Johnson, Louis, Ali, Dempsey, Marciano

Disagree. Sonny Liston should easily be in there. So should Holmes. Dempsey might not have been the best heavyweight of his own era.

 

If you don´t go by some well thought through criteria but instead by how they were perceived in their time it´d be those 5 plus Sullivan, Jeff and Tyson IMO.

 

1/ Muhammad Ali
2/ Joe Louis
3/ Larry Holmes
4/ George Foreman
5/ Joe Frazier

Imo.

 

How do you define greatness?

Does H2H ability play any part in that?

In H2H it's unfair to compare old lighter heavyweights to much bigger heavyweights decades later.

 

Prety close I would say.

 

I agree that these were the first five greatest HW champions. When I was a youngster reading about boxing in the very late 60s and early 70s, the 5 named were generally perceived as the 5 'greatest' champions, with Tunney also highly regarded, but generally perceived as a notch below.

Liston's name didn't enter the equation in truth...I think that the odour from his 2 fights with Ali still lingered strongly. Liston was perceived by many as a bully and a quitter because of those fights, and wasn't forgiven for this then as readily as he seems to be forgiven now.

 

Agreed. The Tyson years changed all that though. People started saying TYson was "the most feard/ intimidating heavyweight since Sonny Liston" and this created a "Liston renaissance". He became cool again, the mystery became sexy. imagination ran wild...:hey

 

... Nick Tosches wrote a shitty book...

 

Jim Jeffries, Bob Fitzsimmons, John L Sullivan, Paddy Slavin, Peter Jackson.

 

While I believe it is a justifiable placement, I would disagree.

01 Louis
02 Ali
03 Holmes
04 Foreman
05 Lewis
06 Frazier
07 Holyfield
08 Marciano
09 Johnson
10 Tyson

11 Wlad
12 Dempsey
13 Liston
14 Jeffries
15 Bowe
16 Vitali
17 Schmeling
18 Charles
19 walcott
20 Patterson

 

NO way holmes or Foreman should be above Johnson in a all time ranking unless it's h2h. While I even disagree with that, I can see why people would say so. However, in overall HW ranking.. no way no how are they ranked higher...

 

That was the opinion in 1905.

Must have been right.

 

Even that could be open to question.

Even if we made Ali the cut off point, there would be a strong argument for the inclusion of Jeffries.

 

It's a simple list and probably the one that would get the less criticism. I'd throw Lewis and Holmes in the mix for a top 7 of guys who dominated their respective era. Guys like Liston, Frazier, Foreman, Holyfield would come after.

1- Louis
2- Ali
3- Lewis
4- Marciano
5- Johnson
6- Dempsey
7- Holmes
8- Foreman
9- Frazier
10- Holyfield
11- Liston


Something like that, for me.