Is Ali the No.1 h2h Heavyweight?

It's either Ali or Lewis.

Probably Ali.

 

He beat the best competition, but at the same time was also beaten a few times too. He was the most famous.

I don't think Ali beats Larry Holmes, and we will never know if he could match up and hit hard enough to beat the best super heavyweights.

Maybe there is no #1 ATG at heavyweights, or he has yet to fight.

 

1-well if you aren't going to post your own score card it's pointless to bring up how you scored a fight. It's like raising your hand in math class saying the equation is wrong and that you did it at home but didn't bring your own equation.

2-Ali rarely lost rounds. He was notoriously difficult to outbox. You clearly haven't seen many Ali fights. he didn't start losing rounds until the 70's when he lost some of his speed and athleticism.

In the case of the Mildenberger fight, I will repeat what I said: he was beating the dog doo doo out of him dropping him 3x and stopping him. It doesn't matter what the score card looked like if he was never in danger of actually losing the decision.

3-how is that a straw man when this is a DIRECT QUOTE from you:

What i wrote is not a straw man. You literally said that losing a round means you got bested for 3 minutes and is a Mark against you. If you proceed to beat the breaks off of your opponent, how does that lower their h2h standing?

Ali dropped Karl in 3 separate rounds. That means 3 10-8 rounds. Even if the bout ended in a 12 round decision, how on Earth does Karl win that...??? When did a guy ever get dropped in 3 separate rounds and won a convincing decision?

Did you know you can win decisions by battering your opponent and dropping them without necessarily controlling every second of every round or being more technically sound?

What's even more hilarious is all 3 judges had Ali winning and so did Nat Fleischer and the associated press. Nobody gave Karl more than 3 rounds which makes your argument dodgy at best.

4-Even Ali's most die hard fans don't claim he was the most technically sound in terms of boxing ability. He was unorthodox but made it work for him. You can't penalize him for being blessed with absurd speed, he still put in tons of hard work to running to be able to use that speed consistently for 15 rounds. Dundee said Ali was the 1st to the gym and the last to leave. He Even ran home instead of getting a ride.

As for chin, it was more about mental fortitude than biology. In fact Ali's physician said his body wasn't even really suited for boxing despite his athleticism and said it looked more like the body of a dancer or model. He wanted it more than anyone else. That's why he's the greatest. He was tougher and had a stronger will than everyone and it would be dumb to dock points from him h2h for having such admirable qualities.

 

For the 3rd time now I'm asking what world class boxers Johnson beat while champion that puts him above Holmes' championship reign?

Holmes was past it against Spinks. The fact You're excusing Charles going 2-2 and losing to guys like Rex Layne but penalizing Holmes for WINNING fights that were close is biased.

Norton was great. I've seen dozens of lists that have him as high as top 15 and rarely lower than top 25-30.

If shavers and Cooney were "hard hitting and not much else" the same applies to Elmer freaking Ray. Just how biased are you? Was Ray known for being a brilliant tactician?

Size does matter and we're also discussing h2h. Did you forget what thread you're in? even Janitor admits it's more difficult to consistently fight larger men on a regular basis. And Holmes didn't have a lot of power as an equalizer the way Rocky did or the size and height to just tie up and bully short plodders the way Johnson did.

 

For the third time I am telling you McVea, Sam Lanford, and Joe Jeanette.

The point is that Holmes' only two relatively high quality wins were dodgy. That stands for itself, and most people can understand that is says something.

Norton was a pseudo great. He has the Ali win, and did well in losing efforts against Ali and Holmes, but he never won a single title fight, and lost to a couple of bums. He is great to some.

You asked ME about MY top ten. That has no element of head to head. If is did, then only modern heavies would get on the list.

 

Ali has the strongest case.
I have Louis right next to him and I think in a series they would find a win against the other ATGs even if they lose more often to some.
The rest have fighters that always beat them IMO.

 

When Johnson first fought Joe Jeanette, Joe had less than 4 professional bouts and was 0-3 while Johnson had been in more than 34 pro bouts with a winning record Joe and Johnson fought on several more occasions but Joe was still an inexperienced rookie in all of these bouts with mediocre record of 10-1-10 in the last time they fought.

And if you're going to keep going on and on about Holmes' close decisions, what about all those draws on Johnson's record, including a draw with the vastly inexperienced Joe?

Sam Langford was 5'7 and moved up from light weight. When they fought Johnson was 30 lbs heavier and Sam was fairly young at 23. Sam never got a shot at the title.

McVea was yet another guy who vastly inexperienced with less 11 fights and 19 years old when he fought Johnson.

None of these guys had world class ability, experience, and records when Johnson fought then save for the tiny Langford who had a 30 pound disadvantage and also younger.

