Mythbusting: Wlad had a greater size advantage than Ali

The numbers don't lie- I crunched them on Excel using weights from Boxrec. When weights were unavailable, I used the highest listed numbers for surrounding fights for Wlad, and the lowest for his opponents to model it as conservatively as possible. All figures are per fight. I can go more in depth with this as far as wins/losses go against different sized opponents if the interest is there.


Here's the results thus far:
.........................Wlad..............Opponent
Average Weight:..236.4.................. 234.8

lb difference...1.59

% difference.....0.67%


..........................................Ali........... Opponent
Average weight:............... 211.1...............204.45
Average Pre-exile Weight: 200.6...............198.72
Average Post-exile Weight 220.6...............209.64

lb difference Pre-Exile: 1.8
lb difference Post-Exile: 11.0
Overall average lb difference: 6.6

Overall lb difference %: 3.15%
Overall lb diff % Pre-Exile: 0.92%
Overall lb diff % Post-Exile: 4.98%

 

:good The weight gain mirrors the difference I saw in him as a fighter- a little slower and less mobile, but physically stronger. He also took a better shot from bigger punchers (both figuratively and literally, as his pre-exile opponents were almost exclusively Cruiserweight sized).

I'd initially planned on doing height and weight for each. If it was quicker verifying height than manually tracking down the inputs for the ~120 plus fighters they've fought one by one, I'd have it .

This is one case where having everything on one page to start with, like boxrec does with weights, makes it handy. Tracking weight is also easier because it's much more concrete and harder to *****; height can fluctuate from source to source.

The goal here is to strip away preconceptions and assumptions and put some cold, hard data out there for anyone who wants to see it.

I can run the numbers for other heavyweights, but it seemed like with the busier-than-usual Wlad-Ali talk, it'd be a good place to start.

 

The thread's been blessed by your presence. How unimportant could it be?

 

As explained, the height's more time consuming to hammer out.

Once that's completed, I'll update that, as well.

My initial hypothesis is that Wlad would typically have a 2-3 inch average height advantage, with Ali's being about 1.5-2.5. I'll know once it's done.:good

 

1) Let's run some more numbers for the heck of it: Pre-Exile, Ali was the heavier man 18/29 times, or 62% of the time.

Post-exile, despite his opponents weighing 10 lbs more a pop on average, he was the heavier man 25/32 times, or 78% of the time.

Overall, that's a ratio of 70.4%.

Another surprising takeaway is that Wlad was only the heavier man 35/66 times in his career, or 53%.

I'm not getting compensated enough to judge body fat composition per fight .

 

Of course it is. Critics on either side of the fence have been and will continue to say Ali beat up Cruiserweights and Wlad bullies fat guys. No numbers on an Excel page was going to stop that tidal wave.....

But it can add to it!

I'm realistic about the audience. Any interest in them will likely be subject to more twisting than a Twizzler factory to back up the position they already held.