Bigger one punch power? Shavers vs Tyson

Were the circumstances that different in the Holmes fights? Not that I could see. You mention Tyson doing "tons of damage" to Holmes prior to the knockdown, but in reality Holmes spent much of the first three rounds tying Tyson up and nullifying his offence. It was only in the fourth, ironically when he started to backpedal, that Tyson caught him.

Talk about Holmes being as old and worn out as you like and I will keep referring you to the Ali fight.

 

I'd vote Tyson here.

 

Throughout this thread there has been the assumption on the part of the Shavers brigade that Shavers wasn't skilled enough to consistently land his best shots on opponents, and that this, coupled with his lack of finishing ability, limited his success as a puncher. While I admit that this is to a certain extent true, I feel like the disparity between his skills and his power is often exaggerated to make his power seem greater than it actually was.

I posted the HL video to show that Shavers had no trouble landing on decent fighters, albeit faded ones in the case of Ali, and that it was his lack of truly devastating power that was primarily responsible for allowing Ali to survive, not his defensive skills (which were very eroded by that point). That he rocked Ali is impressive in its own right and nothing to sniff at, but it doesn't match the sort of thing I'd expect the hardest puncher of all time to be doing considering how many times he caught him flush. Certainly, had that been Tyson throwing those shots I have no doubt Ali ends up far worse off (not even deploying his greater arsenal, just throwing single shots).

Thing is, Tyson has way more instances of his shots causing devastation on his opponents to cancel out the odd off night. Not so with Shavers.

Testimonies are meaningless to me without anything concrete to back them up. We've been over this.

 

If "hitting hard" isn't about how it feels to the man being hit, then it soon becomes meaningless.
There was certainly something about the quality of Shavers' punching that impressed his opponents.

To say "the hardest puncher ever" should be sparking out everyone he lands on is crazy, because no one did that. So no one was the hardest puncher ever.

 

Tyson hit guys loads of shots. Of course all the punches hurt his opponents, but the number of quality opponents who were devastated by a single shot is very few.
The same is true of Shavers, no doubt.

Let's not pretend Tyson had an "off night" against Tony Tucker or whoever. The fact is, you can't knock everyone out. Some guys will be in condition and determined and will take the shots without going down.

 

Right hand Shavers. Left hook Tyson.

 

Every time Shavers landed on Ali he hurt him. He wasn't throwing a million combos. He was throwing 1 punch. Also proof that he wasn't a combination puncher. That version is Ali isn't past prime...he's a shell of his past prime self. His speed is completely gone and he barely slips punches like he was so famous for. Not to mention Shavers barely landed on him AND STILL managed to rock him with just a simple right. With no set up or anything. Tyson ALWAYS set his punches up.

So yes, Shavers skill was far below his punching power and had it not been for his power he may have well been a journeyman.

 

I'd say it starts to become meaningless when it ceases to have any firm connection with observable results. What someone says about your power after you've left them dribbling on the canvas is pretty irrelevant in the grand scheme of things.

Thing is Shavers never really sparked anyone out on film, as in: one punch, BOOM, lights out, Julian Jackson style. That's the least I expect to be put in amongst that kind of company. So he, at least, definitely isn't in the running.

Tyson wasn't superhuman and you're bound to find fights that paint him out to be less of a puncher than he was, but you'll also find tons of evidence to the contrary. The overall picture is that of a truly devastating, heavy handed puncher at the very highest echelons of power.

With Shavers the balance has to be artificially tipped. He failed to knock down and knock out too many fighters to put him into the same bracket without introducing dubious qualifying elements.

 

To the contrary these fights certainly go into the mix when rating his overall punching power. Cherry picking ain't gonna cut it.

 

Tyson hardly did it too.
Francois Botha is really the only convincing example that has been offered up, despite the fact that about 55 of Tyson's professional fights exist on film.
There might be others, but we're talking about tomato cans really. Botha wasn't really much of a fighter either, if I'm honest.

I'm happy to put Tyson in the very highest echelons of power.

But based on your own criteria that disqualifies Shavers so sharply I can't see how you regard Tyson so highly ....
What evidence?
Almost all of Tyson's stoppages are NUMEROUS PUNCHES, swarming attacks, multi-punch combinations, opponents conscious and AWARE that they are getting beat up when they are rescued by the referee.

Bruno, Ribalta, Thomas, Biggs, Ruddock, Stewart, C.Williams, even McNeeley, Jameson, Ferguson..... etc, etc.

But of all the few "quality" fighters Shavers fought, how many did he knock down or knock out ?

He knocked down Jimmy Young.
He knocked down Ron Lyle.
He knocked down Larry Holmes.
He knocked OUT Jimmy Ellis.
He knocked OUT ken Norton.

He failed to knock down Jerry Quarry but he was stopped early himself.
He failed to knock down Muhammad Ali but he rocked him about as badly as you'll likely to see Ali rocked.

