How good was Ken Norton?

Quite the back-handed compliment to say that Ali "troubled" Norton. I think Ali might trouble rather a few heavyweights. Holmes too.

 

Thank you. I accept it is harsh, I am actually a fan of Norton myself but looking at the whole historical perspective (as harsh as it sounds) I think it is how we must regard Norton. Great contender.

Top 20? I think after more than 100 years of filmed title fights there are a lot more than 19 heavyweights better than Norton. There's been so many champions that you have to fit into a top ten, there must be twenty guys of the level of a top ten now.

Recently I can think of Tyson, Lewis, Holyfeild, Bowe, both Klitchkos that's 6 better than Ken just since Norton retired. And then there are many that were his level or there about (on their best nights), guys like Witherspoon, Thomas, Page, Sanders, Douglas, Moorer perhaps McCall, Rahman and Bruno.

ALi at 32 was able to show the world that George was still very raw. The same Ali that Norton could give life and death. Now I know folks will say styles make fights but that is just the half of it. A top 20 ATG deserved to be as competative as say Ron Lyle or even scrap Iron Johnson were against George. I don't know if it was stage fright but Ken made a raw George Foreman look a lot better than Ali proved him to be. Ken himself was appalled with his performance against Foreman on that video champions are forever.

There is no shame in a great contender losing to Ali and Foreman. No shame in great champions either. Ken was a very strong contender. I would put him in a list of top ten chalengers of all time. I just cant put him ahead of many actual champions. I think Jack Sharkey has a better resume.

I honestly don't think Ali was much better defending his title against Norton as he was against spinks. Unfortunately We now know Ali was an accident waiting to happen after Manila. I don't think Ali took a real beating after that until Holmes. A sticky moment with SHavers aside all those fights were quite tame and undemanding. certainly not wars.

What Norton should have done was got onto Ali and put the kind of heat on Ali that he did in their first two fights. At that stage Ali could never have coped. I think the extra duration of the championship rounds intimidated Norton. ALI was no longer a great fighter he was just getting by. Ken stood off him at times and he was better than Ali at that point. He was wary that Ali would counter him. Like Ali could one time him! Ali had nothing, he was hurting but Ali bluffed Kenny all night, bought time and made it look close. It should not have been close!

 

Yeah, Norton's probably a bit overrated.
Almost as overrated as Jerry Quarry.

 

I already acknowledged that he could crack. But you'd be hard pressed to find too many people steadfastly claiming that he was anywhere on the level of a Foreman, Shavers or Cooney ( two of which fought him when he was shot ) in the punching department.

I don't see this as being a problem. I am not matching Norton against Ron Lyle or Floyd Patterson. Only against Quarry who had nothing in common with those guys. If we're going to make comparisons with common opponents than let's just make it easy and compare their results against Muhammad Ali. Of course you could do the same with Shavers but Ken was finished by the time that fight came off. So the fact that he never met those guys is irrelevant to me. Quarry was a good hitter but not an elite puncher and didn't have the physical or stylistic tools necesary to back Ken up and force him to fight on the back foot. He also didn't have the sort of stick and move Style to keep Norton on the end of a jab for 12-15 rounds the way that Holmes and Ali did ( neither of whom had an easy time of it. ) The only argument I could see you making is that Norton didn't fight too many counterpunchers or at least good ones that we can think of. Fair enough. But I don't see Jerry counter punching his way to victory over a guy who had superior boxing skills and acumen to people like Mac Foster or Ron Lyle. I also can't see Quarry pulling an Earnie Shavers on him either as Ken knew how to clinch and could fight a little on the inside when he had to.

That's a pretty good list if one's honest. You just named three men who make most people's top 10, one of them who is arguably #1 all time, and two who commonly rival one another as the hardest punchers of all time. He also beat Cobb and Bobick who were undefeated and ranked, though not world class.

And I think its also telling that when you go from beating no one to beating the greatest heavyweight of all time, it says that you were obviously a lot better than people thought you were. I don't blame his people for keeping him away from someone like Ron Lyle and maybe they even saw dangers in him fighting a young Quarry as well. But looking at both of their strengths and limitations, its not entirely unreasonable to think that Ken could have an edge.

 

This right here says it all to me. Essentially you dont care that Norton was largely unproven you just THINK he would beat Quarry. Sounds like a bias to me.

