Greatest heavyweight with weakest resume?

You.

 

He was fighting championship fights even after his imprisonment. That makes him relevant. Some fighters burn bright but brief, their physical tools and requisite style dictating this. Some, the bigger, taller, longer, more deliberate sort, can stretch a career as if by definition.

Do we count Dempsey banging starlets as part of his active career span? Fights are the numbers that concern me, not the calendar.

 

The best thing that could be done to preserve some modicum of quality in the classic board is to make a separate sub-board for heavyweight only discussion.

It's not going to happen, but I'd be willing to bet that the board would be better for it.

 

“The Johnson who made fewer defenses than Tyson” - NoNeck

Title Defenses…

Johnson: 9
Tyson: 2

Talk more rubbish.

 

He should have been champion for years & years after besting Spinks. He would fight after Douglas for another 10+ years once removing his prison time, would never again regain the crown, & would make only one effort to do so - which consisted of one honest round of trying. If that’s passable, anything is.

 

The non-heavyweight sub would die within weeks

People simply want to see behemoths throw big right hands and brutally knock each other out, sorry to break it to you. P4P is a made up concept and many people have difficulty respecting fighters that are smaller than them (this is one of the cruxes of the nonstop Marciano controversy)

 

Neither fighter is east european, so he likely barely knows who they are

 

Also to answer the thread, the answer is Wladimir or Sullivan imo, although youd think Tua beat a prime Ali with the way some speak of him in H2H matchups. Johnson, Holmes and Dempsey are also good shouts. Marciano has strong wins IMO, but they are a bit underwhelming compared to the other top 5 heavyweights, so in that regard Marciano could also be mentioned since his greatness is beyond all previous answers mentioned

 

Bowe, Vitali, Fury

 

I think we should do the opposite for weight class boxing, which shouldn't even be allowed. It's been really bad for the sport. Imagine if they did this for something like the NBA? You wanna watch a class of 5'5, 130 pound basketball players being incredibly coordinated and never dunking or just with a lower hoop? WTF for? Joe Gans in his prime couldn't beat current Wilder. These other classes are dumb. HW is all that really matters.

 

I don't know who you are.

 

Oddly enough, Wikipedia lists seven defenses and Johnson drew the color line on several of the top heavyweights so I'll stick with you being the disingenuous one.

 

And that's why nobody watches the WNBA.

 

Evidently, given Wikipedia is his source, while having the temerity to talk facts

It takes a special kind of nerve for a dilletante to be so bold.

 

Deep breaths.