Other "fringe" contenders, or near-contenders :

He knocked down Bernardo Mercado
He knocked down Joe Bugner
He knocked down James Tillis

He knocked OUT Roy Williams
He knocked OUT Henry Clark
He knocked OUT Howard Smith

It seems that when Shavers was actually matched with good or decent or half-decent fighters he generally did score knockdowns or knockouts.

 

Game, set & match right there. Fine points.

 

Botha wasn't lights out either, it's like saying who's got the biggest dick in Ron Jeremy and John Holmes...

 

Yeah but you have to dismiss any testimony from the p0rn wh0res who were f--ked by them.

 

He did it though, and more than once. Not to the same extent as Jackson, but the Hawk was a truly exceptional puncher, well worthy of his fearsome reputation. Plus, Tyson was a HW and was frequently fighting larger men.

Botha was no great shakes as a fighter, but one thing he never lacked was toughness. In fact I can't think of anyone else that did the same to him in his professional career, not till he was way past prime anyway.

What about Etienne? How is that not a clear one punch KO?

I've laid out my arguments for why I regard Tyson so highly. I've also mentioned that I consider Tua a harder puncher than anyone, including Tyson, so resumes or overall quality don't factor solely in my estimation.

Tyson's stoppages aren't "almost all" from numerous punches. He had a bunch of one punch KOs, as I mentioned earlier in the thread. He also practically destroyed Holmes in one round, taking into account the pattern of that fight. He consistently demonstrated fearsome power, above and beyond his peers.

Shavers has one one-punch KO on film, Ellis. Instead of going in on Tyson why don't you lay out your evidence for why you consider Earnie a harder single-shot puncher, using only the evidence we have on film. No BS about saxophones please.

Yeah, Shavers was great at knocking guys down. Not so hot at actually stopping them. Not sure why that merits such fanfare.

 

This is the first post I've made in a while, but I find this topic kind of intriguing so it's gonna be a bit lengthy.

There's different types of punching power and different types of punchers in general. There is blunt power that knocks the **** out of opponents and will physically move them even when landing on gloves, arms, and shoulders. George Foreman is the ultimate example of a fighter who had blunt power. He is clearly one of the hardest punching heavyweights ever, yet he usually had bounce people off of the canvas multiple times to get the KO because his punchers weren't very sharp and usually were seen coming by the opponent. Others have a kind of shocking power that will knock a person totally unconscious and they don't tend to have to bounce people off the canvas. Many times it's a one and done dropping of the opponent. Julian Jackson is the perfect example for this kind of power.

Shavers had more raw power than Tyson. He seemed to have the heavy handed nature of Foreman, but also had added "shock" value to his shots that seemed to set him apart. Granted, he doesn't have many filmed 1 punch, lights out knock outs, but neither does Tyson. The Marciano-Walcott or Marciano-Layne esque totally out cold motionless KOs aren't common, and Tyson himself doesn't have many of those.

Tyson was much faster than Shavers, much more accurate, had better timing, better technique, better punch set up, and better punch selection. He was a smarter puncher, too. Power, and power alone is the reason why Shavers and Tyson are even compared as punchers. It's the only elite part of Shavers as both a fighter and a puncher. Tyson is regarded as either the best or second best all around puncher the heavyweight division has ever seen. Only Joe Louis can really be mentioned as being a better all around puncher.

Many of Tyson's opponents have stated that it wasn't so much his power that bothered them as much as his speed and ability to nail them before they were able to brace for the punch. The same can't be said for Shavers, who didn't have the luxury of being as great of an overall puncher as Tyson. The guys Shavers nailed generally saw the punch coming and were able to mentally brace for it. Earnie's punches could usually be seen coming and even when thrown in combination, weren't very quick. His finishing skills were ok overall, but poor when compared to others at the top level.

You have mentioned the Holmes example numerous times about how Tyson finished him off and Shavers didn't. Tyson had more time to get Larry out of there than Shavers did, and even still Holmes came within less than 10 seconds away from surviving the round. Tyson hit Larry more times and for a longer period of time in the 4th round following the initial knockdown than Shavers did in the 7th. Later in the fight, Shavers also knocked Larry to the ground with a punch to the shoulder.

In his dressing room following the Tyson fight, Holmes stated that Shavers hit "much harder" but that Tyson was the sharpest puncher he's faced and that he was a much sharper puncher than the other people he's fought. This isn't him discrediting Tyson and building up his own wins against big punchers like Shavers and Cooney, it's actually a very big compliment to Tyson.

Jose Ribalta, who fought and lost to many of the better fighters of his era, is another who wasn't bothered as much by Tyson's power as he was his speed. He complimented Tyson's power too, but said that he didn't think he hit as hard as people expected.

Tyson obviously was an extremely hard puncher, but it was his other attributes as a puncher and a fighter that portrayed his power to be more than what it was.