I know Ezzard is rated one of the greatest, if not greatest, LHW of all time. But I don't know much about his actual title run at HW. Of course I know about Louis and Walcott but what about Valentino, Beshore, Barone, Oma? Were these guys quality heavyweights? Also how did LWH champs Maxim and Lesnevich fair? How do you rate his championship run against other ATG HW champs?
His 9 x lineal HW title wins are the joint 6th most in HW history alongside Lewis. Only Ali, Louis, Holmes, Wlad & Burns have more. The quality of his title defences weren't great though. His wider HW resume is probably slightly underrated. In fights contested above 180lbs he beat past prime Joe Louis, JJW x 2, Jimmy Bivins x 3, Joey Maxim x 5, Rex Layne x 2, Elmer Ray, Bob Satterfield, Joe Baski, Gus Lesnevich & Cesar Brion. Whilst his overall record in fights contested above 180lbs is a very modest looking 52-20, he initially went 26-1, with his only defeat being by SD to Elmer Ray, a defeat he avenged. For a natural LHW, he was a damn fine HW for a while.
excluding Walcott and louis Lesnevich - had lost 2 of his last 3 at LH (the losses the win was at HW) and it was his last fight so not great Valentino - was on a pretty good run but nothing special and was a 5-1 underdog going in ( did put up a great fight though) beshore - on a 2 fight losing streak ranked 9th in the world barone - 5/6-1 underdog best win over LH tommy yarosz Oma - won 15 of last 17 fights 1 NC 1 L to Satterfield in that run he beat Beshore twice Vern Mitchell Barone and Satterfield, really deserved this title shot and great win for Charles Maxim - underrated legend, at the time had lost only 4 times in last 5 years (46 fights) twice to Walcott once to Charles and once to Joe Kahut, in that run alone he beat Satterfield, Walcott, Kahut, Cooper, Bivins, Lesnevich and Freddie Mills. he was also the reigning LH champ and after this fight would go on to beat Robinson, Murphy, Nardico and Floyd Patterson, charles on the other hand dominated every second of this fight winning by 20 points on 2 of the 3 scorecards. truly a great win. so in summery, of his 8 defenses 4 were against mediocre opposition (Lesnevich, valentino, beshore, barone) and 4 were against good to great opposition (louis, walcott, maxim, oma) all things considered not bad, I would rank it above Patterson but below Dempsey and Marciano (though that is mostly because charles himself contributed to it)