It might be a good list but out of the names on it Norton won one fight against them. Essentially he was proven NOT to be on that level. He was competitive at that level, but not on it, hence the only HW champion never to have won a championship fight. If you want to pretend beating Cobb and Bobick was ANYTHING at all well, we can agree to disagree. And frankly Im not even sure Norton actually beat Cobb.

Like I said, stylistically Norton gave Ali problems. BUT nobody at the time denied that Norton was anything other than what he called himself: A ham and egg fighter. Thats right, even Norton acknowledged this prior to the first Ali fight. And the point I was making was the simple fact that due to this stylistic contrast against a single fighter who just happened to be mega famous Norton was able to bypass a whole minefield of talent. Combine that with the fact that he was given a pass against Frazier due to their friendship and status as stablemates, and the over protective match making he benefited from and its hard for me to argue that Norton is a lock to beat Quarry. Again, you can say "Norton didnt have problems with a Quarry type of fighter" but what fighter of Quarry's calibre, durability, punching power, and skill level did Norton beat prime for prime? Outside of the one Ali win hes got none (I dont consider the Jimmy Young fight a win for Norton and frankly I dont think Young would be as difficult an opponent for Norton physically and stylistically as a prime Quarry). Henry Clark? Randy Stephens? Ron Stander? Duane Bobick? Anyone want to argue any of those guys was in Quarry's class? Some people want to compare Quarry's fights with Ali against Nortons. One big difference. The one time Norton beat Ali Ali took Norton very lightly, this was heavily covered in the press up to and including the night before the fight. On the other hand Ali KNEW he had to be in shape for Quarry. That tells you the level of comparative respect their contemporaries had for the two. The best chance a prime Norton has to beat a prime Quarry is cuts (which isnt out of the realm of possibility). Barring that my money is on Quarry. Maybe hes overrated by some but hes also a lot more proven from top to bottom.

 

Evander Holyfield was mentioned earlier in the thread. I think Holyfield is a tough matchup for any heavy in history and I'd have loved to have seen Norton and Holy fight. I think Ken has a 50/50 chance against someone like Evander.

So yeah, I rate Ken. Lovely jab and had an excellent overhand right hand. He would be a tough fight for most heavyweights in any era.

 

I don't find this particular line of argument convincing at all.
Ali barely beat Norton the second time. It was razor close and there can be little doubt that Ali was in tip-top shape. The third fight was a dodgy decision, some say robbery. It would be fair to call them even over the trilogy, at the least that's what Norton deserves.

On the other hand, it looks like Ali could have afforded to take Quarry more lightly than he did. Quarry appeared completely out of his depth against Ali.
Ali toyed with Jerry.

 

- Its not biased at all. If you read my earlier comments in the thread I had them at about 50/50 odds and have picked Quarry to win a lot of head to head match ups in the past. I later adjusted my statement to saying " if I were forced to bet money I'd lean towards Norton and gave an in depth analysis as to why. You don't have to agree with it.

- I'm sorry but calling Ken Norton unproven is laughable. He arguably won two out of three against the greatest heavyweight of all time, beat a solid contender in Jimmy Young, gave a prime Holmes fits and KO'd an olympic gold medalist who went 38-0 in the pros in some 30 seconds. He also beat Quarry pretty convincingly in their actual matchup, though I acknowledge that Jerry was diminished. you also keep referencing Henry Clark as a weak opponent when in fact he was ranked on and off throughout his career and was actually a pretty decent fighter. Sure there were definitely contenders and dangerous men in the 1970's who Norton did not fight. No question about it.. But saying that he was "unproven" is an unfair and incorrect assessment.

- You call him a champion who never won a championship fight.. Fair enough. Did Quarry?

- How proven were Ron Lyle, Mac Foster and Earnie Shavers at the time they fought Quarry? Most of them had never even beaten a contender but only washed up names and in some cases not even that much. Earnie Shavers was certainly a vastly improved fighter by 1977 than he was in 1973. How about Floyd Patterson? was he prime and do you think Jerry deserved those decisions? Was Chuvalo prime when he put Quarry on the canvas and Jerry supposedly " miscalculated the count" resulting in being counted out? Was Machen at his pinnacle when he easily outpointed Quarry? What about the Jimmy Ellis fight? Quarry may not have been quite as protected as Norton but he also didn't exactly fair well against a lot of the foes he met either, while Norton has claim to have mixed it up well with the elite.

