When was the last time there was a 20 year old heavyweight phenom?

How are you defining this? Joe Louis was an amateur light heavyweight on his 20th birthday.

 

Young Up N Coming promising prospect boosting through the rankings i guess

 

Tyson and Patterson stand out.

 

His coming out party was against Primo when he was 21 but he was a good prospect.

Beat some guys with good records but on the whole they were more hand-picked.

 

Before Louis was 22 he had beaten Carnera, Baer, Uzcudun, and Levinsky. He was definitely up there as a young phenom. I wouldnt say his opposition was handpicked, at least not in the sense that he was being carefully matched. Louis was being moved along as expertly as any fighter in history in terms of steadily increasing the quality and learning curve of his opposition. Louis was moved along to actually teach him how to fight. That is a lost art today when fighters get title shots before you even know if they are any good or can handle adversity.

 

Wasn't Wlad Klitschko 20 when he took home the gold medal? He was a highly touted prospect for sure.

 

1986

 

Nathan Gorman.

 

Structually it is very difficult for someone capable of winning at 20 to actually get where Tyson and Itauma have got to 20 or even 24. If a fighter was better than Tyson or Itauma at 20 it doesn't really matter they still have to go pro and win the fights to be ranked by that age. Its like MWs and LHWs fighting at HW. Whether they can or can't isn't really relevant they won't get the chance unless a perfect storm arises.

Back in the day it was easier to do crazy things earlier. Louis has the best pre title run of any HW ever not minimizing that but it was more of a straight merit thing and less letting the chips fall where they may.

 

I would agree he became a phenom at 21, but the thread caps it at 20.

He had a fast rise and was definitely a prospect at 20, but I think beating Primo is what made him a phenom.

Likewise, Tyson isn’t a phenom at 20 if he hadn’t beaten James Tillis by then, imo.

Most guys don’t even turn pro before 20 so this is a hard ask, but there are probably some young ‘phenoms’ who turned out not to be all that who we are overlooking.

 

Does George Carpentier count? He had beaten Billy Wells twice, Gunboat Smith, and put up a good fight against Joe Jeanette before turning 21.

 

Mike Tyson is probably the most recent. Unless im forgetting some other 20 year old prospect at some point over the past 40 years who was highly touted and failed into obscurity

 

It's probably Mike Tyson.
But it's interesting that people have mentioned Floyd Patterson and Joe Louis, but haven't mentioned Cassius Clay yet.