Why is Frazier ranked aboved Tyson?

Tyson should be higher and more people will realize it as time passes.

 

Idk about Tyson being hit "significantly" less, but it was a little harder to nall him clean with more than 1 flush power punch in his prime compared to Frazier. I'll also add that sometimes Frazier needed a few rounds to warm up and he could be bum rushed or hurt early before he could gather his bearings, while Tyson was one of the most explosive early starters in history.

Post Prison Tyson got worse and worse, and it eventually got to the point where he made even washed up Frazier look like Willie Pep in comparison. When assessing the overall effectiveness/skill of two boxers who never met in the ring, you have to assess their whole careers like basketball or football, not just cherry picking 2-3 prime years.

 

Resume comparison:

Tyson
+Lots of decent names/contenders
+Became champ remarkably young and was very dominant hardly ever losing rounds
+Knockout artist who destroyed multiple guys with solid chins such as Thomas, Berbick, etc.
+Became a 2x champion several years apart.
+PPV sensation and household name due to consistently seeking out quality opponents even when he was way past his prime.

-Doesn't have many high quality signature wins. Holmes was old and coming off a loss and 2 layoffs, Spinx was a blown up LHW with a thin HW resume.
-Even some of the better contenders on his record had a few asterisks* due to health/financial circumstances in or out the ring. There weren't that many peak conditioned opponents in their primes.
-Zero avenged losses and failed to beat the two biggest names in his division (Holyfield/Lewis).
-Had arguably the worst loss in HW championship history to a major underdog.


Frazier
+Gold medalist
+Cleaned out his division
+Was fairly dominant when on top and his only losses were against 2 ATG opponents
+Superb signature win against Ali (one of the best wins of all time

-Although he has some decent names such as Quarry, Ellis, Mathis, etc, his resume isn't particularly deep. He didn't really show us anything new post championship rematching some of the same opponents.
-His title defenses were very unremarkable aside from Foreman, a fight he lost. Not a very busy champion either.


Comparing their resumes, Tyson has both more pros and cons. Tyson has quality over quantity when it comes to contenders, while Frazier has quality when it comes to their best wins. Tyson became champion again when Frazier didn't. For what it's worth, Frazier had the much better amateur career. Tyson was more dominant, but also had much worse losses and didn't beat the two best names in his era, while Frazier had much more forgivable losses and managed at least 1 win against his most elite opponents.

So I guess it's a matter of apples and oranges, but gun to my head I'd probably place Tyson slightly ahead on an ATG list, but not by a lot.

In terms of skills/overall ability, Tyson is obviously better overall, although Frazier had the better stamina and inside skills. Prime vs prime, Tyson would likely beat Frazier h2h 75% of the time, but things would be very dangerous for Tyson if Frazier made it to the 6th round in good shape and could potentially drag him into deep waters.

 

No one made Ali miss more than Joe Frazier. Joe proved his defence over more rounds, against better competition.

 

Ali missed a lot but he was also landing a lot IMO.

 

How did that work against Foreman?

 

Bout as well as it did against buster douglas for Tyson.

 

Yes, but he had more success defending against Ali than all his other opponents.

 

Ali landed something like 27% of his power shots against Frazier. Truly world class defense on display.............

 

Tyson did considerably better than Frazier did in either Foreman fight despite being in crappy condition. Bonavena also dropped Frazier.

 

I was thinking about there whole careers not just picking 2-3 years. I mean just to my eye to looked like Frazier took a lot more punishment with solid blows than Tyson did but perhaps I am misremembering a little bit.

 

Barely a year into Joe's professional career, and Eddie Futch explicitly stated it was the fight that made him develop Frazier into the bob and weave fighter he would be recognized as later on. Not to mention Foreman is far more of a stylistic nightmare to shorter fighters than Douglas was to Tyson, and his unorthodox timing and generalship further worsened the odds for the rhythm fighter that Frazier was.

 

Frazier-Tyson resume debate used to have a deep, deep thread with massive amount of quality post. Gold mine of a debate.

 

Some people have Frazier higher, some have Tyson higher.

It comes down to what you like.

 

I have Frazier seventh, Tyson ninth all time. Which means they’re pretty damn close and it could go either way between them IMO. I do think Frazier had bigger balls and more heart than Tyson (figuratively of course and those are qualities that can’t be quantified).