Liston and Tyson are getting a lot of love lately and Johnson is getting shitted on

There are some here that don't rate Johnson highy, but most do. His championship reign wasn't much to write home about, though. I have him somewhere 3-7 and that's probably quite mainstream.

Liston is rated in the lower 10 by most and I agree with this as well. Even though his title reign wasn't much he did one of the most impressive jobs ever of cleaning out the division before that, and this is the main reason why people rate him. I know McGrain and SuzieQ, two of the most excellent posters on this forum, have him in their top 3, and for me that's way too high.

Tyson is much the same as Liston. He had a couple of tremendous years, but in the end he didn't deliver on the promise of those years. Most have in the lower top 10, as they should.

Personally, I think the top 10 lists here are getting better and better actually.

 

I put johnson at 10, Liston at 11 and Tyson at 14....But in defense of why I have Johnson that low and some do not include him is the ammount of good footage we have of his fights. it is so hard to base newspaper articles and word of mouth, books, unforgivable blackness and other sources the same credence as actual fight footage.

 

Who cares about title defenses, Liston already cleaned out his division Pre title. There was no one left to face by the time he became champion in 1963 other than Upcoming Cassius Clay. Liston cleanly and clearly wiped out his era as much as any heavyweight champion who ever lived, and liston ducked no one. If Liston had won the title in 1959, then all those contenders he beat pre title would have been counted as title defenses on his resume.....Think of this, Without Cassius Clay Liston arguebably reigns until around 1969.

Defintley. Holmes Never Unified the title once in 7 years, Never gave Rematches, Avoided his WBC # 1 mandatory, and took on Embryo fighters instead of the Prime Alphabet Soup Champions

Holyfield was one of the most inconsistent fighters of all time, while liston was very consistent in his prime. You talk about title reigns, but Holyfield also had a horrible title reign struggling with 42 and 44 year olds Holmes and Foreman, and nearly getting kayoed by backup substitute Bert Cooper. Liston cleaned out his era, while holyfield did not.

Foreman was one of the dumbest ATG fighters ever in his prime. he never proved he could beat a top defensive Boxing Stylist, and foreman had one of the most padded records of all time coming up, while liston was thrown to the wolves early on. Liston also was the much better all around fighter and would clearly beat foreman h2h.



Liston, Marciano is close. Both cleaned out there eras very convingsingly and both never ducked anyone. I do believe Liston beat a slightly bit more variety of styles than marciano did, and as a whole younger fighters(though the old ones rocky fought were tremendous), and I would favor Liston over marciano h2h in a classic...both are top 5 IMO

Disagree....Liston beat some of the BEST Prime Young Heavyweight contenders never to win a world title, and Twice Knocked out a Hall Of fame prime ATG in one round. Tyson beat some of the most skilled talented powerful big heavyweights we have ever seen in this divisions history in the 1980s.

 

So did Sonny Liston. Eddie Machen, Cleveland Williams 2x, Nino Valdez, Zora Folley, Wayne Bethea, Mike Dejohn, Roy Harris, and Johnny Summerlin 2x

 

Thank you for that compliment and you can consider yourself one of those excellent posters. I do have Liston at # 3, it is my opinion, and I try to present a case as best I can. I understand your reasoning why you think that is too high.

 

I think Holyfield should be below them as well. He had few really dominating wins over good opposition, lost his series to both Lewis and Holyfield, and lost to Moorer while still close to his prime. But it's not clear cut in any way.

And Foreman isn't top 10 for me. He's to unproven, basically 50/50 with ranked opposition. He faced four top level boxers and only beat one of them, when trailing big time on points.

 

1. Joe Louis
2. Muhammad Ali
3. Sonny Liston
4. Lennox Lewis- Congrats Pontius and Old Fogster and John Thomas, youve convinced me!! Im HOOKED!
5. Rocky Marciano
6. Mike Tyson
7. Larry Holmes
8. Jack Johnson
9. George Foreman
10. Joe Frazier

* for the first time ever i am forced to remove Jack Dempsey from my top 10 list. He just did not accomplish enough and did not beat enough of the best of his era...but h2h I do consider him top 10. Makes me sad there wasnt room for Jack

 

I will say that Johnson has the deepest resume of any of the heavyweight champions outside of Louis and Ali.

Louis and Ali both beat twice as many ranked contenders as any other champion (outsid of eachother) since rankings began. To that extent the consensus that they are #1 and #2 in whatever order you preffer is plausible.

There were no rankings in Johnsons day but if there had been I think he would probably be the clear cut #3 in terms of ranked contenders beaten.

 

I they they are all worthy of top 5 spot. Johnson does not get **** on by me, He gets alot of praise for the way he cleaned out the colored heavyweight title which was far tougher than "linear" title back then. Johnson does need to get critisized though for not taking on the best black and white contenders during his title reign, but since he already beat the best black ones pre title reign, he gets cut some slack.

 

Very well True

Agreed