My top 55 heavyweight punchers

1. Both having losing records against ranked opponents is a valid point.

2. Dragging in a Revolver-level WWII putdown is both bizarre and ignorant. Satterfield was a 1941 Golden Gloves champion who served three years in WWII before beginning his pro career upon discharge in 1945. All his knockouts of top heavyweights came in the 1950's. This sort of 'deny them any credit with any kitchen-sink argument' might make a bit more sense with Savold who at least boxed during WWII, but Savold broke into the rankings before the United States entered WWII in 1939 and 1940. Five of his seven rated years were outside of WWII, and all of his seven knockouts of top five heavyweights were against men who peaked in the ratings either before or well after American participation in WWII. Nova was the #1 contender in 1938, Franklin #2 in 1941, Walker #5 in 1940, Flynn #4 in 1948, and Woodcock #4 in 1946 & #5 in 1949.
Competition probably took a hit during WWII, but the almost complete abandonment of the sport by white Americans after the fifties or by almost all top American athletes after the turn of the century might have far more impact.

 

Yes, I thought we are talking about punching power, not all-around skills. Your point about Norton is valid, but Jimmy Young did well against Ali, Foreman, and Norton, but that does not make him a top puncher.
Norton's only ko's of rated fighters were against a slipping Quarry and the enigmatic Bobick. Quarry was stopped 6 times in his career and Bobick was downright weak-jawed. Despite his impressive record knocking over journeymen, there is nothing in Norton's resume to compare with Joe Louis.

This still begs the issue. Perhaps the journeymen of Louis' era were a better lot on the whole than those of the Norton era. And both great punchers and not so great punchers can blow away journeymen, and some great punchers, for example Dempsey, had trouble doing it during early stages of their careers. What these men do with rated opponents at their peaks is far more indicative of their punching power.

By the way, off film, Jersey Joe Walcott is certainly a harder hitter than Norton, and Ring Magazine picked him as one of their 100 top punchers at all weights.

 

"Quarry, who's more durable than anyone Walcott stopped."

Nonsense.
Jerry Quarry 6 ko'd by in 66 fights (1 in each 11 bouts)

Walcott's rated ko victims:
Ezzard Charles 7 ko'd by in 112 fights (1 in 16+ bouts)
Curtis Sheppard 5 ko'd by in 87 fights (1 in 17 bouts)
Tommy Gomez 5 ko'd by in 87 fights (1 in 17 bouts)
Elmer Ray 7 ko'd by in 95 fights (1 in 13+ bouts)
Johnny Shkor 4 ko'd by in 51 fights (1 in 13 bouts)
Harold Johnson 4 ko'd by in 87 fights (1 in 22 bouts)
Ole Tandberg 1 ko'd by in 30 fights (Walcott only man to stop)

I don't know why anyone should judge Quarry more durable and Norton certainly never scored a knockout on film as impressive as Walcott's over Charles. Quarry was simply not an exceptionally durable fighter.

2. Why keep bringing up Ali, Foreman, and Holmes. No one is disputing that Norton was skilled, but he did not stop or have any of these men down or in really deep trouble.

3. Jack Dempsey and Max Baer have records that would mark them as journeyman level fighters in the current era. Old timers lost more often, have lower knockout percentages, and tended to be stopped more often. One possible explanation is that the depth of competition was generally better.

4. ko'ing Bobick early means little or nothing.

5. A lot of people pounded Stander. He was stopped 9 times in 61 bouts. Why should he be considered more durable than, let's say, Tandberg.

 

Butterbean and Joe Mesi look like they punch VERY HARD on film too.
Why do you think this is an attempt to "derail this thread" ?

I bet Butterbean could hit like a freight train.
Mesi was a very good hitter too, look at the films.

Who did Pat Killen knock out who Butterbean wouldn't if he hit them cleanly ?

 

Well, he did manage to break Ali's jaw, and gave a peak Holmes all he could handle.

 

On the war--many of the boxers who went into the service boxed in the service for the entertainment of the troops.
For those who saw front-line service, the experience of war probably produced greater mental and physical toughness.
Anyway, what has the war to do with Satterfield's success in the 1950's against heavies born too late to see service in the war.

WWII was the era of Robinson, Pep, Ike Williams, Moore, etc. Provide evidence that boxing after the war was not booming in quality. Revolver raised this issue and I find neither his nor your viewpoint very compelling.

