Earnie Shavers - ESB's Undisputed king of power.

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: Ernie? You talking Ernie Shavers or Ernie Jackson, King of the Coalfields? Oh. Shavers. Yeah. He was a good kid. Taught him everything he knew. Hard hitter, too; just not like me. Nobody hit like me. Not then. Not never. You can ask Ronnie Lyle about that. He still comes out to see me sometimes. You finished with that donut? Doc says they make my heart disease worse, but **** him. Thanks.

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...Considering Jones's penchant for namedropping and stealing credit, Ernie clearly impressed the guy.

 

The "Best I've Faced" Ring series probably has a couple you can directly link to.

You might also try running the quotes in a Google book search. That might give you the original sources, or at least citations to original sources.

 

I don't think it was only Ali or Holmes standing in his way. He'd already lost to men like Stallings. Granted he was depressed at that point in time, and hadn't fought in over a year, but even considering that, It's a terrible loss. He'd also lost to men like Lyle, Quarry, etc. He likely would've lost to both Foreman (well definitely) and Young as well.

He had Top Tier Power, heart of Gold, and an excellent chin, but lacked stamina, ring IQ (at times he presented excellent ring IQ, but not nearly enough), consistency, and fundamentals.

 

Yah, & let is accentuate the fairly obvious to the non-oblivious: Lyle said nobody hit like Shavers, even Foreman-yet Jones cites Lyle as an authority that somehow he hit the hardest lol!

I am waiting for the woefully undiscerning to use Shavers' losses against him.
As if overall & finishing ability somehow is the same thing as pure power-or even the ability to land effectively & efficiently.

 

Shavers is a perfect example of why we should not fixate on raw power. Guys like Foreman, Wilder, Baer, Louis or Liston were more effective punchers and had probably just as much power as him.

 

Of those you mentioned, the best fighter Louis had the least raw power.
But a superb combination puncher.

The kid in us will always be interested in raw power.
I do not think any of those you mentioned had quite as much as Shavers.
For example, in this thread I said that not only everyone who fought him said he hit the hardest-guys who fought from the '60's-'90s-but somebody else said many of them also fought Foreman.

So why do you say Foreman likely had as much power, when nobody who fought them both agreed?

 

And they all have felt the punches of:

Ron Lyle, George Foreman, Mike Tyson, Tommy Morrison, Bernardo Mercado, Frank Bruno, Joe Frazier, Sonny Liston, Gerry Cooney, Jeff "Candy Slim" Merritt, Gerrie Coetzee and Oscar Bonavena

In conclusion, Shavers hit harder than all of the guys mentioned above