Which 1990s Heavyweight Struggles Most In The 1970s?

Wlad hit harder than George and was more explosive. Plus was way bigger. Terrible match-up for Frazier.

 

He beats everyone on his way up in the 70's as well.

 

Wlad got stopped and beaten up by Ross Puritty, who was about the same size as Foreman but not nearly in the same league. Puritty finished his career 31-20-3. Sanders was another contender who KO'd Wlad, and was a notch below Ali, Foreman, Frazier, or even Norton.

Brewster was a one-trick pony with decent power and another smaller HW who stopped Wlad. I'd rank him a notch below Shavers and Lyle.

Chambers was another small HW who almost went the distance with Wlad.

Wlad goes life and death with Samuel Peter, another hype job who barely got past a fat washed up Toney. Peter was not in the same league as Ali, Foreman, Frazier, Norton, and more on the level of Shavers, Chuvalo, Lyle, Young, or even Quarry.

Thompson was a late comer to boxing and took Wlad into deep waters in their first fight.

Wlad was chinny, and the 70s was not a good decade for stiff fighters who buckled when chin-checked by journeymen.

 

A lot of it depends on how they’re matched. Ray Mercer for example does well against guys like Shavers, Lyle and Bonavena but gets schooled by All, Young, Frazier and Quarry. Bowe does well against most of them but again gets outclassed by the better boxers. Moorer does ok as long as he stays away from big right hands which the 70s had plenty of

 

Moorer was good, but his chin is the X factor. He had wars with Stewart and Cooper, but he was chinned by old Foreman. Moorer may be chinned by Shavers and Lyle. He doesn't last at all vs George Foreman in the 70s. But Moorer absolutely could trouble Ellis, Quarry, Bonavena, early 70s Patterson, Frazier, Ellis, Ken Norton and Muhammad Ali.

But Moorer has better luck if he comes around after 1975 although he could rack up good wins in the early 70s against the above named. After 1975, I'd say only Norton and Holmes stand in his way and maybe an aging Ali up to 1978.

If his chin were stronger, I'd definitely favor him against Lyle and Shavers.

 

On top of this Wlad is going to have to fight a lot more in the U.S. in the 70's and there's no way he gets away with near as much rabid clinching.

 

If anything I think the 70s champs would struggle more if put into the 90s than vice versa

 

They all would done worse then they did in the 90s. Foreman, Ali, Norton, Frazier, Young, Lyle, Holmes, Bugner and Shavers will be very hard to break through against. With Lennox and Bowe being the only ones with a decent chance.

Now when you get past the top 70s guy to Quarry, Evangelista and an aging Ellis, Ernie Terrell and Bonvaena, now Moorer, Holyfield, Tyson and maybe Golota could eat but that's already the edge of the top 10. What about everyone else? In the 90s there was a very sharp drop off after Golota to Botha, Seldon, Akinwande, Bruno, Briggs, McCall, Mercer, Morrison, Savarese, Schulz, Mavrovic. Is that group going to be able to outcompete Wepner, Leon Spinks, Bobick, Kirkman, Roman, Chinvalo, Denis etc to even be in the top 20? One or two might most won't.

 

The record top 10 70s HWs in the 90s is 43-7 with 6 decision losses in world title fights. Lyle's comeback wasn't serious but he was in his 50s not his 40s so of course it wasn't. And if Lyle were the same age as the 49 trio he would have been on the warpath as well.

If half the top 10 is making noise when they are old what makes you think the whole top 10 couldn't be making noise when they weren't?

 

I didn't say they *wouldn't* make noise, just that the 90s guys would make more noise in the 70s than the other way around.

It's important to mention that most of those 43 wins did not come against notable 90s contenders or champions. Off the top of my head I can only think of two, Holmes beating Mercer and Foreman beating Moorer. Outside of that pretty much every time they stepped up to the elite level they came up short. Still impressive to even be in the world level conversation at their age and state, but hardly something I'd call a warpath.

Also I find the idea that Lyle could've had as much success as Foreman and Holmes in the 90s if he'd been younger a bit bizarre to be honest. Prime for prime he wasn't as good as them, he took significantly more punishment than they did in the 70s, and I never saw anything from him to make me think he could make the kind of technical adjustments that Foreman made to make up for his shortcomings. When he was around the age that they were in the 90s, he was getting blasted out by Cooney in a round.

Best case scenario is that he might be able to pull out a big shot against a chinny guy like Moorer but even then it's way more likely that Moorer just blasts him out in a way that he couldn't do with Foreman.

 

Just like Ali got away with clinching Frazier 130 times without a warning in their rematch?

 

Do you think Wlad would have Ali's power and reputation, as well as U.S. status? Wlad abused clinching throughout his career. It was a huge part of his gameplan once he hit his straps. It was a necessity for him. It wouldn't be tolerated in the 70's, certainly not by him to that ridiculous extreme.

 

Tyson and Bruno

 

Ali got away with it because he's Ali.

Wlad, in the US, being of Soviet origin during the 1970s - he gets stopped the microsecond he wobbles when rising from a knock down. Wlad's dominance over a weak era is as much to do with favourable refereeing, home turf and a system purely built to protect his major flaw, as it is to do with the fact that he hits very hard, has a good jab and style that absolutely worked against the overweight, one dimensional plodders that he tended to dominate. He gets absolutely zero of that protection in the US during the 70s.