So you never answered my question smart ass.

What world class fighters did Johnson beat while champion that outs him above Holmes?

There was nothing dodgy about his wins over Berbick, Spinks, Weaver, Smith, or Mercer who were all decent boxers that were either ex champs at the time or who would go on to become champions. He won very convincingly, some by stoppage.

Ali himself said he lost the 3rd Norton fight which was a title bout. He had an eliminator with Young which made him champion by default since Spinx refused to fight him. He also had good wins over Quarry and Bobick.

He never lost to "bums" unless you think Foreman and Shavers were bums. he was about 60 yeads old in boxing years when he fought cooney.

Even if we're going by just records your list was pretty stupid having Johnson and Charles above holmes, Holyfield, and Tyson.

 

Jeanette also beat him once, so it seems he was already showing something special.

Jack Dempsey was afraid of Langford. Heavies were small back then, and 5'7" was short, but not out of the quesion. Decades later, Galento was 5'8", for example. You would be alone in saying that Langford was not a special fighter.

Mcvea might have been inexperienced. It is still a better name than Norton, who lost to Jose Luis Garcia, or coke-head Witherspoon.

There is bsoutely nothing you can do to big-up Leon Spinks or Berbick into impressive wins. Or Weaver, or Smith. I know how Norton got the title, and my statement stands: Norton never won a world title fight. He was not a great champion.

Norton lost to Garcia, and was 38 when he lost to Cooney, coming off a win over Tex Cobb.

 

You have a strange habit of not actually responding to what someone said and failing to provide evidence for your claims.

If you saw a lot of Ali's fights you wouldn't be disputing my claim that he rarely lost rounds at his best and that he was hard to outbox. It isn't a matter of opinion vs opinion most of the scorecards for a lot of his fights are well documented.

I'm not arguing with you because you literally aren't even defending your own positions. You said something weird and I pointed out how weird it sounds. If that makes me a bad guy oh well.

 

Johnson losing to Joe makes Joe look good. It doesn't make Johnson look good no matter how skilled Joe was because he was a novice with a losing record.

I never said Langford wasn't special. It takes a very special fighter to go from lightweight to heavyweight. But facts are facts. He was still 5'7 and 30 lbs lighter. And no that was not "common" even back then to be that short. Even in Jefferies era many of the top contenders were around 5'10-6 feet.

Mcvey was 19 years old with less than 10 fights. There's no talking your way out of that one. Garcia was a prime 6'4 23 year old south paw. Norton avenged the loss with a brutal KO. He was shot against Cooney. There you go again showing your bias.

Witherspoon was in his prime against Holmes and not a coke ahead. Quite unlike the shot old men marciano and Charles fought.

5th time asking you who Johnson beat while champion that makes his resume better than Holmes? He beat the murderers row when they were teenage novices/had losing records and they weren't ranked.

 

The fact that Johnson and Jeanette beat each other bumps both up. Its called The Schmeling effect.

Langford was one of the best heavies in the world when Johnson beat him.

Look, Johnson beat better fighters. You can put all the asterixes by it you want. Langford, Mevea, Jeanette, Fitzimmons, Flynn, Jefferies, Burns, Ketchel. Jack O'Brien...this resume dwarfs Holmes.

Witherspoon and Norton were both good wins, but not stellar, and they are both controversial affairs that could have gone either way.

There is no way to transform Holme's record into something it wasn't.

 

I don't need to "transform" anything. The fact You're hyping up 2 literal middleweights in langford and ketchel along with a 19 year old novice and inexperienced fighter with a losing record means you're really scraping the bottom of the barrel. It isn't even like Johnson was utterly dominating these opponents, they had several back and forth wars and he lost or had draws with many of them. Hence why I said you're making a mountain out of a mole hill blasting Holmes for 2 close fights that he won while ignoring all of Johnsons losses and his own dodgey decisions.

I don't need to put asterisks because Johnson's own record is full of them.

You're being biased and you know it but if you really want to die on this hill go ahead and make a poll comparing a 19 year old mcvey, inexperienced joe jeannet with a losing record, middleweights Langford and ketchel, ancient glass jawed bob fitzsimmons, and 5'7 168 pound burns against top 20-30 ATG Norton, 2x champ hall of famer Witherspoon, along with former/future champs Weaver, Smith, Berbick, Spinks, Mercer, top 10 atg punchers shavers and Cooney, etc. I dare you.

 

Yeah he probably is because he is fast enough and good boxer to beat guys like Tyson and tall enough to compete with today’s giants. Good chin too.

George Foreman is another top Head to head heavyweight of all eras.

vitali Klitschko too.. nearly unstoppable really

 

Tyson beats almost everyone. Bowe and Liston are his biggest threats, possibly Lewis and Foreman too.