Gerald McClellan Had Potential To Be One Of The Greats

Yeah his fight with Julian Jackson is ridiculous. I think Benn got lucky in the harshest possible way. Take no credit away from him and of course he couldn't have known.

 

G man is one of the most brutal fighters in the history of boxing .

He would have decapitated everyone in the super six .

 

I don't know, I don't really see him being beyond a "very good" fighter. Maybe a lower-tier great.

He was increasingly becoming in love with his power and his technical skills and defense suffered for it.

He would also be facing larger opponents as he was like the hugest middleweight ever. Most ATGs who are big punchers have a lot of skills to go with the power. His skills seemed to be regressing.

 

His left hook to the body is one of my favourite ever punches

He was a psychopath & they usually have short shelf lives

 

He hit too hard for his own good! He's like a more polished version of Vernon Forrest!

 

I personally don't credit Nigel Benn with a win over McLellan. I don't know whether it was something he was predisposed with or the amount of flush shots he took in fights and sparring before (I'm sure some of you have heard Manny Stewards story of how he went head on with no head guard when sparring with Hearns), but the guy was fighting even though he couldn't place his gum shield in his mouth properly. And he counted himself out too.
His skills were declining, Manny says so and we have to take his word for it, but he had heavyweight punching power. One of boxings biggest 'what ifs'.

 

****in' bollocks! Benn deserves nothing but the utmost credit for that win, I'm sure (if you were around back then) that you were one of the people picking G-Man to destroy Benn in 2-3 rounds like everyone else was, fact is McClellan met his match that night, when Benn bounced back off the floor and said "lets have it!" McClellan knew he was in a real fight for the first time, Benn took all McClellan had and gave it back.

Sad outcome of course, but Benn beat him, no excuses. End of story. Goodnight.

 

1/2 of benn's shots on McClellan were hooks to the back of the head damn near full forced, Benn should have been penalized or the ref should've been suspended.

 

Brutal power, brutal fighter, but King's matchmaking made him look more unbeatable than he actually was. Don made sure there was a history of being knocked out for practically all of Gerald's opponents which is, in a sadly ironic twist, one reason Benn was targeted in England in the first place.

He only ever beat 1 rated fighter. He actually had a losing record in fights that went 6 rounds or longer (2-3).

My 2 cents is that he was certainly going to give action fans the action they craved, but he would've been found out sooner rather than later as his opposition level rose and his personal life and behavior became more erratic and undone.

H2H, I believe he is overrated today. But I'd still gladly pay to see McClellan at his best square off against the top 10 and championship level fighters of today. He'd take out his fair share of them, but I don't believe prolonged greatness was ever in the cards.

 

He may have had health issues before the Benn fight.

After the first Jackson fight, he started having frequent headaches. That could mean something or mean nothing, as lots of people have headaches that can come from a variety of reasons.

Cutting ridiculous amounts of weight to make 160 surely wasn't doing him any good health-wise either.

 

Agree, people seem to forget that he had been beaten before the Benn fight and could be outboxed

 

I agree with everything you said. He was a very exciting fighter with astonishing power which makes it easy for less subjective fans to over rate him.

 

MASSIVE puncher.