Most successful boxers with the worst defensive skills?

Margarito, Paul Williams, Baldomir, Razor Ruddock.

 

Ricardo Mayorca
Pazienzia
Mosely

 

I'm starting to think Paul Williams takes the cake. He was very successful and his defense consisted of throwing 100 punches per round and being tall.

 

If I had to pick an example of what real bad defense looked like in boxing, it would be Cotto. He does the things he's supposed to do, but like you said, he's just leaky and can't seem to avoid the punches he's trying to avoid. When he goes on his bicycle he gets trapped, punches find their way through or around his guard, and when he moves his head or upper body he still usually gets tagged.

Cotto's defense just not getting the job done:

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He was quite good at catching punches and moved more than credited, he shut down Norton and Frazier's offense before he demolished them.

 

Doug Dewitt .zero defense hands by his side just tough and a bit barmy.

 

Gerald McClellan for sure. Monster puncher but poor defense that was gonna catch up to him eventually. The results don't lie.

 

OctoWlad?

 

I think Joe Louis' defense left something to be desired.

 

Maybe you're confusing it with their 3rd fight. In the 4th fight Pacquiao landed at will JMM was all offense

 

I know the fight inside out and accept that many of the shots landed on the gloves and arms and that Ali took the steam off many of the punches with his ducking, blocking, rolling, leaning back and other subtle tricks but I can also see that he took ALOT of clean punches especially to the body which was hardly an advisable strategy against one of the hardest punchers in heavyweight history. Yes Ali won but it wasn't a great defensive display, he just pot-shotted off the ropes, Foreman fought a terrible fight that night, no matter how good a defensive radar Ali had built inside him other fighters would have beat Ali that night had he tried to use that strategy against them for the whole fight, Ali saw it was working against Foreman who had no plan B and he stuck with it.

 

Juanma Lopez
backs up in a straight line
heavy on the lead foot and very upright with chin hanging in the air
never slips or weaves
beyond a lead parry, minimal hand defense
will get tagged over and over with the exact same combination but never makes any adjustment (believes his power when it lands will make the difference)

 

Arturo Gatti
At mid rangle, Gatti leans in with his head slightly below the opponents guard and literally just stays there for a few moments.

He doesn't clinch, doesn't slip, most often hands down, just trying to catch a few breaths right in front of his opponent while they start to clip the top of his head. He did this mainly later in his career.

We loved you Arturo but at least put your hands up or bloody clinch. You are still a very available target doing that.