Which Heavyweight Is Possibly Overrated Because Of Nostalgia?

All you've done is score every decent round for Ali as even so you can conjure up widest possible scorecard for Shavers.

How comes no ringside reporters or the judges or any boxing fan on this site has a scorecard anywhere close to yours giving Ali only 3 rounds ? there's your answer.

Well he must of done something for you to conjure up that 7 rounds could be scored even hence that goes against your original narrative that "no way Ali won" if you think pretty much half the rounds are debatable.

So you've pretty much just admitted what we all know that you dislike Ali hence your opinion isn't to be taken seriously thanks for confirming that.

It is a joke every decent round Ali had you scored even and you gave Shavers the benefit of the doubt in every other close round.

That's called not being objective.

 

Liston is almost totally untested against huge punchers though and the information we do have (Martin, Ali, Williams) etc is not very encouraging. Ali was hurting him early in their first fight and Williams punches were bothering him. It seems like a massive leap of faith to favor him over massive hitters like Dubois and Itauma and to make things worse he wasn't that difficult to hit.

Why is blasting him out not a viable path to victory for these guys despite Liston's reach and boxing skills?

 

I already told you I did no such thing. I gave Ali the rounds I thought he deserved. There were many rounds where I thought none did enough to edge them, so I scored them even.

Cause they were clueless about boxing and biased towards Ali.

It does not go against my narative at all. If you score those 7 rounds even, and Shavers wins way more of the 8 that remain, my narrative is perfectly valid.

I've never hidden that fact, I've always said I consider him the most overrated boxer in history.

My opinion is to be taken seriously. Me thinking Ali is overrated does not influence my assessment of his fight with Shavers.

I gave Ali all the rounds I thought he actually won. The fact that you think he won more and I don't, doesn't make me less objective.

 

What else could Ali do? He beat every top 10 fighter in the Ring Magazines rankings in 1963 except for Eddie Machen who he never fought and than beat every top 10 heavyweight in Ring Magazines 1973 rankings

Heavyweights Light Heavyweights Middleweights
Sonny Liston, Champion
1963 Rankings

1. Cassius Clay
2. Doug Jones
3. Ernie Terrell
4. Cleveland Williams
5. Zora Folley
6. Eddie Machen
7. Floyd Patterson
8. Karl Mildenberger
9. George Chuvalo
10. Brian London

1973 Rankings

Heavyweights
George Foreman, Champion

1. Muhammad Ali
2. Joe Frazier
3. Ken Norton
4. Jerry Quarry
5. Ron Lyle
6. Earnie Shavers
7. Oscar Bonavena
8. Joe Bugner
9. Jimmy Ellis
10. Chuck Wepner

 

He beat four Olympic Gold Medalists from the 1956 to the 1976 Olympics which shows the amazing breadth of his career, two top ten atg heavyweights and a bubble top ten heavyweight , and six members of the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

 

Pull the other one it's obvious what you did.

You scored every good or decent round Ali had as an even round to conjure up the widest scorecard possible for Shavers your scorecard is a joke.

Or maybe you're clueless and biased towards your hate for Ali ? how comes your scorecard is not anywhere close to the average scorecard that's a "you" issue.

If you deem 7 rounds as debatable which is pretty much half the rounds then it does go against your narrative that there's "no way Ali won".

If you admit to disliking a fighter and can't score a fight objectively then yes your opinion shouldn't be taken seriously.

You scored 3 rounds for Ali and scored every other good or decent round he had as even which is pathetic it's clear what your agenda is.

 

AP had it 10-5 Ali and UPI had it 9-6 Ali. There have been bouts they scored against him. For instance UPI had Ali- Norton 3 for Norton 8-7. There's other instances.

 

I would never watch a fight on mute, i need to hear the impacts.

 

I meant with Coetzee.

It looked like happening on 2-3 occasions.

 

I’ve said that the exception is HW.


The issue, is that you say things like:

“It’s not disputed in other sports”


Maybe not.

But it has to be in the sport.


It’s truly, truly baffling, that we still have fans who genuinely believe in continuous evolution.

The proof that there isn’t such a thing, is literally there for us all to see.

 

I know what he did.

But you have to apply context and look at the circumstances.

No, it was not the same as it is today, which was my initial point.


