Is Jimmy Bivins run from 1943-1945 one of the best ever?

-I said his weight from 43-48 peaked at 192. Bivins fighting prime could be defined as late 1942-early 1946. He hovered around the LHW limit for only the first 12 months in this time frame (only 4 fights officially below the limit) and averaged 180-190 for the rest.

-None of those names were at or under the MW limit. They are LHWs and fought Bivins prior to the summer of 43 when he left the divison for good.

-He beat many bona fide HWs in his career. Only four names in this listing were "bona fide LHWs" at the time. Charles, Marshall, Moore, and Chris.

The others you challenged: Tami, Valentino and Bettina had fought their last bouts at LHW at least 1-3 years prior to facing Bivins and would never return to the divison they outgrew, Tami would weigh as much as 204 in future fights.

Maxim was a top 10 HW when he lost to Bivins but would return to LHW late in his career. He bounced between both divisons as it suited him.

-The fact that Bivins never weighed under the LHW in 12 years would make him a bona fide heavyweight in that timespan.

Bivins spent one year of his career as MW at 19-20 years of age in 1940. He spent 1941 as LHW. He than sepnt 1942 to mid 1943 bouncing between HW and LHW before spending the next 12 years of his career and the bulk of his prime as a HW in his early and mid 20s. It looks like he just grew into a HW. Calling him a LHW/sometimes Crusier as you did in another thread is just wrong.

 

It could be defined as any time .

Maxim was 178 lbs when he lost to Bivins.

Moore was 168lbs


Cristoforidis 168lbs

Charles 165lbs

Calling the last three lightheavies is selective bull****.

 

-178 is above 175 lbs.

-LHW was 160-175. They were rated as light heavies. To pretend these men were not light heavywights is bull****. What do you have against facts? Are you on a mission to rewrite history?

Light Heavyweights


[url]Gus Lesnevich[/url]*, Champion

1. [url]Jimmy Bivins[/url]
2. [url]Anton Christoforidis[/url]
3. [url]Ezzard Charles[/url]
4. [url]Freddie Mills[/url]
5. [url]Lloyd Marshall[/url]

 

I just take the opposite corner to you as a matter of course.:good

 

It's a good run, but I believe that on the balance Archie Moore, Ezzard Charles, Joey Maxim, and Mellio Bettina all came out on the winning end of their series of fights with Bivins.

How do you think that version of Bivins does against Rocky Marciano?

 

This run is deceptive and being blown up a bit by the simple fact that a prime Bivins took these wins against guys who were not yet prime or past their prime for the most part or were good fighters but not great (I mean including Pat Valentino in a supposedly greatest ever run?? Really?)

Another problem is this: While Bivins fought Pastor twice he only beat him once. The first time they fought was in 42 not 43. This illustrates perfectly that, as someone else pointed out, Bivins was hardly dominant over this competition. Indeed a lot of times he just squeeked by either in fights or the series. His fight with Lee Savold was 42 also as was his fight with Mauriello.

I think Bivins is a little overrated today. He came at the right time despite some thinking he was around at the wrong time. He was a bit of a spoiler and his legacy has gotten a bump from people who think its a shame he didnt meet Louis when both where in their primes. I can tell you after seeing their fight that hes damn lucky they didnt meet in the early/mid 40s.

 

Not a good idea of it goes against the facts.

 

How you figure that? Bivins is 1-1 with Maxim and Bettina. Maxim didn't get his win back until Bivins was on the slide.

 

It goes both ways, most of these guys like Moore , Murray, and Charles didn't get their wins back until Bivins was on the slide and they were peaking. Marshall was certainly great and at his prime when Bivins beat him.

It's not so much the manner of victory but the sheer number of top fighters, future/present greats, various styles in two divisons he cleaned out with Conn and Louis on hitaus.

There was a Mauriello rematch in 43.

