Best five wins thread. Lineal / Ring Magazine heavyweight champions.

1. Jersey Joe Walcott II (a past prime Louis beat the heir to his throne)
2. Max Schmeling II (a first round destruction of a former lineal champion and #1 contender)
3. Max Baer (a toe t toe demolition of one of the hardest punchers int eh divisions history)
4. Primo Carnera (what impresses me about this fight, is that it was only nine months after Louis's pro debut!)
5. Lou Nova (a systematic destruction of a capable #1 contender)

So why did i not include certain fights?

I regard Billy Conn as the fourth best fighter that Louis beat, but the win was not particularly dominant. I also rate Tommy Farr highly, but the same applies. I rate Louis's second wins over Pastor and Goddoy very highly, but they did not quite make the cut.

 

Has to be Holyfield with

Tyson x2
Bowe
Douglas
Moorer
Holmes/Foreman/Mercer

There's 6 lineal champions there, followed by Lennox

Vitali
Holyfield x2
Tyson
Rudduck
Golota
Tua

 

We're doing it in chronological way.

 

All in good time.

 

Better hurry up, there soon wont be anyone left to debate with!

 

My top 5 for Louis:

1. Max Baer - combination of how good his opponent was, how amazing he looked in this fight and how dominant this win was. Nobody ever did that to Baer and very few fighters in history would be able to do that.
2. Max Schmeling - it would have been 1st, but I believe that Max wasn't at his best then.
3. Jersey Joe Walcott II - extremely impressive win when he was past his prime.
4. Billy Conn - it was very impressive win, although Conn didn't have huge resume at HW.
5. Bob Pastor - he's highly underrated fighter historically.

So many HMs: Primo Carnera, Lou Nova, Arturo Godoy, Tommy Farr, Jim Braddock...

 

Fantasic. Louis was a genius indeed.

Charles

1) Walcott
2) Elmer Ray 2
3) Rex Layne 1
4) Louis
5) Satterfield

I am ranking the Louis win at #4 because of how far gone Louis was, but i can see why people would prefer to rank that win over Layne.

 

Let's look at the obvious candidates for Charles.

I will not defend the inclusion of Walcott and Louis, because I expect everybody to have them on their lists.

Elmer Ray was probably at his career high point when Walcott beat him, but after that he put together seven wins including an SD over Charles, before Charles ended that winning streak.

Charles's subsequent win over Joe Baksi was an eliminator, for a title shot against Joe Louis, who declared Charles his outstanding challenger.

Joey Maxim was on a long winning streak at the time of their fourth meeting, with the title on the line, and was seen as a very qualified challenger.

Rex Layne split a series with both Charles and Walcott, but the timing wasn't quite right when Charles beat him. The first time he was coming off a loss against Marciano, and the second he was burned out.

Bob Satterfield was coming off an impressive destruction of Bob Baker when Charles beat him, and this set him up as the #1 contender.

His wins over Bivins was an important fight in moving him towards a title shot, but the timing wasn't perfect.

Oma was also seen as a good challenger.

Overall, plenty of depth here.

 

Walcott 1
Louis
Maxim-title fight
Layne
Ray
===pity the rules don't allow Moore!
Baksi, Bivins, and several other good wins,maybe Bivins-1946 should be in the top 5

 

@George Crowcroft it's your time to shine

 

What's the rules? At HW? If so, I'd say:

• #5. Joe Louis

More a spectacle than a great win, but it was Charles' title winning effort and a dominant win over a top 2 HW. Louis was coming out of retirement (and years of inactivity), and was old as dirt. It's not a great win, but it should be mentioned here IMO.

• #4. Joey Maxim IV

I don't know if it's just me who rates this win highly, but I think it's a very good win for Charles, specifically because he beat the sitting LHW champion, when he himself was denied a shot. It's a win over an ATG with added sentimental value.

• #3. Rex Layne I

Some call Rex one of the best HW contenders ever, (I call that bull****) so it shows how good he was at his best. Past prime Charles humiliated him.

• #2. Jersey Joe Walcott I

His chief rival throughout his career, and this was a nice win to get the title. Walcott is a top 20 HW IMO and was riding popularity from the Louis fights. Charles beats him clearly and gets away with his 'title' defences. It should be noted that Louis himself picked these two as the best two HWs in the world, after his retirement.

• #1. Jersey Joe Walcott II

I put this one above the first win, because it was by a clearer margin (the crowd booing was from how wide the scorecards were, it's obviously Charles didn't win by 13 points but he was still the clear winner) and because Walcott wasn't coming off a stoppage loss here (although he was coming off a loss again). Charles was also aging himself by this point.


Very good résumé if you ask me, especially given that it's limited to just his HW fights, if not the list would be derived of Archie Moore and Charley Burley and nothing else!

 

Fight 4 was for the heavyweight title.