Is Ali the No.1 h2h Heavyweight?

Well in your previous posts you kept trying to act like the loss in speed was exaggerated even thought we can simply watch the footage and see the obvious big difference.

I do agree Ali was smarter and more well rounded in the 70's and more cautious.

 

thats who i was quoting. And he has a point, few boxers showed as much heart as Patterson or got off the floor to win as often as he did but that's held against him. Patterson went right after every opponent who beat him seeking rematches. Vitali quit on his stool and never rematched guys who beat him. In that department Patterson is way ahead of Vitali.

 

I saw you mentioned Patterson later. My apologies!

I also forgot to mention. You made an excellent case for Patterson and Quarry's chances of beating Vitali. I'll throw out another name, I don't see mentioned. Young. I think he frustrates Vitali to no end ala Byrd, and decisions him.

 

Vitali beat everyone he was put up against easily. Not even close. ( barring injury) You could say he fought b level, but he dominated them all. Who could he have fought that would have made the A grade. Lewis wanted nothing to do with him after the first fight that he got lucky in. Wlad and him would not fight. Do you think Tyson, Ruddock, Haye or soemone else could have done better?

Who exactly could he have fought to convince you. Did he duck people?

 

It was exaggerated, he was still the fastest guy around in almost every way. I encounter tons of people who act like Ali was suddenly slower than all of his opposition after the comeback, mind you these people are usually the types who are Ali fans rather than boxing fans. He was still athletically far ahead of most of his contemporaries.

 

He did not beat everyone he was put up against. The 2 best fighters he faced he lost to. He quit in one loss and got brutally stopped by an obese and out of shape boxer in the other loss. Even if you want to cry that he was ahead on the cards, he shouldn't have been getting nailed so much and having his face torn to shreds by an old fat boxer like that. If that was how anyone else looked against their best opponent you would crucify them for it.

No, his competition was C level. His best opponents were between 34-38, slow, easy to hit, plodders with low ring IQ (Peter, Briggs, Sanders, Chisora, Arreola, Adamek, Williams).

There are dozens of boxers who could have smoked through those guys.

That isn't my problem if he refused to fight his own brother. He could have stuck to kick boxing. They both kind of messed up their careers competing in the same division and then never facing each other.

David Haye called him out after he beat Chisora. For whatever reason the fight didn't happen. He was supposed to fight Rahman and Mercer but those fights didn't happen either. He was called out by James Toney, never fought him (although to be fair Toney did have a yo yo career with lots of ups and downs but he would have been a good "name" opponent and the fight would have sold well since Toney had a big name and a big mouth).

Even IF for the sake of argument we excuse him for fighting in a weak era, the point still remains that you can't overrate someone to #1 h2h status when they don't have any high quality elite wins. I mean, this is common sense. How can you favor Vitali over every elite fighter in history when he never beat an elite fighter? That doesn't even make logical sense. Sure there are some guys who Vitali should be favored over in history, but EVERYONE...? When he lost to an obese 38 year old Lennox?

 

I'm not saying I don't believe you but I have never in my life encountered anyone claiming Ali was slower than most of his opponents in the 70's. That's one of the stupidest things I've read in my entire life.

 

I've encountered many fans saying that he slowed down so much that he was basically on par or slower than many of his opponents. It was stupid to read yes. But this is coming from the type of people who think Bruce Lee was a master fighter and Mike Tyson was a literal immortal demon incarnate (but also say he had suddenly lost all of his prime ability in the Tokyo Douglas fight because he shagged too many Jap birds). Casuals do make for some great entertainment sometimes.

 

Ah. Sounds like the stuff you'd hear in a spors bar, youtube comment sections, or a playground lol. I figured there was no way you heard respectable knowledgeable boxing fans claiming that.

 

Head to head I would actually take Wlad over Vit but both would be Top 10.

 

The fight against both Byrd and Lewis he was winning, and they were stopped on injury. IF they were the best he faced - he met the challenge by dominating Byrd and was on his way to stopping Lewis. You rate him poorly, yet the very people you cite as his losses he was beating. It is a good indication how he would do with others at the same level.

If he were beating both of the BEST men he faced handily, (who were at least B+ level or better.) How can you say he would fare badly against others of the same caliber? Your entire argument is defeated by his performance in those contests. He was having no more issues with Byrd and Lewis than he had with the others you call C level.

 

Byrd was figuring him out and starting to break him down. Byrd was a blown up light heavyweight fighting on a 2 week notice.Yet he never pursued a rematch. I wonder why/ If it was such an easy fight surely he would want to avenge this loss?

You could argue Lewis would have knocked Vitali out as well. The scorecards don't matter if half your face is hanging off and pouring blood like a leaky faucet. It shows he had poor defense against a guy his own size that had a decent amount of skill. A prime Bowe, Foreman, Lewis or Joshua would have torn him to shreds.

 

Vitali may beat Wlad head to head for reasons that are mental.

But Wlad beats more greats than Vitali.

 

I totally agree, I had been following Muhammad Ali since the first Floyd Patterson title defense on Nov 22 1965, even Floyd had said on many occasions, that when he fought Ali on Sept 20 1972, that Ali was a different fighter, no more legs, and stamina, got hit more than in 1965.

 

I agree. After my Top 7 I'm not that confident with placement. Send me your Top 10 or something close in a private message if you'd like.