Frazier won FOTC now defends title against Usyk for HW ATG No.1 ('71)

He has much more experience fighting larger boxers, the largest Frazier fought was Foreman who is around the same size as Usyk while Usyk regularly fights and spars with giants

 

Wrong again Frazier KO'ed Buster Mathis who was 6'3 243 pounds, but i bet you'll give Frazier no credit for this win aswell or come up with some other mental gymnastics to be biased towards Usyk.

 

Usyk (like probably every other elite boxer that needs space to look their best), would be in Hell against Frazier. All elite "boxers" throughout history, if you look at what style gave them the most issues, it's always the guys that are in their chest from round 1- round 12 (or 15). And it's not even necessarily a guy that is an animal at crowding and forcing the fight, it's just regular guys usually. This matchup would be Usyk facing one of the best ever at that style, and someone he would have absolutely no hope of stopping or even slowing their forward progress. Usyk also isn't strong to the body.

Frazier TKO13

 

I agree. The thread isn't clear. I'd favor FOTC Frazier for sure, but post-FOTC Frazier isn't getting it done imo.

 

I'm off the hook!

 

Ridiculous , completely ridiculous.

 

Maybe so, but Joe wanted Ali's heart, innards and gonads on a platter that night. I have much more respect for Joe Frazier now than I did when I started posting here and started reassessing things seriously ... I used to think he was somewhat overrated especially by people who detest Ali, I still think his pedestal here is maybe a millimeter or two too high but he's solidly in my ATG top 10 now ... but I still think he needed that hatred of Ali (which IMO was not to his ultimate reputation's credit but he was horrifically provoked by someone whose actions were indefensible) pushed him into the stratosphere in a unique way.

 

Not an argument

 

The only fighters Frazier to stop in his prime or near it was Oscar Bonavena who was only stopped once in 68 fights, Joe Bugner who was only stopped 3 times in 82 fights once aged 46, once in his pro debut and once on a cut by Shavers and of course Muhammad Ali.

It's also worth nothing that even though Frazier didn't stop the extremely durable Bugner, Ali, he put both of them down with one punch.

I wouldn't say a stoppage for Frazier is out of the question Frazier was a very good body puncher, the amount of body shots Ali took for example vs Frazier someone like Usyk wouldn't be able to take amount of body punishment as he's shown some weakness in that area.

I would say an elite relentless pressure fighter like Frazier who Usyk couldn't keep off him would be one of the worst style match ups for Usyk.

 

I'm not going to argue how Joe Frazier would chew Usyk up and spit him out, you wouldn't understand anyhow

 

Yeah because the only way it would happen is in your dreams

 

Don't we all? At least I'm honest about my biases

 

Usyk has no problem with pressure fighters. It's basically his bread and butter. The reason why the upcoming Fury fight is so interesting is that we are going to see how he does against a huge boxer. Usyk would do the usual space and angles schtick with Frazier while using his superior speed and size to selectively break him down.

 

The weight of evidence is clearly in Frazier's favor.

Sure, take a punt on Usyk by all means, but there's really no obvious advantage for him in this match-up.

Usyk hasn't fought any All-Time Greats for comparison, but could you provide any example of when Usyk blew out an opponent, who could be considered something like world class, inside of 2 rounds?

Sweeping statements like the ones you seem to post in abundance are fairly useless without some kind of realistic rationale.

 

This is what i'm not understanding and it was a point i made in the other the thread aswell. Usyk is a boxer who uses movement and who i would say has average power at best nothing out of the ordinary which i think is a fair assessment.

Most of Usyk's stoppages have been from accumulation of punishment and to my knowledge hes never stopped any notable opponent before 6th round.

Foreman is an aggressive physically strong hard hitting Heavyweight who is known for his early KO's and high KO percentage in what world are Usyk and Foreman remotely similar ? their styles are completely different their power is not even remotely in the small ball park so i'm not seeing how Usyk replicates Foreman's performance.

People want to use the size argument but Frazier beat Bugner who is 6'4 convincingly and floored him who is naturally bigger than Usyk with an iron chin. Frazier as i alluded to earlier also beat Mathis who weighed 243 pounds also.

Style wise an elite swarmer pressure fighter like Frazier who hits very hard is going to be a very tough stylistic match up for a boxer/mover like Usyk who would struggle to keep Frazier off him.