Joshua’s opportunity is now

Lol behave.

Straight off the top of my head he has his way with the likes of Douglas, Bruno, McCall, Hide, Morrison, Bent, Seldon, Old Foreman and Akinwande all who held versions of the title in the 90s.

Not saying he'd be beating your Lennox's, Bowe's or Holyfields by any stretch of the imagination but he'd be in the mix with the top boys.

 

Well, the PR campaign was for a reason. His main market is the English.
If AJ just expressed himself in natural fashion, he would alienate his customers, both ''politically'' and just in general behaviour.
He already crossed the line a few times and it was smoothed over with damage control.
If he starts being honest about his hypocritical opinions and cuts loose with his naturally obnoxious and moronic behaviour, he will lose a lot of fans and sponsors.
I do support that though. He needs to be himself.

 

first on your list: Buster Douglas 1988-1990 would beat Joshua
just a better boxer & much better jab

Joshua is around Bruno level

 

Nah he'd get flattened.

I'm all for nostalgia and it was great what he did...... beating a coked up Mike Tyson.......... but let's have it right

 

Maybe he should get in their with Helenius and get back in to your top two in the division. Thanks for the laugh.

 

what has AJ done ?
Douglas in his contender years also beat guys like Greg Page, Mike Williams, Trevor Berbick; Oliver McCall. no great shakes
but these are same type of boxers AJ has built reputation on. but AJ came along in hype era & his mediocre fights were stamped with unified titles & PPV broadcast
if you look at actual quality of opposition he did not beat anything much

Joshua beat guys like 39 age Pulev
among his best wins!
let's get it right
people swallow too much hype these days
Joshua v Pulev would probably be worthy of a third down the bill on a Don King heavyweight card for a title shot a couple of shows later!
but in 2020 it's a mandatory challenger and a 3 belt unified!

that's not nostalgic
there was a lot of crap back then too
but top fighters were facing live challengers regularly still
old men were not allowed to sit in mandatory positions years on end in the 1980s
not to this extent

 

I agree with fastleft....buster douglas would have beat joshua. Just an all round more natural fighter....better jab. Could take a better shot. Better variety of punches. Better stamina. Even just go back and watch the oliver mcall v buster douglas fight. Buster was far from the no hoper people we,re billing him going into the tyson fight.

His problem is he let himself down a few times in his career....with overeating etc. But on his day and his pretty usual form....he was better than joshua for me. Different times. Joshuas done well in the grand scheme of things. But the standard is a lot lower imo. More so in general boxing skills. Concentrate too much on gameplans nowadays.

 

The top guys were Mercer, Moorer, Bowe, Tyson, Ruddock, Holyfield, Lennox, Buster at his best, a mature Larry Holmes and so on; they box ****ing circles around Anthony.

 

oh, yeah.. Joshua got chased out of the ring by Andy Ruiz and he's supposed to be too much for Buster Douglas? I don't think so.

 

With one life and death win over a retiring, old and inactive Klitschko coming off the Fury loss, at home in London.

 

You're not serious with the top 20/30 comment mate (and a glass jaw doesn't get up and win after that right from Wlad), but completely agree with the main points here. I genuinely think the Joshua who beat Whyte in 2015 had a better chance against Usyk, almost solely down to him being more comfortable with himself.

Unfortunately think he's been too carefully manufactured for too long and it has led to a fairly serious existential crisis. He could do with getting away from it all with his proper mates and just having a good time, not worrying about his sponsorship deals.. or his abs. Then maybe after a year he could come back and do what you say.

But instead he'll be sat down with Hearn discussing how he can maximise his earnings over the next few years. No doubt with some more PR training thrown in.

 

Yep - the same Wlad that would still punch holes through most of those names mentioned

 

What........ the same Buster Douglas who got banjo'd inside 3 rounds by Holyfield and lost to 12-5 Mike White ?

 

Deary me.

 

When was the last time you watched a buster douglas fight? As i said....busters problem was he,d let himself down through not training properly and overeating on a few occasions. But on the whole he was a very good fighter especially by todays standards.

I watched the douglas v mccall fight recently....that version of douglas beats joshua all day long. Just watched joshua look amatuerish. Average jab. Average stamina. Average punch variety. Average chin. Douglas beats him in every single one of them categories. Go back and watch douglas outside of the few times he let himself down by com8ng in unprepared.