I believe this is shaping up to be the third best decade in heavyweight boxing history....

Zhang has bad stamina though even old Foreman has a considerably better gas tank than Zhang. If you extend Zhang into the 2nd half of a fight he's very beatable based on his poor stamina and limited punch output.

 

Yeah but he's tough to put down. He's very good and dangerous early, and can rack up points early. Against guys who aren't too evasive he's deadly. Hrgovic has a great chin (like Foreman) and Parker is evasive. Once we get him in the ring with someone like Joshua or Dubois we can rate his chances against someone like Foreman more accurately

 

I agree it would be good to see Zhang vs a puncher to see how durable he really is we didn't get to see him get tested by Wilder unfortunately.

 

Most HW’s are a threat.

But he’s part of big group of very good, but non great fighters.

 

Joyce is less skilled than wilder. the fact that he got as far as he did, not knowing how to fight, is just one more example, of many, of how weak this division and its competitors are. bunch of grandfathers and circus fat men.

 

Does Ali beat Joyce? Does Ali beat Usyk?

Hmmm. I can't be sure, but I can actually see him losing both those fights - and more

Ali was a blown up Cruiserweight in today's world - and only 6'3"

 

I agree, but with some asterisk.

1) I think long-reigning, dominant champions are making their eras look worse than they actually were. I think 30s wasn't bad era at all, certainly MUCH better than 1910s or 1920s, but it looked that Joe Louis didn't have real competition because how good he really was. The same can be said about Holmes' and Wlad's dominant reigns. Is that coincidence that 3 longest reigning and most dominant champions seemed to have pedestrian (if not weak) eras? I don't think so. I think they made their eras look to one-sided because they were just so much better than their opponents.

2) Talent-wise I think 70s was clearly the best era, but 90s was more colorful one because former Eastern block/Cuban heavyweights started to emerge, even though not at the highest level, as well as some talented guys from Africa. Plus, I think, there were FAR more glass cannons in the 90s than in 70s, and glass cannons are made for exciting and unpredictable fights. Morrison, Hide, Maskaev, Grant, Golota, Jefferson, Thunder, Jorge Luis Gonzalez, Bruce Seldon, Phil Jackson, Darrol Wilson, Jeremy Williams, Alex Steward all were bona fide glass cannons, while guys like Bruno, Rahman, Izon, Moorer to lesser extent (Moorer was very skilled but his chin was really weak). You won't find so many glass cannons in any era, at any levels. And it made fights very exciting and unpredictable. I actually would say I enjoyed 90s the most and mostly because of the lower echalon of fighters fighting each other in many, many exciting fights. Plus there were two very, very old ATG fighters (Holmes and Foreman) that were still competitive in their mid 40s which added colours to tgis era as well. On top level I believe this era wasn't as good as 70s though, mostly because a lot of the fights were missing when they would have mattered most (or missing at all like Lewis vs Bowe)

3) Currently era IMO is very colourful as well and very good talent-wise, but it's not filled with such a huge amount of talented but vulnerable B-level glass cannons like 90s era was.

 

Is this is a joke?

Would Ali have beaten Joe Joyce?

Ha!


What do you mean, only 6’3?

1. 6’3 isn’t in any way small.

2. Many, many guys of 6’3 and under, have beaten larger/taller opponents.

3. He’s the same size as Usyk.


So: A blown up CW has just beaten all of the best HW’s of this era. And on skills and speed, and not with power.

Who does that remind you of??

 

No I don't think it is the third best era.

I wouldn't put it above the 00s tbh. Lewis, Rahman, Vitali, Byrd and Wlad were all worthy champions.

 

Instead of gas lighting everyone who disagrees, maybe consider they genuinely just have a difference of opinion in how they rate a boxer, in the same way that existed for every boxer since the dawn of boxing.

His lack of popularity has nothing to do with anyone being against where he's from. Its because he is not an exciting fighter, does not speak english and has had no high profile fights in the USA and against big american opponents, where is where superstars are made. He is simply not marketable.

 

I am watching boxing since 1995. My two cents.

1990: Lewis, holyfield, tyson, foreman, Tua, mccall, Moorer, mercer, rocky guy, bow, Golota was the best era because of similar talent with exceptional talent in lewis, holyfield, tyson and bowe.

2000:
Lewis, holyfield, ruiz, Byrd, klitschkos, Peter, maskaev, ibragimov, sanders, mccline, brewster, Briggs, valuev, liahkovich, golota and Arreola was not that bad, but they didn't fought each other like in the previous era. Almost only that top guys fought the rest, and the rest didn't fight each other. You had still exceptional talent with Lewis and the klitschkos.

2010:
Wlad, vitali, povetkin, Haye, Thompson, chagaev, chisora, fury, Adamek, wilder, pulev, aj, Martin, Jennings, Parker, ruiz Jr., whyte.
Less talent than before and a lot of layoffs from the top guys. Still with wlad, fury, Thompson, povetkin, Haye, aj, ortiz and Parker some serious talent. Furys absence of three years hurt the division plus wilder inability to fight anyone with a pulse because he was always protected and never any good.

Still imo a good division with some good fights.

2020:
Usyk, fury (fighting regularly), aj, Parker, joyce, whyte, chisora, dubois, wilder, zhang, bakole, hrgovic, kabayal less deep pool of fighters but imo very high level of talent and quality + they fought eachJoyce,

Usyk vs fury, aj, dubois and chisora
Fury vs usyk, wilder, chisora, whyte
Aj vs usyk, whyte, Parker and dubois
Dubois vs joyce, usyk, aj, hrgovic
Parker vs aj, Joyce, wilder, chisora, whyte

So everybody fought against each other and we have imo the best heavy ever!!! (IMHO usyk would beat everyone in the past, only difficult fights would be ali, Holmes, lewis, wladimir)

So every era has something nice and interesting about it and I enjoy them all.

Wlads era was just the most boring one because he was so much better than the rest.

1990 and 2020 is the most interesting one in form of fights

 

Good post.

I love Usyk too.

However, he wouldn’t have beaten every HW of the past.

That is completely unrealistic, due a number of difficult stylistic match ups that he’d have faced.

For the record, I don’t think that any HW in history could have beaten every other HW. There would just be too many great fighters, and too many styles to have overcome. It’s not in any realistic.

 

I will tell you why I feel that way:
Usyk is the only one who fought and won against all the styles on absolute high-level. No one else did that ever.
He beat smaller faster top talent guys with good technical ability at cruiser (breidies, hunter, bellew)
He beat top talent punchers his size or smaller with fast hands: breidies, gassiev
He beat tough swarmers: mchunu a small lefty akward southpaw,glowacki unbeaten champ, and a big and tough chisora
He beat 3 super heavys: one a pure puncher in dubois, one a boxer puncher in aj and one an all around tricky boxer in fury.

So he mastered all possible styles. No one else did that on this level