Did Ken Norton ever say who hit him the hardest?

I don’t have anything from Norton. But Jimmy Young fought all three of those guys and this is how HE rated them.

1. Shavers
2. Foreman
3. Cooney

 

Not to me knowledge. If i had to guess, i would say as follows: 1) Shavers 2) Foreman 3) Cooney

Cooney actually buckled Norton with his comparatively weaker right hand. Remember Cooney was left handed so his backhand (right) was a relatively weak punch. I think Norton's punch resistance was shot by this point. Perhaps Cooney could have put a prime Norton away with his huge left but i don't think a prime Norton would have been staggered by Cooney's right.

Even against Shavers, Ken was past his prime.

None of us can speak for Ken but looking at the tapes, its clear that overall Shavers and Foreman are bigger hitters than Cooney since they could badly hurt you with either hand.

 

Yes, have to agree. I think the biggest difference between Shaves and Foreman was how wild Shavers was at times. Look at how Shavers knocked Holmes down. Larry got up and afterwards, Shavers was swinging wildly and missing wildly. Foreman, despite his reputation as being crude, was actually incredibly precise. He may have looped his punches but he was rarely wild. If George knocks you down, he will knock you down a second time. Other than the Young fight, once Foreman had someone hurt, he never let them off the hook.

If Shavers had Foreman's chin and finishing ability, he would have been a top 5 heavyweight of all time.

 

Very true. I also think it’s possible that you could have had ten guys who all fought the same three hitters and each had different accounts of who hit harder for the following reasons:

- Timing
- velocity of the punch
- where it landed
- was the opponent walking into the punch ?
- were both combatants prime ?
- was it a boxing match or were they slugging at the time ?

 

I mean, yes & no. Foreman was a great finisher, but I would not call him precise. Look at him vs Roman, or even how often he completely misses Frazier in their first outing. He was much better overall than Shavers (who had run out of steam when he got lucky against Holmes, which contributed to his failure following up), but I couldn’t ever call Foreman a precise puncher personally. At least, not in his first career.

 

I thought Norton nominated Shavers as the hardest puncher - though I don’t have a primary source at this moment.

However, I’ve also read that, at another time, Norton said that Foreman and Shavers were basically equal in terms of power.

 

Me too

 

I'm certain Norton stated Shavers. It's getting harder to get good info on it as google cache is no good anymore and we lost a solid segment of the forum from the early days.

 

I believe I’ve read Norton said Foreman and Shavers hit “About the same” I’d say he’d likely extend that to Cooney. Shavers is the biggest hitter of the three… doubtlessly punching like Samson but it just killed his development - I wish Archie Moore got through to him more.

 

"Shavers. No question. At least with Foreman I was able to get up. When Shavers hit me I went down and stayed down." - Ken Norton when asked who hit harder

 

Kenny selling himself short. He actually hauled himself back up (though in no condition to continue) before 10 seconds had expired but Mills Lane had already stopped the fight.

Shavers hit Ken with everything (that last uppercut - wow!) so credit to Norton for not actually being put “out” and still trying to stay in the fight.

Ken actually laid some hard leather on Shavers also but Earnie was absolutely on point and his performance from go to whoa was near perfect - arguably his best ever over the short route.

 

A shame Norton had to even go through that. His performance against Holmes should've earned him an immediate rematch.

 

It was certainly a performance and a half. Admittedly Norton was getting on tho still a decent fighter.

Norton scored a couple of hard punches against Foreman too before almost being sent to heaven. One wonders what the matches may have looked like if he had his own ATG power.

 

Why trust Norton to judge this? He wasn’t even there for the last half dozen punches Cooney struck him with.