Dempsey's punching ability compared to the 90s heavyweights

There's no need to overcomplicate this to try to prove a point. Tyson was a genetic freak who displayed way above average speed, strength and explosiveness than anyone else around at the time. He's a prime example of a smaller heavyweight able to compete on more than even terms with bigger heavyweights due to his innate physical advantages and superior skill. Even then he always had a bit of a harder time against the giants than men nearer his own size.

I say 'image' because there's no way we can know how he'll do today. It can only ever be an educated guess. I suspect he might struggle a bit with the top level mammoth fighters of recent times, but outside of those (outliers themselves) I think he'd be fairly successful. 220lbs is only ten or twenty pounds off the top superheavyweights in the division, not as insurmountable as a fifty pound difference, as would be the case with Dempsey.

I don't really hold with all this modern advancement stuff, and I think that whatever advancements have been made in the field of performance enhancing drugs has been counteracted to a degree by advancements in testing procedures and stricter testing protocols. There's also the fact that no amount of wonder drugs is going to turn an average fighter into an exceptional fighter. It will, however, confer massive benefits on them over an undrugged fighter, all things being otherwise on the level.

 

You can apply most the same to Dempsey.

I disagree with your statement that Tyson dsplayed more STRENGTH than anyone else in his time.
Hand speed, yes. Explosiveness, perhaps. But his strength was matched by several of his peers.

I'm not overcomplicating anything. You made simple arguments against Dempsey compared to 210-240 pounders based mostly on size, then you make exception out of Tyson compared to the men nowadays 240-260 pounds. That's where it gets complicated.
You try to explain the contradiction away with reference to Tyson "genetic freak" (yet isn't A.Joshua or even T.Fury some sort of freak??) and his physique shape etc.
That's OVER-complication.

We're only talking about "punching ability" remember. Head-to-head speculation is mostly irrelevant. The question (I think) is : can Dempsey punch pretty well in 1990s era ?

Morrison was 222 pounds. Cooper was 215. Tyson was 218. Hide was 214. Bowe and Lewis were big at 235, 245. The weights differ.
Dempsey was too small to punch well compared to them as a group, you say.
Okay, but do you think Mike Tyson's power can ever be compared with the power of a 250-pound puncher like Lewis or Joshua ?

But, whether we speculate on PEDs or not, the fact of the matter is : fighters became bigger by some degree in the 1990s. After Tyson's heyday.

When Tyson came along in 1986 he mostly had guys weighing 210 to 230 to deal with.
Of his 10 world title win streak he had only Smith and Tubbs were over 230 pounds (Smith was 233, and Tubbs was ridiculed for being fat at 238). Spinks was bulked up to a career high at 212. Holmes was considered overweight at 225.
Four of the 10 came in under 220.
The guys Tyson fought before he faced Berbick were generally even smaller.

Today everyone in the RING magazine top 10 is over 220.
In fact, apart from Deontay Wilder, everyone is over 230, most of them are 240 or more.
Breazeale is over 250, now over 260. Pulev and Joshua are over 250. Jarrell Miller is almost 300 pounds.

They are a bit bigger than they were in the 1990s, and a lot bigger than they were when Tyson came along in the 1980s.

The size of the boxers in the division has increased a lot since Tyson's successful days.
So .... Maybe Tyson's power would be average now ... no ?

 

"So .... Maybe Tyson's power would be average now ... no ?"

Possibly. Though he still displayed a good amount of one shot power until late into the 90s/early 2000s so there is that to bear in mind.

Difference between today and Tyson's day is that fighters aren't really that much bigger, they're just fatter or more bulked up. The guys in Dempsey's day were, on the whole, a lot smaller. Dempsey himself had the frame of a light heavy weight despite topping the six foot mark and was heavily muscled at 187lbs. Tyson could still compete in today's division because he wouldn't be fighting anyone significantly larger than his opponents in the 80s/90s. Dempsey would find he's fighting in a whole different division.

 

In agreement. Something that could last 5 minutes but stops in your mind for ever.

 

Exactly.

Dempsey would not have been able to demolish guys like Fulton and Willard, without being a nuanced puncher.

No heavyweight has ever been more effective at overcoming a size disparity, at world level.

 

Well, stopping Savarese and makin Golota quit isn't exactly much better than knocking out Fulton, Firpo and Willard even, to be honest.

Joshua is 6'6, Klitschko brothers were 6'6 and 6'8. Fury is about 6'9.
I've already told you how much heavier today's heavyweights are from the days when Tyson was winning.
Tubbs was fat at 238, he was about 6'2 or 6'3.
Spinks was bulked up at 212.
Tyson's TALLEST title-fight opponent was Tucker at 6'5. Tucker was 221 pounds. You could argue Tyson's power didn't even have much effect on Tucker.

Tyson was about 30+ pounds lighter than most of today's top heavyweights.
That's equivalent of comparing Dempsey with 220 pounders.

But let's forget Dempsey for a minute. Your favouritism towards Tyson is better illustrated by how you dismiss Sonny Liston's chances of carrying power into today's heavyweight scene. Liston was a heavily muscled 212 pounder, just a few pounds lighter than Tyson.
It's pretty clear you've given Tyson some "magical" immortal powers, and I think that your rosy-eyed stance on Tyson discredited your hardline 'logical' argument where you entered this thread saying people must be "insane".

I'm not saying I have the answer to how hard Dempsey hit, or how hard a 190 pound fighter can theoretically hit, but I think Dempsey was a shockingly hard puncher.
Guys on this thread have mentioned Bert Cooper being a hard puncher in the 1990s and I remember he was just a pudgy cruiserweight with a cocaine addiction.

 

Those are the outliers, genuinely big men with elite class skills. The majority of HWs at the moment at ten to twenty pounds overweight, in some cases significantly more. Only Wilder is about the right sort of weight for his size.

Liston's power came from being the bigger stronger man in the ring. It was what enabled him to mentally and physically dominate fighters. Against men bigger than him he loses that advantage and just becomes another short, slow, heavy handed slugger, no better than Mercer or Takam.

Tyson's power came from his speed and explosiveness. He was used to being the smaller man in the ring and used it to his advantage.

Dempsey sold out on his shots and wrung a lot of power out of his 188lbs body, but he was still a smallish man and quite lanky for his frame. There's a limit to how much that sort of power can transfer up.

 

You are equating punching power with size and that is an erroneous comparison.

 

You are equating knocking down oafs in black and white with a hand cranked camera to punching power and that is also an erroneous comparison.

 

Dempsey is universally considered one of boxings hardest punchers with both fists. He had very short compact power to both body and head. Enough power to KO anyone regardless of weight. Punching power has to do with speed, technique and the ability to put ones body weight behind each punch.

 

Do the 90s heavies get to stand over their downed foes and hit them unguarded as soon as their ass leaves the canvas?

Fulton claimed his KO loss to Dempsey was a double cross. Do the 90s heavies get this benefit, too?

 

I don't know if he was telling the truth or not but he repeated the story in detail for years. He was there so that gives him some credence. I don't think we can know for sure either way.