Did anyone accept VITALI as the legitimate heavyweight champion when he beat Sanders?

I would've picked a healthy incarnation of him over anyone in the division at the time, but he never established himself as "the man." HBO and RING made asses of themselves by declaring him king of the division before he really accomplished anything.

 

I agree with that sentiment, but it's not relevant. You can't just go around awarding accolades to fighters based on how good you think they are. The have to earn it in the ring.

 

Exactly. I would've made Vitali a favorite over Ruiz and Byrd in a rematch, but you can't call a guy a champion just because you think he'd win but hasn't done it. Who's to say that Vitali doesn't suffer another injury against Byrd in a rematch? Vitali wasn't the only guy to suffer a bad shoulder injury against Byrd, and his body wasn't the most sturdy anyway after all his years of fighting. How do we know that Ruiz doesn't hug his way to victory? Sure we don't think it's likely, but that's why they fight and there are upsets. How many people thought it was likely that Rahman would beat Lewis, Baldomir would beat Judah, or Douglas over Tyson?

I think Kirk Johnson was in the middle or lower end of the top 10. I'll have to check the issues later.

 

Vitali Klitschko would have destroyed that joke John Ruiz and he already was having an easy time with Byrd before the injury. He would have beat Brewster too when he was WBO champion.

 

I concidered Vitali the champ at the time since he beat the WBO champ and picked up the WBC strap all with one fight.

As far as Byrd is concerned, he arguably lost to Oquendo, Golota & even McCline, so it's hard to imagine that he would've had much of a chance at Vitali. Byrd's earlier "win" vs. Vitali was due to Vit injuring his shoulder while he was ahead on the cards.

 

Ruiz also lost to Golota IMO and actually did drop a decision to Toney only to get his belt back when Toney tested positive for steriods. Therefore it's hard to really take Huggy Bear seriously as a "champ".

 

It was interesting how the Ring pushed Vitali up so quickly even though he had losses to Byrd and Lewis. Perhaps they saw him as a man who had never been "beaten" since he was winning at the time of those two stoppages? I'm not saying it's right, but I don't see why else the Ring gave Vitali so much credit so fast.

 

There's a difference between being the #1 contender, and being THE CHAMPION.

Wlad is not The Ring champion even though he'd be a favorite over the other top heavyweights out there.

 

i'd say Vitali was number one ranked...but the champ slot was vacant.

 

I have no problem with him being ranked #1. The issue here as I understand it is Vitali's status as THE Heavyweight champ. As I wrote earlier, I believe that Vitali was the best fighter in the division for a time but he never proved it in the ring. As far as I'm concerned, Lewis was the last legit champ in the weight class.

As for Wlad, it's the same deal. I believe that he's the top fighter in the division, but I don't think that he should be recognized as THE HW champ, and he isn't by anyone that I'm aware of. He's just ranked #1.

 

Heylll NO..........