Archie Moore has a better top 12 HW wins in their era than Marciano does.

Marciano whoops him at the top end with Moore himself, Charles and Walcott. Moore has a number of solid wins tho.

Of course, tho not the topic, Moore lost plenty whereas Marciano was never bested in 49 fights.

 

Moore beat that parade of so so 50s heavy’s who were the best of what was around except for Charles and Walcott who Moore never beat. You have to give Rocky that despite Rocky’s other guys being inferior he beat decisively the 2 top guys Moore never did as well as Moore himself. However many fans feel despite Rockys successful record some of Moores victims may have had the styles and strengths to expose the shortcomings that were never tested. Famously Valdez presenting a good fighter who had the size that Marciano was never tested against.

 

I respect a peaceful thought through response. You make a point.

 

“A terrible era” couldn’t disagree more. 50s saw more ranked men fighting each other than any other era ever. Was an excellent era for competition.

 

No it wasn't because many of those ranked men would not have been ranked in other eras

What matters is the quality of those ranked and many were at best average.The 50's was seen universally as a poor era for heavyweights , with remnants from the previous decade still commanding a ranking, and blown up Lhvs and moderate men taking the rest of the spots.

 

What does that make the 90s when 45 year old Foreman and Holmes were beating the competition? Things never before seen. That and a few LHWs moved up to win titles. No difference except the aid of steroids.

 

Here's a question for you .
Would the following,all ranked in the 50's ,be ranked in the 70's ,80's , 90''s or today?
Williams 10
Gardner 8
Dunlap 4
Bucceroni 3
Wallace 10
Cockell 2
Norkus 9
Slade 10
Sys 5
Brion 5
Neuhaus 8
Summerlin7
Holman 4

 

from S-MW - L-HW and maybe some as CW's...

with 3-5 months to make weight, I suspect most of them wouldn't even see themselves as HW's...

they would fight, and cut, and compete at those lower weights just like the rest of todays either side of L-HW fighters do(?).

 

We can do this for every decade. There are people who earn their rank (they all earn it one way or another) and maybe they just aren’t up to par. Many of these fighters are good fighters who just weren’t good as the upper echelon

 

By definition the upper echelon is the top ten isn't it!
Look up what those names best wins were.
My point is the 50's were not a deep decade for heavyweight talent,I think most would agree on that.
For comparison.
The 60's
Patterson
Liston
Machen
Folley
De John
Cooper
Terrell
Williams
Daniels
Chuvalo
Cleroux
Miteff

The 70's
Frazier
Ali
Foreman
Quarry
Bonavena
Bugner
Ellis
Young
Holmes
Coetzee
L Spinks
Shavers
Norton

The 80's
Weaver
Dokes
Berbick
Page
Mercado
Bruno
Thomas
Witherspoon
Williams
Tubbs
M Spinks
Cooney
Smith
90's
Holyfield
Tyson
Ruddock
Douglas
McCall
Ibeabuchi
Tua
Rahman
Mercer
Byrd
Golota
Morrison
Tucker
Bowe
Moorer
Lewis
Briggs
Any of these names you don't think would make the 50's top ten?
Any of these names,you don't think would be worthy of a title shot in that decade?
How many of these do you think Cockell, Lastarza, or Mathews would beat?

 

"By definition the upper echelon is the top ten isn't it!"

- Only if it's honest & true, but Boxing History has recorded the contrary too many times, even to the point of Criminality & Indictments made against Governing Bodies and the RING itself.

But, yes, it should be...

it's a big bad world out there, I say, again if honest & true, the Top 25 -50 might actually show the greatest fighters in the world representative from across the Globe, especially in greater Era's, Divisions, Proliferation of Numbers of Fighters and less Boards & Belts and all such variables.

 

That’s a fair point but the division has made people getting title shots rare forever. The best guy often doesn’t get his shot right away. It’s one of the most frustrating things with boxing. Frazier fighting nobody’s after Ali. Holmes avoiding his number 1s. The mess in the 90s is too long to list and into the 2000s. Early 50s wasn’t that strong but by 52-53 on it was a strong division imo. I think people perceive it as weak because of how often the fighters lost. People like Moore, Valdez, Baker, Layne, etc lost a lot because they fought a lot of ranked good competition. When you do that you get losses. Later men would get one or two ok wins and parlay that to a title shot. Layne, Valdez, Baker all should have gotten title shots at some point but they all lost at the worst time. They prob should have held out for a shot instead of hopping back in against good comp.

 

The ideal.