 

At 164.5lbs Marshall was over 10lbs lighter than Bivins. As I belive I may have mentioned in passing:hey

 

So? Fighters get credit all the time for beating great fighters that were lighter than themselves. In this case, two men that were within the limits of the same divison. Do we say Ali had 10 lbs on Frazier, so don't count that! How about the disparity between Louis/Conn?

And it's not as if Marshall was at a handicap. He achieved greatness as a sub 170 lb fighter in the Light Heavyweight Divison. He gave up 21 lbs to Maxim and dominated him, as well as 11 lbs to Sheppard.

 

Even you know that Heavyweight is unlimited.
What Bivins did against Maxim and Sheppard isnt the issue ,what I called you on is you saying that Bivins beat a prime Marshall as though that was a terrific acheivement.If they had both been 164lbs I would have agreed. If you don't think over 10lbs disparity is signifcant between a super middle and a light heavyweight it can only be because of your agenda.

 

Even me? Brave words from somebody who's demonstrated nothing but ignorance of the divisons in this time. LHW was 160-175. Bivins/Marshall was a LHW fight. Marshall 164 1/2, Bivins 174 3/4.

No, what Marshall did as a sub 170 lber agianst Maxim and Sheppard is the issue if you are attempting to discredit him as a LHW.

Beating a prime Marshall is a terrific achievement. Great fighters Maxim and Sheppard could not match this feat despite having a larger size advantage than Bivins.

There was no super middle divison in the 40s. You dont' have to be the same as Marshall to get credit for beating him. That's just stupid. They were both LHWs, one was 10 lbs heavier. So what? Bivins was a big LHW when he fought in the divison, he had long arms, weighed at the limit, and he hit hard. That's what he did.

 

I dunno, I think it depends on how you view some of these guys. Some of them I think are being overrated. Ive never been too high on Maxim. Marshall was very good but he was never unbeatable. Guys like Sheppard, Murray, Fox, and Bivins have become vogue but while they were good, maybe even very good, solid fighters they didnt have that special something that typified the guys who actually stood out in that era. Certainly not to pretend that someone like Bivins had the best run ever. Bivins never cleaned out any division as has been said here. He simply didnt. Splitting, struggling in, or losing multiple series is not cleaning out a division.

Bivins' has always had his career juxtaposed against Louis' as a "what if." Even now his biggest supporter on this thread is arguing that Bivins was a HW not a LHW. Fair enough but I submit that the Louis who easily beat a timid Bivins was far more shot than Bivins was at that point. Had Louis and Bivins met in 1943 when both were prime and Bivins was having this supposedly epic run Louis would have smashed Bivins to pieces and thats if Bivins even had the courage to get close to Louis because when he fought the version of Louis who only had a jab left in his repertoire he ran like a thief the entire night.

The idea that somehow he didnt have an advantage fighting many of these guys who were 10 pounds lighter than him, not yet in their prime or past it, and often on home turf seems like a bit of reach.

I guess the problem I have with a lot of these guys is their "greatness" is based on the house of cards of: "It was a great achievement to beat a prime Lloyd Marshall." Why. "Because Lloyd Marshall was great." Why? "Because he beat Eddie Booker, Jack Chase, etc." So? "Those guys were great!" Why? "Because they beat Lloyd Marshall..." Its kind of like the Langford, McVey, Jeanette circle where those guys were basically considered great because they all beat each other. Its a big circle and one Im not sure I agree with in regards to some of these guys. I agree that Langford was great and some of these others as well, but you down and look at their records and a lot of these guys werent really in the mix, they were fighting each other numerous times, winning some, losing some, and then the cream rose to the top. Somewhere along the way some boxing nerd like myself got interested and these guys with an interesting back story and an interesting record went from being interesting to great. Thats a big difference.

I dunno, Im talking out loud.

 

It's kind of like the negro league baseball players-you now there were greats there but who and how great is up for debate.

Anyway I think that most of the BMR have their greatness based on what they did against Moore and Charles who were more known quantities. Whether we have overrated them (why do Bivins and Marshall get credit on top 100 p4p list for beating Charles and not Ken Overlin who has quite a list himself?) is worth discussing.