Nope, Louis beat a whole lot more contenders than Holmes did. Larry had better longevity but Louis started his career much sooner and was less protected coming up, and less choosey as champ. They have comparable best wins: (Norton, Cooney, Weaver, Williams, Witherspoon for Holmes) (Schmeling, Baer, Nova, Braddock, Pastor, Walcott, Conn for Louis) Interestingly, both fighters' extended reign was ended by a light heavyweight, both continued fighting after that and got knocked out by an up and coming shorty with big power, and both were about 38 when it happened.
Yeah, you can make a case for Holmes over Louis, though it's definitely uphill and not one most would bother with. But if you strip away the myth and just look at what they did in the ring, there's an argument. Holmes fought bigger, stronger, more modern heavyweights. Louis racked up title defenses against a lot of smaller, outgunned opponents. Fighters like Billy Conn and Bob Pastor were good for their time, but they were undersized compared to modern heavyweights, and Conn was coming up from light heavyweight. Holmes, on the other hand, dealt with real heavyweights like Norton, Shavers, and later Witherspoon, Mercer, even Holyfield and McCall. And aside from Tyson, who caught him prime after a long layoff, his losses were all close, sometimes even controversial decisions. You could argue he never clearly lost until he was well into his 40s. Holmes also passed the eye test his jab might be the best the division’s ever seen, and his toughness gets overlooked because he was such a technician. People remember Louis for his aura and his dominance but when you get down to who beat better fighters and who could’ve hung in more eras, Holmes starts to look a lot stronger than he’s often given credit for. Personally, I think the better case to make is Holmes vs Lennox for third place, but if someone says Holmes over Louis, it’s not a ridiculous take.
In these debates people use subjective arguments though. So someone might say oh Holmes had a tougher era and would destroy Joe Louis if they fought. Of course there is a point were people would laugh it off but in Holmes case he was a very dominant champ himself. I am not necessarily saying it's true but still. But some people rate like this in rankings and it's why most people don't have Wladimir Kiltschko say as a all time top 10 heavyweight.
Yeah, you can do it head to head, or mixed with a lot of head to head, and have the opinion that Holmes would do better against the field than Louis.
I can’t no. While Holmes was absolutely a great fighter his title reign didn’t bring anywhere near the dominance and verification of being the one and only champ as Joe Louis’ reign did. Louis fought every single worthy challenger and beat them. And if they ever gave him problems he immediately rematched them and beat them more decisively the next time.
You can make a case for Holmes over Louis, but it depends on what criteria you're prioritising. If you're going purely by dominance and résumé, Louis has the deeper record — 25 title defences, cleaned out his era, and held the title for over a decade. That’s hard to argue with. Holmes has his points too. He fought in a deeper, more competitive era after Ali, had better overall athleticism, and arguably faced more versatile opponents. His jab and ring IQ were elite, and he went 48–0 before his first loss — not far off Marciano’s record. He also came back and gave a prime Holyfield a tough fight at 42, which says a lot about his durability and skill longevity. The main knock on Louis is that his opposition, while dominant for the time, doesn't look as impressive on film or paper when compared to later eras. Holmes didn’t unify the belts or beat a lot of big names at their peak, but he was consistently excellent and very hard to beat. In the end, Louis still usually ranks higher historically because of his impact and longevity at the top, but stylistically and skill-for-skill, you could argue Holmes would be a problem for most heavyweights in history — including Louis himself. It’s not a ridiculous take; it just depends on how you weigh era strength against legacy.
I wouldn’t call Holmes early career “protected” he had bad management early on and was basically honing his craft in hard sparring.
You could make the argument that Holmes is better than Louis. You can make a better argument that Louis had a better jab than Holmes.
No. Even if you are looking in terms of ability, the fact that Louis had an amazing combination of hand speed and power would give him the edge.