Just for fun, talk somebody up.

Probably want to add he beat every man he ever faced, his only loss was really a robbery, Lewis turned down 3million to face him, he would of comeback to reign for years if he didn't suffer permanent testicular injuries, Tyson ran to face Holyfield who he had just knocked out and got knocked out by his left over, destroyed great champions like Dokes in a round......

 

About Holyfield: He the greatest to compete in the cruisurweight division even though it was 190 not 200. He is also in the running for the best 176-200 boxer. I think he's a bit overrated at heavyweight. His best win is either Buster Douglas who had all the tools to be great but could not put it togeather on a constant bssis, or his win over Bowe a Majority decision . He cought Tysin at the right time and would have gotten knocked out had they fought in 91. As for the Valuev fight. I have not seen it. Mostly from what I understand Holyfield "deserved" to win because he was slightly less bad than Valuev.

On Douglas: He might be one of boxings biggest under acheivers. He was a good sized 6'3" longed armed 83" reach heavyweight with very good boxings skills and showed against Tyson he knew how to use them. He also was not the most durbal boxer. He was knocked down by Tyson and lost 5/6 by stoppage.

On Bowe: Bowe in my opinion is the best H2H heavyweight, for the reasons mentioned above. Bowe barely cracks my top 10 heavys when it comes to acomplishment. He throw away more than the WBC belt. He also threw way his greatness. Bowe in 92 was a more devloped boxer than Lewis was. Considering what Lewis became it would have been a win that would make him a top 10 if not better heavyweight. His only loss was a MD to Holyfield of whom he beat the other two times they fought. He looked bad against Golota but how much of that was due to the low blows?

 

Eugene Chiriqui is a horrendously underrated former featherweight world champion. He had an excellent resume which is made all the more impressive by the fact that his jaw was completely shattered by an enemy round while fighting heroically in world war 1 for France. Judging by newspaper reports his 6th round TKO win over the also absurdly underrated Johnny Kilbane was regarded as one of the most amazing displays of punching power, speed and savy ever seen in the ring. And he performed with bravery beyond the call of duty when he took his licks losing the title to the amazing Johnny Dundee.

I wish we had more threads about the old timers from the lower weights these days. It seems like there's always 6 or 7 'Shavers vs' or 'Larry Holmes is underrated' or 'how ****ing great is Pernell Whitaker threads' or such floating around this forum which monopolize the discussion.

I miss the old days when you could get really informed discussions going about someone like Randy Turpin, or Lou Ambers, or Joe Jeanette. Sorry now I'm just mooping.

 

Always wanted a chance to talk this man up.

Frank bruno is the most underrated heavyweight in history. He has only ever been behind on cards to one man and that man was mike tyson.

Frank would have never lost had he gone through any reasonable training camps that didn't spend 100% of the time doing muscle work.

He had a gone enough jab to force lewis on the back foot and stamina is the only drawback to his game. He's realistically unbeaten apart from the rematch with tyson where he was blind and brain damaged.

With the right trainer frank would go down as the goat, not just heavyweight but p4p.

 

Will sombody talk up Joe Grim then?

Consistant record.

Resume stacked with Hall of Fame fighters.

 

The majority of his listed losses are unofficial newspaper decisions. There are only a handful of men who can rightfully claim to have gotten the better of him, by a decisive finish. Who is to say that Bob Fitzsimmons or Joe Gans wouldn't have fallen from exhaustion had the fights been scheduled to the finish? After all, he broke Philadelphia Jack O'Brien's fist with his face.

Fought to a draw with 40+ lbs bigger Luther McCarthy who was one of the big heavyweight hopes of his era. An all-time great result surely.

 

As hinted above by other posters, Douglas was about as good as Bowe. Most of Douglas's losses came after his prime (and anyway, Bowe would have lost both Golota fights were it not for Golota's meltdown). Both fighters beat great champions in their prime, but Tyson had been more dominant before -- and even after -- Douglas beat him, whereas Holyfield lost the title to Moorer. Holyfield had also defeated (generally) poorer opposition in his leadup to Bowe, and less decisively at that, than Tyson had defeated in his leadup to Douglas. Sure, you can fault Douglas for giving up in the ring against Holyfield, but by the same token, Bowe didn't even bother getting into the ring against Lewis.

I have never seen the wide gap between the two that others see. Both Bowe and Douglas were excellent contenders who profited from stylistic advantages against fighters who were better on paper.

 

stylistic advantages are often the diffrance between wining and losing.

 

I agree.

My points are simply that (1) Tyson and Holyfield were better than Bowe and Douglas overall, and (2) Bowe and Douglas couldn't replicate their dominance over Tyson/Holyfield against the rest of the division because they didn't have the same stylistic advantages over everybody else.

 

Nat Fleischer listed Joe Grim as one of the top 3 Most Courageous fighters he had ever seen.

 

Bert Cooper was cheated in both of his "losses" to Holyfield and Moorer when they were given time to recuperate when he almost finished them.
Same for Ali receiving time when Angelo Dundee split his glove against who was that ?