Best heavyweight of the 21st century?

The answer will be Fury or Usyk after Feb 17

 

Fury beats any man born from their mother. Fury could have been even better that's the thing and if he had Holmes or Lennox level opponents maybe he would be but right now we can only judge him against his competition and so far he has destroyed them. Usyk next.

 

Fury himself has disqualified this following his shameful, disputed SD win over a boxing debutant. The winner will need to do a lot more than just beat the other to catch Wlad or Lewis.

 

Fury is double digit defenses away from being in the discussion. Wilder was never nearly as good as prime Sam Peter and Wilder is Fury's best win who wasn't a decrepit old man.

 

Im baffled to see majority of the votes for Wlad over Vitali.

Vitali is a better boxer in almost every category compared to his younger brother, its not really much of a debate honestly.

 

Honestly, it's highly debatable.

The key yardstick is resume - the level of opposition you beat counts for far more than how convincingly you did it.

Vitali had the better chin, and the more pleasing style to watch - as a complete package though, Wlad was highly effective and capable of doing it more regularly and over a longer period of time...
The fact that Wlad gets all the votes despite being not nearly as good to watch (which tends to bias fans against a fighter) tells you how wide the gulf in achievements is.

 

Vitali would beat Wlad and imo beat Lewis

 

On what basis do you have Vitali beating Wlad?

Wlad wouldn't KO Vitali, Vit's chin was too good... But Wlads was okay and I don't think Vitali would KO him - so it'd go to points and Wlad would've done enough, IMHO.

As I say, resumes matter - Wlad dealt with plenty of the best of that era, Vitali didn't do nearly as much.

And fwiw, I thought TKO6 was the correct outcome - Vitali did well in that fight, but that was a near prime Vitali against the corpse of Lewis in horrible shape, it doesn't exactly make Vitali into a better fighter than Wlad to have gone 50/50 (at best) with Lewis at his worst.

 

Agree. Vitali never lost a fight that didn't involve him lying on an operating table with an opened-up shoulder within 48 hours of that fight's conclusion.

If Vitali had fought a properly-motivated late-90s edition of Lennox Lewis - I would not be able to pick the winner with confidence. But we are talking about the 21st century, so I have no hesitation in picking Vitali.

 

Considering a very near prime Vitali couldn't beat a poor condition and basically finished Lewis... Well, it seems obvious that prime Lewis would've won comfortably.

I'm not sure what running it back would've achieved

 

Objectivley, taking in resume H2H and career stages, it can only be Wladimir

Subjectively there is an obvious argument for Lewis.

Neither Vitali or Fury's resume is good enough to change that.

If Fury dominates and stops Uysk as none has been able to do then it adds sigificant ammunition to his claim, but that's a big if, and his reign at HW has mostly been smoke & mirrors resume-wise