Billy Conn vs. Tim Witherspoon

He sure was Nightcrawler..I've always thought that on the basis of his showing with Louis, what lightheavy from history would be able to top him? If he had never fought Louis, and instead channeled all that ability in just cleaning out the lightheavy division, which admittedly, wasn't the best, he would have gone on and on...but of course the War had something to do with the dynamics of his career. Another time, another era, no war, a better crop of lightheavy contenders, I think Conn would have ruled supreme. His biggest rivalry would have been with Charles..not so much Moore.

 

Witherspoon was a boxer, not a stalker-destroyer. Moreover, Witherspoon himself could move, unlike Louis.

Witherspoon had an entire dimension to his defense that Louis didn't - he could move.

Except that's not really true. Many of the guys that Conn fought at "heavyweight" were really blown up light heavies and otherwise just complete bums. I'm supposed to consider Conn's stoppages of guys like this and this impressive heavyweight stoppages? That's preposterous. And Conn did not hit Louis a zillion times before he had him holding on.

You can put "heavyweight" in caps all you want, it doesn't change anything. Schmeling would be a cruiserweight today and not a particularly big one. As for Ali, I seem to remember him getting up by himself, while Louis was rolling around on the floor unable to get up.

How many people who are not insane are going to agree with you about this? Most of those guys are not even real heavyweights and none of them is a great jabber.

It is relevant. Great champion with 70 fights, never fought a southpaw. Some people here claim that Louis' era was deeper than the modern era, but Louis never fought a southpaw. Ali fought two southpaws in the pros that I know of - Mildenberger and Dunn. He also fought a southpaw in the Olympics. And it definitely it is relevant. If you want to compare Louis and Witherspoon, what if Witherspoon switched to southpaw on Louis? It's a big unknown.

Not at all, and I don't view any fighter that way.

 

great post :good imagine if he beat louis...we'd be putting him at LEAST in the top 20 but probably top 10 all time

 

Uppity-up-up.