Youngest Heavyweight Champion Ever: Patterson or Tyson?

Tyson

 

There really has never been a correct and fair way to establish challengers and champions since the beginning of boxing but I agree with what your saying, its the closest and best way of evaluating things.

 

At the time of the Patterson-Moore fight, was anyone disputing that it was for the legitimate World Heavyweight Championship? Not that I've ever heard. A quick search of Google Archives confirms this (unless you count Eddie Machen's "Patterson should have to go through me first."). Rocky Marciano, the previous champion, acknowledges Patterson-Moore as being for the vacant title, along with everyone else.

Tyson's case is more like Sonny Liston's. He's blowing out all the contenders and waiting his turn for a title shot from a champion who has lost much of the public's respect. The only difference is that some of Tyson's opponents had belts from these crazy organizations who think their stamp of approval means something.

When Patterson beat Moore there was no doubt that he was champion. The only way Tyson can claim to be youngest champion is if Michael Spinks had gone away and there was UNIVERSAL recognition of one of Tyson's pre-Spinks bouts as being for the World Heavyweight Championship. But Michael Spinks didn't go away. He stayed active and kept on defending his championship. Even, eventually, against his 21 363/366ths year old universally recognized best challenger.

Floyd Patterson is the youngest heavyweight champion ever.

(Luther McCarty hadn't turned 21 yet when he won his title...)

 

The point is if you go down the chain of Patterson's title you may find a similar break.

 

Yes the lineal title is theoretical.

Yes its lineage is long since been broken.

Yes it is riddled with inconsistencies.

However it is still the only way that you will ever trace any claim for the title back to its origins, and it is still the premise on which the average boxing fan (including you) judges the history of the title.

In summarry, that is what you are stuck wioth untill/unless you can suggest a different premist for judging the history of the title.

 

Nice job,

Thread closed.

 

Also the then highly respected Police Gazette had a lot to do with the origins. And although it contradicted many by insisting that Peter Jackson had the best claim to the title; Jackson's defeat to Jeffries and then Jim's win over Fitzsimmons, brought everything into sync.

 

Perfect. Then we agree that since BOTH men won the title in the exact same ( vacant ) fashion, then Tyson was the younger champion....

Phew, it sure took a long time to establish that one.

 

The counterpoint is that you can't tinker with the heavyweight lineage in one place (whatever its faults) unless you are going to aply the same standard to the whole lineage.

Everybody here accepts:

• That John L Sullivan was the first gloved champion.

• That Sullivan lost the title to Corbett.

• That Corbett retired allowing Sharkey and Fitzsimmons to fight for the vacant title, but that said title claim evapourated when he came out of retirment.

• That Corbett lost the title to Fitzsimmons.

• That Fitzsimmons lost the title to Jeffries.

• That Jeffries retired leaving Marvin Hart and Jack Root to fight for the vacant title (on what authaurity?).

• That the title claim emerging out of Hart Root did not evapourate when Jeffries came out of retirment.

These things are never questioned.

 

The difference is that Rocky Marciano was not active and still claiming the title when Tyson unified the claims.

 

Doesn't matter. And frankly, I'd like to see you produce some sort of written rule that proves otherwise, because if you can't, then its just made up nonsense.....

A champion retiring honorably is stripped of his title, while another is rewarded for merely keeping a valid boxing license in his wallet? Doesn't work that way. Going by this logic, Micheal Spinks could have gone on for years or even a full decade cherry picking tomato cans, while men like Holyfield, Tyson, Lewis and Bowe would have been considered carbon copies... You know as well as I do that the press, the fans, the experts, or even the ring magazine and yourself never would have bought it....

The old adage that a man has to beat the man to become the man, is a very old and ( proabably ) unwritten rule that was likely created to protect white men from relinquishing the title to black men. It had very little to no meaning by the mid point in the century as clearly proven by Patterson's acquistion of the crown with little objection from anyone else, and frankly it shouldn't have any bearing on Tyson's acceptance as champ upon beating Tony Tucker for the same fragment that Spinks junked...

 

On what authority was Sullivan awarded the title and who deemed his opponents worthy to challenge for the title. Blacks werent even allowed to fight for the title back then right? So really the whole thing has been flawed all the way through.

 

Peter Jackson was by far the best Black Heavyweight. He drew with Corbett, but more importantly lost his claim to the title by losing to Jim Jeffries, who then goes on to beat the only other claim in 1899, that of Bob Fitzsimmons.

So the flawed argument, due to racial discrimination, does not stand.

 

Bingo...

Where is there a written rule ( and one that is still valid by today's standards ) that has all these principles about lineage?

 

Lineage has rarely had a written rule, just look at the Monarchs of Britain...

Yet there is little argument that Elizabeth II is the Queen of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, at the moment.