1. Ali is the GOAT 2. Lyle was knocked outcold. 3. Norton was chiseled. 4. Completely irrelevant and 5. 5. So one need to be more than just supposed super heavyweight size. You've obviously accepted all these to be super heavyweights so Foreman really wasn't the only super heavyweight around tho heavens only knows exactly what defines a super heavyweight. That's the thing about Foreman. He gave the impression of being much bigger than he was because his strength and power was just so overwhelming. He fights above his weight more than just about anyone, ever.
Foreman didn’t come in at 220 for that fight. Wlad does not have a fatal flaw in his chin. He likely faced the hardest punchers during his reign compared to any of the other long reigning heavyweight champions (I.e. Louis, Holmes). Fun fact: Louis, Lewis, and Holmes were all supposedly chinny until they earned respect after retiring or late in their careers. Perhaps Foreman failed to put together a notable title reign because he was the one with the fatal flaws, namely being defenseless and having amateurish pacing.
So you think the extra 20-30 lbs Foreman carried in his older years was quality mass?? Klitschko has 15-20 lbs on prime Foreman and about 2 inches in height ... Hardly a massive difference. Young Foreman was better than old Foreman. Wladimir Klitschko fought hard punchers?? LOL. The best puncher he fought was a man who wasn't even a serious professional and he was embarrassed by him. Holmes and Louis were never KOed the way Klitschko has been ... I've never heard Holmes chin being questioned ... And Lewis also had a weak chin and the retooled Lewis with Steward focused on protecting his jaw ... But not to the extent that Wladimir Klitschko has had to protect his jaw. If he doesn't jab and grab he gets KOed. That's how bad his chin was. If he did that with Foreman then he's going to get hit with a body attack and his hands will drop and before you know it he's rolling around on the canvas again like an infant.
Your comment was "I think Foreman benefitted a lot from basically being the first super heavy in a division without any." I named a bunch of fighters that were comparative in size to Foreman who you have labelled as a super heavy. If he was a super heavyweight some of those were as well.
You named a guy who moved up from 175 and knocked out Foreman, a guy who had him on the floor multiple times, a guy whose career high weight was 225, and two limited fighters who never crossed paths with Foreman. That argument gets a C- if your dad comes in and begs for you to get a passing grade.
Wlad Klitscho was fighting at 240-249 and stood 6'6 with an 81 inch reach while being in great shape. Foreman scaled 217-229* and stood 6'3 with a 78.5 inch reach in his best years of the 70s. These two are not equal. *Foreman had one fight against some tomato can whee he weighed above 230. You're delusional if you think Wlad wasn't fighting punchers when he was the guy fighting the biggest heavyweights compared to previous champs. He never was knocked cold in his career and rarely was even staggered during his main title run. A better question is if Foreman would survive a peak Povetkin or skilled, speedy southpaw with a cast iron chin like Ibragimov.
I think you have no feet to stand on if you think that fighting in the 70s was the same as modern era at heavyweight.
After labeling me "detective" earlier i look forward to seeing where i said the above, or even close to it. I'll wait.
Cooney had being out to long, too much ring rust, and I don't belive he was ever the most confident of fighters. Was only a matter of time before big hitting G put him down.
It's interesting that a lot of pundits like Steve Farhood and Randy Gordon predicted that Cooney would beat Foreman. Gil Clancy, who was in Cooney's corner that night, advised people to bet on Cooney. They presumably saw Foreman as someone who was slow and easy to hit and reasoned that Cooney was the first big puncher George had faced in his comeback. The second version of Foreman was arguably at his best around the time of the Cooney and Rodrigues fights. You can see that his timing is much improved (for comparison look at the Qawi fight early in his comeback where he's missing by miles) and he's able to throw fairly accurate combinations that are very damaging when they land. It's hard to know what to make of Cooney in the Foreman fight. Cooney looks more fluid and in better condition against Foreman than he was against Spinks but also seems strangely weak and gaunt. The big heaving chest and shoulders of the old Cooney seem to be gone.
I think it would be fair to say they hugely underrated where George was really at (like the rest of the world) and well and truly overrated Cooney all at the same time. He had that aura where a lot of people just couldn't forget the hype imo. The hype that never ever came to fruition.
Let's call Ken Norton a superheavyweight so you can feel a nice little rush of dopamine. That would have zero impact on Foreman's ability to trudge forward and two handed push Andy Ruiz or Tyson Fury into the ropes and wing uppercuts at them. It wouldn't work.