Looking back, it would have been nice if he’d have faced the winner of King’s small WBA tournament. But like every other fighter who ever worked with King, they had a strained relationship.

King had huge control over things back then.

The other thing to note, is that there was no huge public demand for Larry to fight a guy like Tate in the way that we have wanted Tyson Fury and AJ to have fought for years.


It wasn’t Manny vs Floyd.

Larry was ‘The Man’ and the WBA guy was seen as a lesser fighter.

Also, Tate didn’t even make a single defence of it.

The title was passed around between lots of different fighters.


Now if there’d been a WBA champ for years, who was seen as an equal, who’d made several defences of his title, alongside of Larry’s WBC defences, then that would have been completely different. But that wasn’t the case.

Coatzee held it for the longest, and the fight was on and off numerous times, due to venues and money etc.

As a fan, I wish that he’d have fought Tate and Page.

But to me, they’re just small omissions.

I can’t be hard on a guy who wanted to get away from a long term contract with King, and who fought guys such as: Shavers, Norton, Weaver, Witherspoon, Tyson, Evander and Mercer etc.

Yes, he gave up his WBC after a long reign, to break free. And yes, he gave legitimacy to the IBF. That was his prerogative.


The initial point was:

There was no public demand to hold 3 belts, and no dispute whatsoever, in who was the best HW.

That was my initial point.

The landscape was different back then.


The IBF didn’t come onboard until about 1983/1984, which was towards the end of his reign.

Nobody was desperate for him to fight John Tate or Mike Weaver, in order to see who the best HW was.

People knew that Larry was the best HW.


Now under different circumstances, without King having a monopoly etc, maybe he’d have had a desire to have obtained all of the belts.

We’ll never know.

However, I can’t say that he outright ducked anybody, out of a fear of losing to them etc, and it wasn’t in anyway like it is today.

Again, his circumstances were completely different.

 

I have already discussed this with you previously.

You never came back.


Again, I’m not arguing about evolution.

Again, what I’m saying, is that there isn’t any continuous evolution.


There has been no advancements or new techniques learnt or invented, in years.

I don’t care what happens or has happened in other sports, as they are other sports.

Sprinting or swimming from point A to B, has nothing to do with 2 men fighting in a boxing ring.


Now you can say that today’s swimmers and sprinters are the quickest and best throughout history.

But you can’t say that about boxing, because they are numerous fighters and entire divisions from yesteryear, which were superior than today, by any metric.


Today’s fighters are not the best fighters of all times.

Also, your football/basketball analogy doesn’t hold up.

You would not pick any 60’s or 70’s teams to beat any of the modern ones.

Yet there’s probably 100 fighters from those eras, who would be able to have beaten modern day guys.


Yes, it’s a lazy generalisation.

You have zero proof that the fighters today are faster and stronger. Or bigger. Apart from at HW.

It’s not the evolution of man that has dramatically changed. It’s just the rules of the sport.


Yes, for example, the WW’s today are bigger.

But that’s only because the WW’s of yesteryear weighed 147 pounds on the day of the fight, before fighting hours later, with only a 2-3 pound increase.

Look at ‘Boots’ Ennis.

Yes, he’s bigger than Leonard and Benitez etc.

But he wouldn’t be able to weigh-in at 147 pounds, then fight a few hours later.


Fighters today, have the weigh-ins the day before, where some of them rehydrate by huge, ridiculous amounts.

Now if all of the organisations put out a statement today, saying that from the 1st of Jan next year, that the same day weigh-ins were back, about 90% of the fighters in all of the non HW divisions, would all have to move up a division or two.

So it’s giving you a false reading of the landscape.

‘Boots’ would have to fight at MW.

Back in the day, Canelo would have spent his career between MW-LHW.


So ‘Boots’ etc, are all bigger than the old WW’s.

But they’re not bigger than the old MW’s, which is who they would be with the old rules.


The fighters today aren’t superior.

Again, zero evidence to say they’re generally all faster and stronger etc.


They’re also clearly not fitter than fighters of the past who used to fight monthly and bi monthly.

They’re also not all more skilled.


I don’t care if they have old footage to review.

I don’t care if they have access to sports science etc.


If there’s continuous evolution, which is what you believe, you can come and try and explain to me, why today’s WW’s aren’t on the level of the ones from 45, 30 and 20 years ago.

