joe frazier: underated or overated?

I think overall he is rated fairly. Most people have him rated 8 or 9

He beat everyone he was supposed to beat

You don't see any losses to guys like Moorer or Rahman on his resume

He also gave the greatest heavyweight ever his first loss in the biggest

fight in boxing history.

 

Let him go. He's just desperate and trying cause he knows that I own him.

 

Underated, and likely one of the most grossly underrated heavies. Chuavlo, Mathis, Bonavena, Quarry, Ellis, Foster, Stander, Ramos, Machen... these are top quality contenders, by no means journeymen. Many believe that Quarry may have been champion if having fought in a less competitive era and arguably the best HW contender of all time. Frazier beat him twice. The quality of his competition is second only to Ali and his only two losses come to two top ten HWs. The two losses in which he receives the most criticism, involve a prime fighter who was his ultimate stylistic mismatch. How many champions faced such a tailor made opponent (only Patterson/Liston seems as extreme). Marciano certainly never faced a big puncher of such caliber (and don't say Louis, as he was roughly a decade outside his best).
Combine Frazier's other victories with a win against the man many consider to be the ATG HW (and providing Ali some of his toughest wins), and that gives him a significant bump. My greatest criticism of Frazier would be his limited number of professional fights. However given his health limitations and the severity of his bouts, it is understandable why his career was so limited. I think that he should be in the number 5 range, and certainly never outside the top ten.

 

Yeah sure, he was worse than Ali in the Holmes fight. Imagine him above 4.3%.

Personally i think he is quite underrated by the vast majority, but there's obviously a couple who overrate him IMO. A much bigger hitter than most realise.

 

Honestly, I think he's a bit overrated, assuming he makes the top 10 more often than not.

What doesn't sit well with me is that people are all too ready to make excuses for his devastating loss to Foreman. Hey, George fought plenty of guys he didn't drop 6 times in 2 rounds, so why Frazier?

It's been said earlier that he was shot. SHOT? Hardly. He was competitive twice against Ali AFTER Foreman. Maybe a little overconfident and unprepared, but hardly shot. Still though, even a slightly unprepared and overconfident Frazier should have done better than he did. Much better. he managed to throw one solitary left hook of note (To which George after the fight said: "You mean THAT was his left hook?") and was completely devastated in a fashion that draws parallels with Dempsey-Willard.
Perhaps Frazier WAS made to order for Foreman, but some say the same about Arguello and Pryor, Holyfield and Tyson or Trinidad and Hopkins, but at least the losers, or the made-to-order guy in these cases, were competitive although they ultimately lost. At worst, they were competitive for a while. Joe was not even for one moment competitive with Foreman.

Should an ATG at any time, lose his title in such one-sided circumstances? What helps Frazier's legacy immeasurably is that he lost embarrasingly to George Foreman, another man more people than not have in their ATG lists) and had two thrilling fights with Ali, whose pedigree in my eyes can't be questioned. (Their second fight wasn't that compelling, imo)
However, it's almost by association that Frazier becomes an ATG if you ask me, because he fought two of them and did very well against one of them. Hell, even Ken Norton gets an occasional mention in ATG debates almost purely for beating Ali once, who wasn't in top condition for the first fight.
Seriously, take the Ali win away and what is Joe's legacy? It's pretty decent, but it loses a whole lot in the transition. If a fighter is truly a great, you could take his best win away and he should still have enough left for his legacy to back up the claim to stand without that win. (I'm not articulating that well, but I think you guys will get what I'm trying to say.)

Was Joe somewhat fortunate when Ali was stripped of his title? I think so. It gave him an opportunity to become champion and establish a real name for himself without any really stiff competition. I don't think Joe would have become champ if Ali had not been forced to retire for three years. He was clearly the best heavy during that time, or at least of the active fighters, but there weren't any really dangerous fighters during that time either. Quick - what did Buster Mathis do aside from fight Joe for the title? Jimmy Ellis? Sure, decent enough, but they were not outstanding fighters, or even very good ones.
Bobby Foster wasn't even a blown-up light-heavyweight - he was a light-heavyweight!
Dave Zyglewicz? Ron Standers? Terry Daniels? Somehow Frazier gets a free pass for fighting these very mediocre fighters. Louis, Holmes and Marciano among others have been slammed for fighting so-called weak opposition, but almost nobody mention's Frazier's soft touches. Instead, the focus is on the Ali fights.

His win over Ali was magnificent; I cannot argue that, but it just wasn't the same Ali. He had only 2 fights under his belt before that and had yet to hit his straps in the 70's. Yet, he still managed to send Frazier to the hospital for a week and give him a hell of a fight. After that, he lost 2/3 and got dropped a total of 8 times over two fights by Foreman.
As I said, his legacy has benefitted enormously from fighting in a very competitive era (even though Joe did not fight many of the 'names' back then) and from fighting two of the most renowned names in the last 40 years. He won one and lost the others against Ali and Foreman. Norton did no worse than that, and actually did better (imo) against Ali than Joe did.

The way I'm carrying on you'd imagine I'm a Frazier hater. I'm not. I like the guy and I admire his tenacity, guts and willingness to fight. His left was a beaut. He gave us two classic fights and one horrible disaster of a fight.
If I were in the habit of drawing up lists, I'd put him somewhere in the top 15 and in a head-to-head sense maybe around the same, maybe a bit lower. I think that's fair.
Sorry, but he dosn't cut it as a true great for me.

 

one of my favourite heavyweights......skillwise, i think the guy is anyones top ten..or should be.....but for heart and will....probably one of the gutsiest hw of all time..joe woulda fought a freight train...and maybe derailed it!..a hard style to deal with for anyone, an unquenchable will to win and a superb workrate/work ethic.....i reckon him and ali were made for each other style for style....they would always have fought give and take wars.....i place joe behind ali, louis, dempsey, liston, lewis, holyfield, holmes and foreman..(in no order....)..but ahead of marciano and tyson........frazier vs tyson or marciano are my ultimate dream fights!!

 

I know,thanks.

 

On this forum(Boxing forum) I see people praising guys like James Toney, but discrediting Joe Frazier.
I'm still trying to find out why :huh

 

Toney is a drugs cheat, his entire career is tainted, thankfully for Joe and his knockouts, we are here to critique Frazier's boxing ability, which was exceptional, rather than singing ability, which was not.

 

Frazier lost bad against Foreman. Lewis lost early ko twice. Foreman was the only one to ko him early. That Foreman would've ko'd a lot of great fighters - he did the same to Norton.

 

While the fighters you listed were by no means journeyman I can’t think of any all time great who would lose to them either. Frazier did not have an easy time with Bonevena the first time. I thought the fight was a draw, and Ocsar was very close to knocking Frazier out. Bonevena, outside of Foreman was the best puncher Frazier fought. Look at the results. Frazier was down on two score cards to Buster Mathis before his superior stamina took over late in the fight.

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Underated!