Which Heavyweight Is Possibly Overrated Because Of Nostalgia?

NM

 

The criteria for who won a round and consequently who won enough rounds to win a fight is ring generalship, clean punching, effective aggression, and defense. It's not who was worse for the wear.

 

I'm counting 17 heavier guys for Louis and a number of them were top 10 ranked.
Carnera, Baer, Nova, Godoy, Galento, Simon, and Buddy Baer were all top 10 ranked compared to only Williams for Liston so that's a pretty big difference (7 vs 1). Maybe you could throw out Galento since he was fat.

Moreover I don't see any Liston victims being top 10 heavyweights today. They are simply too small or too chinny.

Who did Liston beat who would make it into the top 10 the last few years? Floyd would be going up against massive punchers 60, 70 pounds heavier.

 

Johansson did come close though when he stopped him early in fight one and dropped him twice in round one of fight 3.
And it's a lot easier to avoid early kayo losses if you don't fight punchers.

If Patterson fought Marciano or Foreman (odd to think his era overlapped with both of them) or even Williams I would be very interested to see how he handled their power in contrast to Liston.

 

Well, Ingo didn’t really come close. Floyd simply kept getting back up after numerous KDs despite his dazed state and increasing vulnerability.

For Floyd’s proven durability, prior KDs notwithstanding, I would look more to his post Liston fights against good hitters.

Being KD’d is one thing, but being KO’d outright is a somewhat different thing again.

Rocky was past it as at the Moore fight at the least but Patterson vs Williams would’ve been a very interesting fight.

People can try and reason why Floyd was never obligated to fight Williams but that doesn’t mean that Floyd might not have engaged an irrefurably eligible Big Cat at any rate. Floyd did avoid his #1 and #2 after all.

It’s funny/ironic that some people will demand an air right case and nothing less for eligibility whilst accepting, at the same, obviously ineligible (or much less eligible) fighters having been accommodated a title shot.

 

Good points, especially on Patterson's somewhat lacklustre title reign. Ultimately, Cus D'Amato was too protective over Floyd Patterson. Hence, why Patterson chose to separate from him in order to finally fight Liston (even though Patterson himself knew he stood no choice).

 

Correct. Otherwise, Ali would've won the Fight of the Century, since he wasn't as damaged post-fight as Frazier.

 

I find the categories of ring generalship and defence a little bit strange.

They are simply means to a material, and far more easily score-able ends - that being who’s landing what, how often and the degree of interpreted damage.

Also, why is there so called “effective aggression”?

You’re certainly not going to factor “ineffective aggression” and you can still obviously be effective without it being driven by or contained within a necessarily aggressive approach.

Remember the days when they used to say that any individual’s scoring of a fight would heavily depend on their subjective leaning to either the aggressive style or the style of the boxer?

Imo, that was hardly calling for the application of uniform scoring criteria. Lol.

 

You want to count Nova. what was the difference? A quarter of a pound.
Where do you see the following?
Kracken 175lbs
Davies 186lbs
Udell 173lbs
Kranz187lbs
Everett183lbs
Delaney 180lbs
Bivins 180lbs
Conn 182lbs
Conn174lbs
Burman188lbs
McCoy 1803/4lbs
Pastor 183 lbs
Pastor 179 lbs
Ettore 189 3/4lbs
Birkie189 1/4lbs
Perroni 187lbs
Massera181lbs
Wiater185lbs
Sykes 181lbs
Ramage 183 1/2lbs
LOL

 

Fair enough, scoring in boxing is a bit of an oddity. Hence, why there are so many controversial decisions.

 

Just a reminder for the people talking about Usyk's weight / size that he was 207lbs in ring against Hunter and 208lbs against Mchunu (both verified on broadcast) when he was already 30 years old. His 220lbs+ weight is bulked up, as Usyk himself has talked about (with the fact that he kept his stamina and work rate so high with added lean mass implying PED use imo, but that's another discussion entirely).

My opinion is that Usyk's 'natural' HW weight is 210 - 215lbs.

 

He could have fought Marciano in 1955. I would rate him a better challenger than Cockell for example.

Nobody is saying he was obligated to fight Williams simply that it would have been a good test against a big puncher. There were always other guys more highly ranked.

Marciano (1955)
Satterfield (1955-56)
Williams (1957-64)
Foreman (1970-72)
Shavers (71-72)

All were punchers he could have tested his chin against

 

I wasn’t saying that Patterson was technically obligated to face Williams - the fact that he wasn’t was my point.

However, I believe Williams would’ve been a fighter that Patterson would’ve been steered away from at any rate.

Cleve was also a guy that other contenders rated above him wouldn’t have and didn’t face.

At any rate, the ratings in and around that time were somewhat questionable as to reflecting the true worth of several fighters in the top 10.

Williams is part of the mosaic of name, reputable fighters who Patterson should’ve faced (Machen and Folley) and might’ve faced (Williams).

Not one of those fighters appears on Floyd’s title resume and Patterson did keep Liston on the back burner for as long as possible also.

Floyd literally couldn’t stall Liston any longer without appearing irrefutably afraid of Sonny.

Floyd’s rep. was well and truly on the line so he simply had to face Liston when he did agree to fight him.

 

It goes over
Lewis's head that a 35 year old considered declining for 12 years does not become a prime victory just because you were older than him when you beat him.

Tyson was shot after Ruddock. Lewis at 35 was better than he had been at 25.