Can a case be made for David Haye as and ATG?

In my opinion no

 

British ATG yes. Otherwise it’s a no.

Very good fighter and some great achievements, some good and very good wins, but didn’t fight many times considering how long his career was.

 

Probably didn’t fight enough.

I really liked Haye and think he was quite underrated. He suffers a little due to a tendency to dismiss his achievements in retrospect; Valuev was some freak show plodder. Maccarenelli a chinny paper champion. Mormeck a bit of a nobody. Truth is all of those fights before they happened were close to fifty/fifty and many picked the opponent.

The Klitschko fight was a let down but Haye was possibly the first UK fighter since Lewis who really, genuinely seemed to want to fight the best. He could have gone up to heavyweight and spent a good few years fighting Monte Barrett types on the basis that he was a small guy at the weight, and nobody would have been shocked; instead he had one of those fights, signed for Klitschko (which he had to pull out of when Setanta went under) then fought Valuev.

Unlucky with injuries and just didn’t fight enough to be an all time great but on his day a massive puncher with speed as well and loads of bottle. Did a lot for British boxing in his own way.

 

Haye/Booth was one of the great partnerships.

An exciting fighter to watch in his pomp.

Easily one of the UKs best ever.

Such a shame how it all ended.

Good Luck towards the future.

 

Afraid not
Good talker good business man
Very good cruiser mediocre heavyweight

 

I have never been a fan of the cruiserweight division. I always looked at it as a catchweight sort of division were people pass through but never etch a career there, or shouldnt anyway.

With that in mind, although he did well in that division on its own it cant offer him ATG status.

The whole heavyweight portion of his career can easily be dismissed too. Valuev had lost to Holyfield but was gifted. He was one of the worst champions in the most recent history of the division. He was there by chance rather than ability. The Chisora result was a decent result but all this together doesn't make him an ATG not on an international level, definately a British great though.

 

No.

Very thin resume for HOF consideration, never mind ATG.

 

Side tracked here but what the hell. The Holyfield fight is an interesting example of a fight that nobody thought was a robbery at the time, but quickly became one.

I read an interesting article by a guy who I think was the boxing correspondent at The Times who was ringside for the fight, which received relatively little global coverage. Holyfield by consensus did better than expected, whilst Valuev looked ponderous, slow, almost unwilling to really engage with the sad, old little man he was fighting. When the result came there was little outcry; nearly everyone ringside wanted Holyfield to do it as the legendary underdog but he just hadn’t.

Then this guy gets home and apparently he was one of the people with a best seat in the house for one of boxing’s ultimate robberies. Based, he said, on the American commentary. I must admit, when worst robberies discussions happen I tend to immediately think of Casamayor Santa Cruz as the absolute worst of all time, with Lewis Holyfield I obviously one of the very worst for a big fight. But you still hear the Holyfield Valuev fight mentioned and it always struck me as odd that at least according to one guy who was ringside, nobody there had much issue with the verdict.

 

Best British CW of all time

Top 10 to Top 15 British HW of all time

Second man to Holyfield to be undisputed CW champion and then go onto win a world HW title strap.

It is a tough crowd here if that level of fighter can’t get much love.

 

I thought at the time Holyfield should have been awarded the fight.

 

Google Holyfield Valuev there are reports from different outlets immediately after the fight calling it a robbery

 

This.
A shame the fury fight never happened

 

But they seem to be second party’s who watched it remotely. I genuinely think it’s an example of a fight where the commentary massively influenced what people thought they were seeing.

I did just Google it. In terms of the British press there’s a report in the Telegraph saying they were ringside alongside writers from the Times and Sunday Times all of whom thought Valuev won. The Guardian didn’t report it as a robbery either; merely saying the fight was a desperate affair. My point is that you don’t expect that many ringside commentators saying it wasn’t a robbery if indeed it was.

Anyway, back to the thread. Fully agree with the above that a guy who ended up British, European, undisputed cruiser and winning a version of the heavyweight title is seen as a mug then the sport is even tougher than I thought!

 

Technically he wasnt the undisupted champion as he didnt have IBF. Still a gdeat achievement though.