Id like to see your lists of heavyweights with the beat resumes in their first 25 fights, or first 7 years. Either or. AJ has been a pro for 7 years n 25 fights. For all the crap AJ gets, I want to know what heavies have carved a better resume in that same amount of time. For example... in Wlads 25th fight he was... getting tkod by Purrity. In his seventh year he was.... getting demolished by Sanders. His bests wins were... Mercer? Monte? McCline? So Id like to see your lists.
It's par for the course now days. This goes for the quality of fighters Usyk, Inoue, Lomachenko, Joyce, Spence etc has faced in their first 25 fights have as well. That's how the business rolls now. It doesn't mean anything in the grand scheme of things other than younger fighters get through in tough earlier. It's going to be a trend from here on out.
Let's say Tyson got shanked in prison or simply didn't make a comeback. That would have been 6 years as a pro from 1985-1991 with one loss. Enough to put him in my Top 10 all time HW. Everything after that hurt his legacy more than it helped. Ali turned pro in 1960 and went into exile in 1967 as undefeated HW champ. Frazier turned pro in 1964 and Beat Ali in 1971 Now that I think about it you're right, Joshua is in great company there.
Wlad had his 25th fight in his 24th month as a pro. He was 22 when he lost to Purrity. Joshua's loss to Ruiz was worse than any of Wlad's defeats. He genuinely quit and looked for a way out when things got rough. And that version of Joshua was the fully actualized finished article. He isn't getting any better.
Those fighters are exceptions (as is AJ) most of todays fighters are not brought along at that pace. Hence, no, it is not par for the course.
All the ones I listed were, then throw in Josh Taylor, Teofimo Lopez, Ryan Garcia, Devin Haney, Artur Beterbiev, Vergil Ortiz Jr., Oleksandr Gvozdyk, Nordine Oubaali, Guillermo Rigondeaux, Erislandy Lara, Tim Tszyu, Andrew Selby, Bektemir Melikuziev, Tony Yoka, Luke Campbell, Shakur Stevenson, Filip Hrgovic etc. If they're amateur standouts, and especially Gold Medalists, they're getting thrown into the deep end, and let sink or swim, with increasing regulairty.
Hence why I added what Wlad was doing in his 7th year. What was that again? And what was his best wins along the way? You saying that was the finished article is absurd for two reasons. It clearly wasnt, because he came back smarter and outboxed Ruiz in the rematch and has quite obviously changed his style into a more boring but unbeatable one, similar to what Wlad did, and secondly, because hes... only had 25 fights, is still in his physical prime, and its absurd to claim someone who has years left and are in their prime will somehow magically stop improving. Anyways... the question was simple. And Wlad aint one.
AJ is a protected fighter who was gifted his Olympic Gold in a fight he lost. If someone like David Price was given the same path that AJ was he would be in a similar position. That is no disrespect to Price or AJ but I'm trying to demonstrate the power of having a promotional and media machine behind you. AJ's best Victory is against a Povetkin that was still concussed from the Price fight. He ran in an oversized ring against a mentally fragile and undertrained Andy Ruiz Jr. You are a fool, a casual or a shill if you don't acknowledge this.
Well... I completely disagree with at least half that list and likely more Many of those name have zero place in this discussion when talking about impressive resumes in short amount of fights. But Im running out of time. The thread has a specific question. I dont see anyone on that list that answers it.
No counter to any points made. Pithy response without any real evidence. Please counter anything I've said XD
What is there to counter? That price would have beaten the Wlad that AJ KO'd? You think Price beats Povetkin? You think Price would beat Parker? You think Price beats Ruiz? I dont see how or why it needs explaining that Price would lose more of those fights than he wins. If you need those points mapped out for you, I just dont have time for that right now, and it probably wouldnt matter anyways. Those fights should be pretty self evident. Secondly, the thread asked a question. If you have to write a bitter paragraph about something something something this and that, all the while... not answering the simple question that was asked, then, it is what it is.
I did answer it, I'm saying that the standard has changed, and from here on out, it's incredibly unfair to older fighters, to compare them to the newer ones. Hell, I've had the same argument about Wilder and his haters on here. Yeah, the first 25 opponents Wilder has faced, sucked, because he was a nobody when he first started boxing a decade ago. Whereas AJ was coming off of being gifted a Gold Medal in the London Olympics, So he had a lot of fanfare, Hearn realized in order to capitalize on that fame, he'd have to strike while the iron was hot. This means nothing, other than it's indicative of the new order of doing business, especially with amateur standouts. So from here on out, we can all say, wow Spence has so much more of an impressive resume, this soon in his career than Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather, who didn't fight many opponents worth a damn until their 20 something-th fight!!! You can literally do that with every division. And yes, that's applicable to guys like Usyk, Loma, Josh Taylor and Inoue, all of whom have far more impressive resumes than AJ.