Holmes's comp... How highly do you rate it?

We're talking about thyrolar Ali, not Spinks Ali.

 

I don't think there were enough good opponents in the 70s or 90s either. Holmes virtually proved the 90s weren't much better than his era by hanging with some of the titles and contenders.
The depth of the early 1970s is probably overrated. Let's imagine Ali won the title back in 1970 or '71, he'd probably still have to fill his reign with the Jurgen Blins and Mathis Jr's, a Ron Stander or two, and a washed-up Patterson.

 

At 40 years of age, after being completely retired for two years and assuming he showed up in the kind of shape Ali was in?? No.. it wouldn't.

Outside of merely appearing on Lewis's record, no. It wouldn't do anything to enhance his resume especially if he got beat into the canvas without even putting up a fight. Getting your ass kicked by a top flight fighter in one sided fashion doesn't elevate your credentials... Otherwise men like Quick Tillis would be in the hall of fame.

For a while I thought I was until I read your posts.. Then I felt better by comparison.

Seems to me you only read the title of the thread and not the thread starters first comment which was this:

"Overall and against other ATG HW's who have tons of defences",

Do Holmes defeats against Spinks, Tyson, Holyfield, etc count as defenses?

I was watching him fight earlier than that and how I feel about his greatness as a fighter does not pertain to the topic.

I've explained this already.

If only it were that simple.

 

But the fact that you had multiple ATG's in both of those eras none of which could stay undefeated for any length of time, where as you had really only one ATG in the early 80's who did says a lot about the talent pool. And let's not pretend Holmes fought the same gauntlet of men that Tyson, Holyfield, Bowe and Lewis were fighting. He beat Ray mercer and lost to holy in one sided fashion. Still a good feat but I don't see it as an indication that the 80's were on par with the 90's.

 

Not a valid comparison. Holmes took 3 years off. It would be like Haye coming back and getting starched.

 

Done.

 

I think it was average to poor but when you look close his best and biggest win was Kooney but Gerry never fought past 8 rds and was limited but it was an impressive win, next to that Norton (who was past it and the fight was close)

Witherspoon was a 15 fight guy and many felt Holmes lost, it was absolutely close and not impressive, the rest of the guys were 14 fight guys, 10 fight guys,12 fight guys, 13 fight guys and trial horses, or really inexperienced guys.

there were better fighters available to fight or rematch and Holmes did not do that

Vlad era, guys like Povetkin,Haye,Ibragimov,Thompson,Brock,Chagaev, would have had an impact in the Holmes era, i think all of them could have beaten Page who Holmes gave up a title not to fight

Vlads era is a better era, especially if you subtract Thomas, Coetzee, Tate, Dokes, Page, renewed Weaver, Witherspoon rematch (guys that Holmes refused to fight)but even with them in Vlads opponents could grab that title

 

Valid or not it illustrates that a washed up retired fighter coming out of retirement ads little to a reigning champion's resume or to the resume of said fighter who gets beat by that reigning champion. And David Haye getting starched by anyone today wouldn't impress me either, especially given that he did little as a heavyweight to begin with.

 

Good post. DoubleChin is obviously a Holmes worshipper and fails to put Holmes championship era competition in its proper context. You can't just go by BoxRec.

I think you're overrating Vlad's competiton a bit though.

 

Holmes got past his fair share of Buster Douglas types, and McCall types.

Holyfield lost to Bowe, who might have been better than Witherspoon or not .. and lost a very disputable one to Moorer.
Yes, I'd rate Holyfield as an ATG because he took on the best and he didn't have a style to preserve himself quite as much as Holmes did but still kept coming back.

I'd rank Holmes above Holyfield, but not by much.
Holmes was dominating largely because he was so good. He had plenty of chances to lose sooner or being KO'd by a McCall, Douglas or Rahman type.

Lewis was TKO'd in 2 rounds by McCall just a few months before flabby old Holmes went 12 rounds with him.
Holmes did better against Mercer than Holyfield and Lewis did.
Holmes did better against Holyfield than Tyson did.
Bowe wasn't fighting anyone apart from Holyfield.
I think there's enough indication.

I didn't see Lewis or Bowe calling out Mercer while he was undefeated. Mercer was rated right up there with them at that point in time.

 

If Holmes had fought the prime Norton of 1974 who got sparked by Foreman in two rounds it likely would have been his best title fight opponent and I'm not even sure he'd win.

 

That's true, but we're not sure Ali would win that one either.

 

Good points.. But I prefer to look at it like this:
Tyson, Lewis, Bowe, Moorer, Holyfield, Old Foreman >>>>>>>> Holmes, C00ney, Witherspoon, Weaver, Berbick.. Tyson's loss to Douglas and Lewis's defeat to McCall obviously throw a fly in the ointment but I don't consider those subsequent incidents as an indication that the 80's and 90's were on comparable planes talent wise. The top men of the 90's were clearly better than the top men of the 80's with the possible exception of Holmes himself. But the 90's had more depth.

 

Well I did give him the nod in the second fight which took place shortly before in 73' and this was a past prime Ali at that.

 

Yes, obviously I'm a Holmes "worshipper" because I think a prime Tyson in 1988 and a prime Holyfield in 1992 was "good" competition.

That's it exactly.

Do you guys just copy all your arguments from one post to the next?

Did you run over to the "Who is the best fighter Holmes beat" thread and copy what you posted there and just pasted it here?

Because this thread isn't about the best fighter Holmes beat.

It's about how highly you rate the people HE FOUGHT.

Tyson, Holyfield, Ali, Norton ... aren't as good as Ibragimov, Haye, Calvin Brock and Tony Thompson ... REALLY?:good:roll::shock:

This thread has been overrun by fanboys.

That's all I can take.