 

Breaking Ali's jaw is a good point, although the fight was actually a split decision. The issue is not Norton as a skilled fighter, but Norton as a puncher in comparision to others such as Walcott. I honestly think myself that Walcott was the better puncher.

 

This whole argument about Joe Walcott being a better puncher isn't really being backed up here by those making the claim. He might have been the superior puncher, but what are people basing this on?

The below statistics are only numbers and may not mean anything, but at least its more substance than anything that has been so far provided.

WIN KO PERCENTAGES

Joe Walcott- 51 wins 32 KO's = 63%

Ken Norton- 42 wins 33 KO's = 79%

NUMBER OF HEAVYWEIGHTS KO'D OVER 200 LBS:

Joe Walcott- 4

Ken Norton- 30

 

That´s really a bad comparison. Walcott KO´d for example a great fighter like Charles with a picture- book- hook, Norton KO´d bums like Zanon, Garcia, Bobick, etc., the only good fighter he TKO´d was Quarry. I don´t know why coming with the whole weight- thing again...

 

I don't necessarily agree with all of Magoo's points, but he does make a valid statement about the differences in weight with Walcott's opponents vs Norton's opposition. Walcott beat a man like Ezzard Charles, but he was only 180 Lbs when Walcott knocked him out, as were many of Joe's opponents.

 

"what are people basing this on"?? Did you not read Fogey's arguments for the last page-and-a-half?

First off, if we go by a combination of KO% and size of opponents KO'd, then I daresay Freddie Steele is up there with the all-time elite hitters, and Norton is not even in the picture. Lining up those statistics for any two guys really does not constitute a thorough and accurate comparison of their careers, and I will point out that it is especially irrelevant when you're making a comparison like Norton with Walcott, who had a much higher percentage of his total fights against world-class opposition than Norton did, who had far tougher personal circumstances holding him back for a great deal of his career than Norton did, and who was a defensive fighter who rarely went for the kill, as opposed to a swarmer like Norton.

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Norton's track record of punching power against his top five opponents:
Ali- never scored a knockdown or came close to it in 39 total rounds, although he did break Ali's jaw in the first fight
Foreman- obviously didn't score any knockdowns or even have a glimmer of hurting Foreman
Holmes- scored no knockdowns and never appeared mildly close to scoring a knockdown that I know of
Quarry- scored no knockdowns, stopped Quarry on his feet through an extended shellacking
Young- scored no knockdowns, never came mildly close to scoring a knockdown that I know of

Walcott's track record of punching power against his top five opponents:
Louis- Scored two knockdowns in their first fight and one in the second, all in the early rounds and from single punches
Marciano- floored Rocky for the first time in his career with a single shot in the first round
Charles- knocked Charles out brutally with a single shot in their third fight
Ray- KO'd him in three in their first meeting while they were pups, had him down three times in their rubber match, all in the early rounds and, I believe, from single punches
Bivins- had him down for an eight-count in round three from a single shot
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Norton never scored a knockdown in 7 fights with his top five opponents; Walcott scored ten knockdowns in 12 fights with his own and knocked down every single one of them at least once, usually in the early rounds and as a result of a single shot. Walcott showed much more elite-level punching power than Norton did.

Now, I anticipate that the counter-argument here will be that Norton's opponents were generally more durable; I will concede that this is true, but is there such an enormous gap as to account for Norton (who was an aggressive fighter) never scoring a knockdown against any of his top five opponents while Walcott decked every single one of them, usually early and with a single shot? Going by boxrec records, Walcott's top five were stopped a total of 21 times in 444 pro fights, or an average of once every 21.1 fights; Norton's were stopped 11 times in 339 total fights, or an average of once every 30.8 fights. Norton's group overall evens out as a little more durable, but there isn't a gap anywhere near wide enough to account for the gap between these guys' results.

 

Read my last post.

 

I dont think calling Garcia or Bobick "Bums" is helpful or true. I certainly think any US Olympic HW is not a bum and anybody that fairly beat Norton is not my idea of a bum either. The relative merits of Walcott and Norton as punchers is interesting with decent points been made on both sides. Personally I would allways take Walcott over Ken but the ko/weight issue is interesting.
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BTw I dont think Tom Sharkey was a terrific puncher, he was an attritionalist for sure but the only top men he ko'd were Ruhlin and the very chinny(but skillful McCoy) and an over-the-hill Goddard. Jeff, Fitz, Greggains, Maher, Corbett, youthful Choynski all survived against Sailor Tom. Any other views on this?:huh