You can try and explain why most of the MW’s today, couldn’t even have competed against the MW’s of 30-40 years ago.


Again they aren’t anomalies.

I can go through numerous divisions.

We can also look at the top P4P lists from throughout history.


There’s been no advancements in this sport for decades. And as I grew up through the 80’s and 90’s, I can tell you for sure that the 90’s contained better fighters across the board than today, which was over 30 years ago.

 

Overrated:

Sullivan - fought an entirely different sport during a transition period. Closer to a tough man contestant in my opinion than a M of Q champion. That said may have had exceptional natural talent and may have been an exceptional cruiser weight in another time and series of circumstances. As is I have no idea if he would have beaten Kimbo Slice.

Jeffries - I have no clue if he was as good as Chuvalo or not , looks horrendous on film. At 212 and 6' 1 1/2" he would not have physically dominated in the 1960's let alone today. That said, he was a hard man from an era of hard men with earned strength and speed ( he was a sprinter too) , a serious athlete so who knows what he may have been if properly trained ... keep in mind how few fighter he had ... Maybe today he's a Tommy Morrison with a steel chin. Who knows ?

Dempsey - an all time what if at best, at worst the luckiest guy to ever lace the gloves. He has terrific speed, power, a rock chin, insane killer instinct and heart . In addition he was an exceptional athlete so again who knows.

Marciano - a true tough little guy, incredible condition, terrific chin, thudding power but truly, the level of opposition and size of that level cannot be justified/looked passed / ignored. Period. Areal fighter for sure with pitch perfect career timing.

Underrated:

Johnson - Beyond gifted, belonged to that rare air of fighter that controlled pace and nullified others ... he's in there with the Gans, the Hopkins, the Whitakers, the Mayweathers , the Wards ... nobody can begin to conceive let along judge or pass judgment on him based on what he went through ... start with he was the son of former slaves.

Tunney - an exceptional , lightning fast, extremely smart fighter

Charles - a top , all time , P4P great .. no one fought , again and again and again and beat the level of fighter he did in the 1940's other than Langford .. .. the fact that he even completed at heavyweight as well and as long as he did is exceptional s he pretty much could have stayed a light heavy his whole career. A tragic , tragic ending of an exceptional fighter. He may have been # 1 at 160, 168 and 175.

Frazier: Absurdly underrated. A small, one eyed swarmer fighter much larger men his who career ... Fighters know great fighters and all praised Joe. He's just too small with is style to be in the highest level of all time heavyweights but he is without a doubt in the top ten all time at heavyweight ranking P4P.

Holmes - He's gotten more credit than he did in the 80's but he was an incredible fighter .. aside from his speed, his reach ( 80" plus) , his jab and his ring intellect , he was as tough and as gutsy as anyone , ever.

 

Well of course since you’ve replied to them, I’ve already addressed most points of contention contained in your post so I won’t repeat my opinion on the points in question.

We simply disagree on said points which is cool.

As to some fresh things you raised.

Shavers’ believing a hurt opponent was more dangerous therefore he hung off?

I disagree with that also. When he detected real hurt, Shavers absolutely went for it, sometimes too hard and clumsily. He simply wasn’t sure exactly how hurt Ali was.

Ali was certainly wobbled but in no way near out on feet. I don’t believe that it was an opportunity missed as much as the story telling has it.

Shortly thereafter, Ali retreated to the ropes for some rope a dope. Unlike Foreman, Earnie picked his power punches beautifully and Ali moved off the ropes in quick time.

Also, it wasn’t as if Earnie didn’t land a good number of his Sunday bests flush on Ali’s chin. If he was ever going to KO Ali, those punches should’ve done the trick - yet Ali didn’t even suffer a knockdown.

I will say in fights where quantity of punches vs quality of punches are drawn into sharper focus, the scoring can be somewhat more difficult with people disagreeing on the punch exchange rate that should be applied.

In respect of the above conundrum, Hagler vs Leonard is perhaps another good example.

 

If it’s not a thing already, one would think that AI could handle isolating and muting commentary leaving all other sounds otherwise alone.

A good first test batch would be all the fights Howard Cosell called. But, then again, you would be deprived of the perverse joy of getting angry with him.