How well would a well trained and motivated Tim Witherspoon do against Joe Louis?

On Machen, Quarry, and Witherspoon, I checked the Ring Magazine ratings, the only ones that cover the whole period from Machen to Witherspoon and checked who beat men who were ever rated:
1. Machen (17)=Nino Valdes, John Holman, Johnny Summerlin, Joey Maxim, Bob Baker, Hurricane Jackson, Young Jack Johnson, Pat McMurtry, Billy Hunter, Alex Miteff, Alonzo Johnson, Wayne Bethea, Mike DeJohn, Brian London, Doug Jones, Roger Rischer, Jerry Quarry.

2. Jerry Quarry (13)--Brian London, Alex Miteff, Billy Daniels, Floyd Patterson, Thad Spencer, Mac Foster, Jack Bodell, Eduardo Corletti, Larry Middleton, Randy Neuman, Ron Lyle, Earnie Shavers, Lorenzo Zanon

3. Tim Witherspoon (11)--Renaldo Snipes, James Tillis, Greg Page, Bonecrusher Smith, Tony Tubbs, Frank Bruno, Carl Williams, Jorge Luis Gonzalez, James Broad, Alonzo Ratliff, Alfred Cole

 

Official to whom? The WBC ratings are official with the WBA? Look, ratings are ratings. You are just trying to make an evasive point to avoid contrasting Machen with Witherspoon as the Ring Magazine ratings are the only ones available for the careers of the oldtimers. They were always well-respected, more so than alphabet ratings. Do you want to check the ratings for the WBA in 1965 and 1966. I'll bet you will find that Ali was not even rated, as Terrell was champion.

 

.. a well trained witherspoon catching louis on an off night might make it as far as seven rounds. a well trained spoon on a good louis night goes out before three.

 

Yes, but the early 30's was a very weak era for heavyweight boxing. Schemling did not clean up the era. He won the title on a foul, and made one title defense. Prior to winning the title, Schemling has a 1st and 2nd round KO loss on his resume. After losing the title, it seem the better fighters Schmling fought beat him. I think Witherpsoon was a little better than Schmeling, though Schmeling certianly has the best win between the two.

 

The WBC and WBA being the sanctioning bodies may be true today but it was not historically and they can't give any championship other than their organizational championship. I have the heavyweight ratings from the March, 2002 issue of the Boxing Digest for the ratings organizations. The champion of the WBC is Lennox Lewis. The champion of the WBA is John Ruiz. The champion of the WBO is Wlad Klitschko. Ruiz is not rated by the WBC or WBO. Klitschko is not rated by the WBC or WBA. Lewis, incredibly, is not rated by the WBA or the WBO. Now this is a farce. I can not and do not take a rating system seriously which presumes to turn Lennox Lewis, then the best heavyweight in the world, into a non-person. You can grovel before these puffed up bureaucrats all you want but a champion is the best fighter in the world who proves he is the best by beating his chief rivals in the ring. The men who did that in the past were champions regardless of what the fat-assed politicians thought about it, and the fat-assed politicians can't make a man champion today by fiat.

So ultimately the public recognizes a champion as the champion and a rating system has validity to the extent the public trusts it as valid. Ring Magazine was trusted over the years for its ratings, which in fact it created.

 

Well Witherspoon certainly cannot be argued to have been as much of a force in his own era as Schmeling was in his never having been ranked higher than No3 in the annual rankings.

Any asertion that Witherspoon was better would have to be based on the asumtion that the talent in the 80s was an order of magnitude higher than that in the 30s.

For whatever it is worth here is the rating history of both men-

Tim Witherspoon

1982-10
1983-5
1984-4
1985-3
1986-4
1987-4
1988-4
1989-4
1990-5

Max Schmeling

1929-2
1930-Champion
1931-Champion
1932-1
1933-4
1934-4
1935-2
1936-1
1937-1
1938-unrated
1939-5