Who has been the most overrated heavyweight of the 21st century so far?

Fury should be around the weight he was in the first Uysk fight. 260ish pounds is perfect.

 

That's a BIIIIIG if, LOL. Fury was in phenomenal shape against Wlad and he was still a bit heavier than Lewis in his prime.

 

No answer is right here except of Makhmudov.

Most overrated = difference between hype/expectations and reality.

And nobody comes close to being as overrated as Makhmudov. Nobody. He was hyped as a future ATG HW while in reality turned out to be a BUM that never beat anyone and got thoroughly dominated and stopped by borderline top 30-40 guy in Vianello.

You can consider guys like Wilder or Joshua overrated but both had pretty good careers. So the difference between their career expectations (even if anybody thought they would become ATG heavyweights) and reality is MUCH closer than the difference between expectations from Makhmudov and his extremely poor career achievements. Period.

Nobody, not even Michael Grant and David Price come close to being as overrated/overhyped as Makhmudov

 

Another great answer would be Stiverne. When people criticize Wilders resume they call him Wilders 2nd best victim over Breazeale or Washington because Stivernes a champion and was the only one to go the distance with Wilder and those guys weren't and got knocked out.

Stiverne got to rematch Arreola for a belt. Before fighting Arreola his only notable win of 22 was barely beating 40 year old Ray Austin and had a KO loss to a 5 11 with a losing record. After winning his belt Stiverne went 1-5 with a narrow win over Rossey and did not come close to beating another opponent. He fought 6 times in 9 years and he never really proved he was on even an semi elite level much less a contender. Because Wilder had a 100% KO rate, Stiverne got credit for going the distance he wouldn't have otherwise gotten and got a rematch. I often hear "Wilder fought no one except Luis Ortiz and Stiverne". What makes Stiverne better than Breazeale, Washington or someone like Malik Scott Wilder beat but not for the title? Those guys were at least paper tigers.

There might honestly be over 1000 HWs throughout history who could have become a champion if handed this sort of oppurtunity in their era.

 

Most overrated of the 21st century is Wilder. Just b/c even his biggest fans have now seen how unskilled and protected he was doesn't mean he wasn't the one with the most delusional hype.
Of everyone who got called a future atg/goat etc. no one did less than he.
During their runs AJ, Fury, and Wilder all were compared favourably to actual ATG's.

 

david Price came to mind when I read the thread title

 

This is why I want to actually want to know were people would rank Wilder for all time heavyweights.

I am convinced quite a few people wouldn't even have him in the top 100 heavyweights of all time (not that people write a top 100 list but still)

 

As much as his resume stinks, I still think he could be top 100. however, It would be easy to rank 50 heavyweights ahead of him

 

The sports old enough where its reasonable to exclude HOFers from an original divisions top 100. Top 100 is tough to make and will only get harder. Number 100 is slowly getting better. I don't rate 21st century HWs high so it'll be hard for him to make my top 100 though he might. A few years ago I probably had him something like 75th but Fury was rated much higher then and Wilders 2 good fights with him had much more value. For guys who think this era is the best one Wilder makes top 100 easy.

If Wilder never became a champ like Earnie Shavers or was champ for a brief period of time like Bruno people would appreciate his power and his exciting fights. Most of Wilders harshest critics would put him in the discussion for best power punchers with them and Fitzsimmons. The problem with Wilder is he snuck into a club with Louis, Ali, Holmes, Lennox Lewis and Wlad he really didn't belong in. And the price for sneaking into that club is being measured against those standards. Fury technically snuck into that club too. The double standards for Fury, AJ v Wilder are unfair when Fury and AJ did a lot of the stuff Wilder has done. Thats a different conversation.

 

Exactly - it's not just about how they're seen at the end of their careers, but how they're seen at the peak of their hype, and how long that lasted for...

It doesn't matter that Wilder's career from Fury 2 onwards has changed plenty of opinions on him (though plenty still believe and just think Fury ruined him) - he was hyped very hard, for a very long time and all with a resume that looks closer to gatekeeper than legit championship level fighter.

One can point to him holding a belt, making a certain number of defences, having a high KO% but all that is irrelevant if he was fighting poor quality opponents... And it takes a pretty significant amount of contortion to justify your way into thinking he did (for example, clinging to Fury-1 as a superb defence, in which Fury was in worse condition than when he fought Ngannou and was still royally robbed on the cards - even if some refs would've counted him out!)

Indeed... And that's ridiculous on all three counts - none of them are H2H greats in an all time sense...

But for them all to get that hype when one has a resume so far beneath the other two makes it very, very obvious which was the most overhyped.

 

I would go the other way...

We agree, I think, that it was a poor era.

Where Wilder sits within the era as a whole is debatable, but it's probably around 7-10 (Usyk, Fury, Joshua, Parker and Whyte **** all over him for resume, Povetkin was clearly better too.. then you have others who've arguably done more or got better peaks on their resumes)... A lot of it hinges on how much better you think he could've been than what he actually proved.

Regardless...
Even if we're generous and put him around 5 in this era... Stronger eras would've had 10+ who would've been likely to beat him.

It's statistical estimation, but he could easily slip outside 100.

 

The extreme Wilder hate means it is definitely not him IMO.

I feel like Wilder was never even really rated much in the first place either. To be overrated you have to be rated in the first place.

 

He was definitely highly rated about a decade ago. People were saying he could beat anyone in history etc. If you take what people are saying now then yeah he doesn't seem that highly rated, be he was hyped to the moon back before the Fury fights.

 

In his heyday it was definitely Wilder.

 

I really think the hate he has got for years on end stomps all over it. Not saying he doesn't have his fanboys I am sure he did.