Middleweights that beat heavyweights.

5ft 9ins, 151lbs Charley Burley beating the 6ft 4ins, 220lbs HW champion of Texas, Jay Turner.

 

Hi Guys.
Mickey Walker 168 Bearcat Wright 210
and he fought plenty more a lot heavier than himself, maybe more than any other 160-170 pounder.
stay safe guys.
Mike.

 

Willie Meehan

 

Sam Langford beat quite a few... Lang, Jeanette, Jim Barry, Bill Hague, Sandy Ferguson

 

164 pound Tony Mundine knocking out 210 pound Foster Bibron for the Australian heavyweight title.

 

Not a win but Barbados Joe Walcott was unlucky to only draw with Fred Russell, 140 lbs v 215!

 

Apparently Charlie Mitchell KO'd the 200+ pound Herbert Slade in a private bout

 

How many if those guys did Sam beat weighing under 170?

 

It wasn’t terribly uncommon around the turn of the 20th century, although in many fights we don’t have weights.

Joe Choynski weighed 162 when beating 230-pound Ed Dunkhorst and fought a draw with 219-pound Jim Jeffries while scaling 167.

Bob Fitzsimmons had some similar victories.

 

Why are suddenly smaller men unable to beat bigger men? One would laugh at the notion that a modern day world class middleweight champion could beat a decent world class heavyweight contender. But it was relatively common in the early 20th century.

 

I think all of them.

 

Well, for one thing we don’t see 160-something and 170-something pounders fight big men anymore, so maybe some of them could.

I also think with the advent of strength training (and PEDs), the big men of today are much stronger than those of yesteryear, and those extra pounds maybe meant a little less a century or more ago in difference in strength and power?

Also, you’re talking about gloves being unpadded or barely padded, so when a middleweight sized guy in 1900 hit a big man square in the jaw, he was probably doing more damage than today.

I also think there’s a much greater height and reach difference on average. Today’s NBA players are much longer and taller than they were even 20-30 years ago (more 6-foot-8 guards vs 6-1 guys for instance) and that’s also true I think for heavies. So a 5-8/5-9 guy might do better vs a 6-foot heavy than a 6-7 monster.

 

Systemic barriers are mistaken to be real ones. The way the sport is set up the fights referenced here can't happen. A fighter being able to avoid losses at HW and compete for the title is not the same as being unable to compete at that division. But if a MW can't do those things they aren't going to fight HWs.

The sport was buitl different someone like B Hopkins taking off from their title reign to fight a Frans Botha, Axel Schulz, Oliver McCall and Ray Mercer with no belt on the line is just not something that happens. The title is all that matters. In the early days it was more like boxing was boxing and the titles were add ons for guys to earn accolades they couldn't. It wasn't meant to be a hard barrier. But gradually it became one.

 

Jack O'Brien was listed at 162 when he schooled Johnson at 205.