- To settle this fairly, I give Jerry a good chance at beating Norton, and he might very well have done so had he been at his best. But as close as I have it, I still give the edge to Norton. He did not fall into the mold of slow moving plodders that Quarry typically beat. He was one of the most well conditioned heavys of all time and well capable of going 15 rounds. He typically lost to Elite punchers or ATG boxers - neither of which describe Quarry. He was not an easy fighter to counter which was Jerry's primary strength. He'd be facing a man who was both cut and knockdown prone..Ken was knockdown prone himself, but during his best years was typically only decked by the very best.

 

Yea that fight was a mismatch, Quarry was too small and slow for Ali....

Ali even looked like he was holding back a little bit because he was afraid he was gonna hurt Quary....

 

And that was the first fight Ali had fought in over 3 years.

 

I agree with post for the most part. Norton's resume was soft until the Ali fight. His style would always pose problems for Ali but outside of Ali, I felt his loss to Holmes (dead even on the cards following the 14th round) was not as close as some believe. Young got hosed and Quarry was washed up. Good heavyweight far from great.

 

" Outside of Ali" isn't the reality. Those were three very tough fights, including a huge win for Norton and if truth be told, probably a dead even trilogy. Quarry got pasted by Ali in his first fight in three years.

 

As someone who followed boxing during the 1970s and 1980s, I don't rank Ken Norton highly. For one thing, he simply couldn't match up well with the big punchers in the heavyweight division of the time, which included George Foreman, Joe Frazier, Ron Lyle, Jerry Quarry, Earnie Shavers and Gerry Cooney. Of the listed heavyweights, Norton stopped a virtually washed up Quarry during 1975, but was stopped in short order in bouts with Foreman, Shavers and Cooney.

Was there any other top 1970s heavyweight who didn't match up well with such a large number of top heavyweights of his era? I don't think so. That is why Norton, more than any of the top 1970s heavyweights, had to be matched very carefully.

After watching a Youtube clip of Quarry stopping Shavers in the first round, I am convinced that Norton was virtually made for a vintage Quarry. In fact, I believe that a prime Quarry was likely to stop Norton even earlier than he took out Shavers.

Cuties without the big punch were the only top heavyweights that Norton could compete with on a virtually equal basis. But Norton was never able to win decisively while facing such fighters, which included the likes of Muhammad Ali (three times), Jimmy Young (once) and Larry Holmes (once). That means Norton never won decisively while facing any top fighter, whether they were big punchers or cuties without a big punch. As a result, how can Norton being nearly as good as Ali, Frazier, Foreman or Holmes?

- Chuck Johnston

 

Choklab, Mr. Magoo already did most of the Heavy Lifting re: Norton's virtues, so i will just reply to sdme of your good words.

Norton MIGHT not be top 20, but when you just state the length of boxing history & name 6 later than his who are better, this does not establish the case. And the guys you added as on his level saying atleast on their best night is not a reasonable comparison. We need to consider ALL fighters at their best, head to head, + total accomplishments. I do not think most of those you named are plausible as quite as good as Norton...Some sluggers would do well against him, but one must consider everyone against all possible competition + their records & legacy.

I cannot fathom how he would not be at least in the 20's anyway.

Norton was neither as good as he did against Ali nor as bad as he did against Foreman. Yes, styles. Foreman showed his limitations against Ali-thouugh Ali's brilliance exposed them, most would not be able to do this-but he was not what "green" means, inexperienced or unaccomplished. He wasan absolutely prime ATG vs. Norton. He would have blown away the vast majority of HWs in history, & he was better than when he fought Peralta or Scrap Iron anyway.

Ali took some huge shots from Shavers, but besides that, the Parkinson's & however the Frazier fights exacerbated things meant he did noticeably deteriorate each year. At least not as good vs. Spinks. If Norton got bluffed to a degree, he still did very well vs. Ali. Shavers could not later. Ali was a psychological master.

How good Nortn was against what theoretical champions is a good question. I do not know enough about Sharkey to judge in that case.

 

Touche.

Got a lol from me...