[CLIP] Chris Byrd on Wlad's greatness and importance of size

Interesting interview where Byrd: claims that he could hang with all of the past great heavyweights because they were his size, scoffs at the claim that Joe Frazier would have beaten Wlad, and calls Wlad one of the best of all time.

https://streamable.com/2m4wa

 

Byrd's fights with Golota and Ibeubuchi would show this. I remember Byrd's fight with Tim Puller on Tuesday night fights thinking Puller was going to pummel him BC of his size.

What a boxing clinic that was , puller actually pulled out a stuffed Tweety bird to mock him by punching it as it wobbled back and forth..lol Byrd is highly underrated but let's be real most big guys with power would be harder for Byrd than guys like Louis. I really can't see how this is hard to figure out.

 

Great clip!

Important perspective from a world class fighter and a good reminder on the importance of size advantages from someone who has truly been there.

 

I'm a big fan of Byrd and agree with him. Since I ran the numbers on this for the other thread, I'm going to repost them here:

Here's some fun facts on Byrd's career:

*In his 4 heavyweight losses, he was outweighed by an average of 26 pounds. That goes up if you include the Vitali fight and the Golota draw.

*Chris Byrd fought 42 heavyweight fights, going 37-4-1. Of those 42 fights, he was the heavier man only 8 times.

*Of those 8 times Byrd was the heavier man, 4 of them occurred in his first 8 heavyweight fights. That means, for the remaining 34 heavyweight fights, he was the heavier man a grand total of 3 times.

*His average weight as a heavyweight was 213.2 pounds; the average weight of his opposition was 228.9.

The dude gave up over 15 pounds, on average, every single heavyweight fight, for 42 fights- and that number is skewed downward by the matchmaking in his earliest bouts, where he was the heavier man a disproportionate amount of the time.

If I had more time, I'd like to run the numbers for other titlists, because I doubt any of them was the lighter man in heavyweight fights at the rate Chris Byrd was.

 

But lets not forget that Wlad doesn't represent the average modern heavy. Wlad is cream of the crop. I'd say a guy like Ruiz more represents the average modern heavy and Roy Jones, who at heavy was the size of an old time heavy, showed us that the average modern day heavy could be dealt with by a cruiser sized fighter.

The Wlad's, Lewises, Bowe's etc are the name brand and the Ruiz's etc are the store brand.

Fraizer may not have beaten Wlad, but he'd have trampled a Ruiz level fighter

 

Good points.

To me, it's all about sample size. Smaller guys can and do beat bigger ones in a one-off or in a few fights relative to the career. In the short run, there's a much wider range of potential outcomes.

The larger the sample, the more things normalize. Constantly fighting guys 15, 20 lbs heavier than you over the course of 40 or more fights is going to be a real handicap to producing exceptional results.

That's what's killed the 210 pound career heavyweight. Not that they couldn't win in a few fights or a one-off vs ranked bigs, but holding up physically for a career campaign spanning dozens of fights against heavier men.

 

You size guys are amazing sometimes. So let's get this straight, fighters like Ali, Foreman,Liston,Tyson Holmes, Louis couldn't beat Klieschkos and Lewis but fighters like Purrity, Brewsters, Mcall, Rahman and the great C.Sanders did when they ( Lewis and Kliechkoes ) were in their primes? A war worn past prime and at 215 pounds E.Holyfield fought Lewis to a draw when Lewis was at the top of his game . Klieckoes turns around, way past his prime, gives the next size guy hero A.Joshua hell until he finally ran out of gas, and couldn't get that 2nd wind, like the youthful Joshua finally did. Chris Byrd is only trying to sell him self and make it seems as the size of the fighters were the reasons he lost to them. But the true reason was he just wasn't good enough. Simple as that.

 

Huh? Who said that? In this thread?

 

You know what? Your absolutely right. I went on a tangent . My point was Chris Byrd just wasn't good enough. And his excuse of size is just that, an excuse.. Apologies.

 

Complimenting Wlad like that makes himself look better since he twice made Wlad a champion. Its a self congratulatory comment.

Reality is Byrd was not that great as shown by how easily he got RECKT by Ibeauchi. He did clown Vitali , but Vitali wasn't a great boxer either.

His best win was against a disinterested Tua whose mind had been taken up with a legal battle against Kevin Barry at the time.

Barry said he still held out hope that he and Tua could patch up their relationship.

"I've been a mother figure, I've been a father figure. David has said many times, 'My relationship with Kevin Barry is like a marriage'," Barry said.


Before he fought Wlad the second time he deserved to lose to Williamson and MaCline . Qquendo was robbed against him and 40 year old Golota should have got the win instead of the draw.
Byrd got those results only because he had Don King looking out for him.

He was so beyond shot in the Wlad rematch that it was one of the weakest examples of a title changing hands in the history of the division.
It was that fight - Prime SHW vs shot to bits MW - that started Wlads run as champ

 

Byrd was a tough, tough cookie. More like a cement wafer masquerading as a biscuit.

 

It really wouldn't matter with these guys. Klitchko could have went undefeated they would still pull out the nostalgia card and continue the ATG past time status of invincible fighters.

What if Frazier and Louis actually fought in the 80's and 90's etc ? They would have been handed several losses and do you think then they would label them as the world beater then? Of course not.

Only today's fighters are marked as overatted when they lose....complete stupidity when you also have to compare the guys they lost too and struggled in their time with that Klitchko would brutalize...

 

Yeah maybe if they came out of retirement/grave to fight in the 80s/90s.

 

That 215 Holyfield that fought Tyson and Lewis would have pounded the day lights out of Liston, he would have been knocked out in 3 rounds tops.

 

But what about that loss to Moorer? When he almost got blasted out by Cooper? What about all the fights he struggled in against fighters with good long jabs?

I would choose Holyfield over Liston because he has the chin and ability to successfully fight back but no way he clears him out in 3 rounds tops.