How come the strong consensus is Ali and Louis are the top 2 heavyweights of all time?

OddR, how were Holmes and Wlad just as dominant as what you see above? Give me even one top 10 that one of them cleaned out. Whay we can say about Wlad is that none of his wins were close, but surely that weighs lightly compared to what he lacked in numbers and not having beat the best of his era (Lewis and Vitaly).

 

Hi Buddy.
You let him down gently, credit to your gentle nature, and being a fine poster, as I have known for a long time, so should others.
stay safe buddy, chat soon.

 

In some ways I think as in both Holmes and Wlad also had super long reign and with Wlad it was to the point he wasn't even often dropping rounds. Holmes had some close calls though some which when in his favor and some that went against him. I don't think Wlad was going to catch Lewis. I see your point about Vitali I suppose but I allow leeway because they were both brothers.

I agree that top 10 disparity is pretty wide in my later comment. That was me sort of revising my point. BTW Ali and Louis probably my top 2 as well I have said so in a few other posts.

 

I get that, but heavyweight is different from other divisions because there’s no weight limit. Fighters like Dempsey, Marciano, and Patterson wouldn’t even be heavyweights today, they’d be cruiserweights or even light heavyweights and I doubt they'd do well in today's era.

So when people rank them alongside guys like Lewis, Wlad, or Usyk, who consistently fought true super-heavyweights, without considering the massive size difference, it kind of misses the point. Resume matters, sure, but context matters just as much.

 

The only argument for not having them in the top is that you think other eras have been significantly better. I'm not saying that this is necessarly wrong, many of their victims would sweat down to LHW today after all, but I only judge fighters on what they actually did with the comp that actually was around.

 

Another difference is that they rarely met their top contender. Actually never in Holmes's case.

 

whom else would you have top-2? Tyson? Holmes? Lewis?

 

Most of Lewis's wins were better tbh and last I checked we consider quality over quantity (though obviously Ali has the two best wins over Frazier and Foreman which is why i have him 1)

 

Wlad beat pretty much all of his top contenders till he lost to Fury iirc

 

Don't agree Ali vs Frazier 2 was bad Wlad vs Povetkin was a farce in which Wladimir should've been disqualified.

 

There's the "greatness" argument as well as the H2H argument.

These both come rolled in the flour of context and opinion.

I think Wlad whoops both Ali and Louis, but is he as great as they are? Ironically he may be a victim of his own success. Ali can point to Frazier and Foreman as prime, great fighters that he demolished. Wlad never let anybody become 'great'. Meanwhile the other side will say that Wlad's era sucked, which is why he was dominant. And then we have the remnants of the fumes of his era in Chisora, still challenging for world titles right now.

In a nutshell: you could be here all day.

 

Dunno. Doesn’t necessarily translate to being the best.