Is George Foreman an over achever?

He also won the gold medal w/ like under 30 amateur fights

 

All sane people have him in their top 10 list. Foreman also beat George Chuvalo, Boone Kirkman, Gregoria Peralta 2 times, Shannon Briggs, Pierre Coetzer, Gerry Cooney ( he was still dangerous) Bert Cooper, Alex Stewart, John Dino Dennis, Scott LeDoux, Alex Shultz, Lou Savarese, Chuck Wepner isnt great but he was a durable and big dude.

If anything people underate Foreman to praise fighters like Holmes who never wanted to fight Foreman in their primes and Tyson who was afraid of the old Foreman

 

I think Foreman was more of an under achiever. Foreman accomplished a lot in spite of his technical flaws, not because of them.

 

Foreman is constantly underrated here. He's underrated in terms of ranking and underrated in terms of his abilities/skills.

 

I think he's an overachiever. He caught Frazier at exactly the right time and could easily capitalize on Norton's inability to handle a puncher, while receiving high accolades because both men were great against boxing type of fighters. During his first career he only had to faced one big puncher who could land on him, and nearly had him out of there.

I think he's an overachiever in that if he came along during an other time, his accomplishments wouldn't be as great. But all you can do is beat who they put in front of that, and he did that all too often, so credit for that.

 

I liked the system that Dick Saddler created for him and which was refined by Archie Moore.

He was a great heavyweight around 72/73.

 

Disagree massively. Won the olympic title against strong Russians. When he blitzed Frazier the first time Joe had just beaten Ali and was near his prime. Norton was strong physical specimen who gave all top ten opponents a hard time.
His only real mistake was realising the power he developed. Watch his earlier fights, he fought off a fast,strong jab and had good balance. He didn't forego that until, like Tyson, he realised his brute power was more effective. Had he been given the rematch against Ali he would have learned, won and been an ATG. He didn't get that rematch and his career and motivation faltered.:bbb

 

Nah,I disagree with the idea that if George had learned to be more patient and conserve himself he would have had a better chance of beaing Ali.

In my opinion,is only real chance against a fighter like Ali was to bomb him out within 5/6 rounds.

 

A. He had incredible power, close to the best in history.

B. He had a great chin.


That's two pretty good assets right there that can overcome a helluva lot of deficiencies.

 

Yep. Foreman didn't get to the top by "conserving energy" and pacing himself. The reason he did so well was because of his balls to the wall style. Foreman pacing himself and fighting a measured fight would of been a horrible plan against Ali, or really any quality HW simply due to him not having the skills or necessary strengths to do it successfully. It didn't look pretty, but Foreman's wrecking ball approach was the right plan.

He tried to rely on his jab/skill after he lost to Ali and looked downright silly. Lyle came close to knocking him out and Jimmy Young made him look foolish because of it.

 

not really

 

I see what you're getting at, but I don't think so. I usually think of an over achieving fighter as someone with lesser physical attributes finding a way to overcome them. I think of Greg Haugen, for example. George Foreman may be the strongest heavyweight champion in the division's history, had one of the best chins in history, and a great will to win. Foreman could only have been better with less wasted motion on his punches, and more precision.

How can you rationalize this statement?

 

Well, he was stopped only once in 81 professional fights in a match where he ran out of gas, and not because his chin failed him..