heavyweights list?

Dude, he's 39.

 

He hasn't yet, and just a few months earlier he put on one of the best performances of his career... Rico, on the other hand, is 37 and has had around 70 professional kickboxing bouts... as for boxing, he had one completely insignificant fight years ago—effectively just a debut. Usyk ought to have demonstrated a clear gap between Rico and Dubois; yet, compared to Usyk, Rico actually fared far better than Dubois—a fighter considered a strong number two, or perhaps even number one. This, along with Ngannou’s exploits, suggests the heavyweight division's standard is questionable; no one would claim Usyk reigned during a golden age of boxing, but rather in a lousy heavyweight era where an aging wrestler and an aging kickboxer—with no prior tune-up fights—could hold their own against the division's leader. You can't simply dismiss that by pointing to the two-year age difference.

Fury is younger than Ngannou.

 

I have not cast a vote because I think it is an unfairly binary choice. Is he overrated needs to be qualified by the context it is meant. He is the best fighter of his (weak) generation and despite being in fights where he HAS had the odd difficult round, he has, certainly at heavyweight, never looked like being in danger of losing. And yes, I count Rico fight there. He stopped Rico after many uncomfortable rounds and, another 'asterisk', it was likely one of his last fights, a money fight, and one regardless of anyone's claims, he was certainly under prepared for. If they fight again I'd expect even this old Usyk to have downloaded the info he needs, he has one of best boxing brains I've seen, and beat Rico comprehensively, although that is subjective opinion for sure.

We don't judge Ali, or Holmes or Louis on their worst night's do we? How many undefeated champions have we had. And, yes, we can question Usyk's small amount of fights and his 'fight 'em twice' record but, news flash, whilst this might not be the strongest division in history, Dubois, Fury and AJ would all be a handful for all but the top fighters in history. They might not beat the elite guys, but they might have a few big results.

Now, it's for this reason I don't have Usyk high on my hybrid 'unicorn 100%/100%/H2H/achievement' list. He does not make my top ten and neither do any of the above. However, on a top ten purely H2H list, I'd have both Usyk and Fury in my 10 regardless of having them well outside my other top ten.

So, no, I don't think 'Ricogate' affects his ATG ranking. But. I don't have him high on my ATG list....

 

The Dubois fight was almost a year before Rico. Ten months. At that age, a lot happens.

You keep citing Rico as 37, ignoring the fact that I have already taught you that Usyk has had about as many fights as Rico has rounds. At 39, after ten months of inactivity, 375 fights can catch up to you quick. Rico and his 70 3-5 round fights is a baby.

 

Didn't he have all those fights before the Dubois bout? Did the fight with Daniel really wreck him that badly?

If a guy who’s that shot is the heavyweight leader, it means the current heavyweight era really sucks... they have to take that into account when making comparisons.
Just imagine Rick Roufus—who tried his hand at boxing back in the 90s—beating Thomas Hearns...

 

I was actually more disappointed in him taking the fight itself, rather than the result. He really was a bastion of old school mentality and this was an unnecessary legacy mis-step IMO.

 

Nope, i didn't believe usyk was overrated before the fight. Im actually an usyk fan. So there is no any anti usyk agenda. I just wanna know what other people think about that performance. And how do they rate him now.

 

it does because modern fighters are held to standards that past fighters are not

and let's face it, the boxing industry and western fanbase never wanted the shorter skilled eastern european to be the best anyway...the haters have always been waiting to dismiss Usyk out of fears of his greatness since he was a cruiser.

 

Very well said and exactly as I feel in so far as being disappointed that Usyk took such a fight in the first place.

Despite same, at least for me, the fight itself still didn’t negatively impact his already, acceptably sealed legacy.

 

Yes, and then he got another year older. Fighters "get old" at that age or younger all at once sometimes.

We've already gone through this.

 

Really? Remind me: which heavyweight all-time great aged so much from fight to fight that he had to fight for his life against an athlete from another sport making his boxing debut?

 

We've already done this.

Holmes hit 35 and lost to a guy moving up two weight classes.

Ali went from serviceable to losing to a seven fight novice.

Canelo just recently losing to a guy coming up to fight him.

Happens all the time.

You need to read other people's posts. I'll not go through this all again.

 

Well I think Usyk wasn’t ideally prepared focused for this fight - of course that’s still on him but he still came away with the win.

I don’t think any fighter is unbeatable but it’s impractical to take a version of a fighter from a specific fight that he actually won to suggest that it proves he isn’t unbeatable.

Would Usyk, and we can include prime Usyk, take a proven ATG or at the least, a far better opponent than Verhoeven so lightly? The answer is a flat no imo.

As great Champs so often do, Usyk did exactly what he had to do to come away with the win against the opponent at hand.

Like it or not, even at age 39, Usyk still remains unbeaten and IF ill preparedness and lack of focus explained a less than stellar performance for the most part, I would expect a duly fit and focused Usyk to make far shorter work of Rico if they were to rematch - with his punch of choice of course being the uppercut from the get go.

 

So, you're comparing a 25-year-old Olympic boxing champion with seven professional fights to a 37-year-old kickboxer making his boxing debut?

Ok

 

COMING UP 2 WEIGHT CLASSES.

Yeah, GETTING BEAT by a fighter COMING UP TWO WEIGHT CLASSES TO UNLIMITED WEIGHT, is worse than BEATING a kickboxer.

Any anyone who is honest knows that.