Prime Ken Norton v the 8os Alphabet Soup

Ken could have beaten them all but he'd still lose out to larry.

80's without larry would almost certainly be ruled by shavers or cooney however.

 

Don't want to detere the subject of the thread, but Shavers isn't reigning the 80's.. He was already past it by the dawn of the decade and losing to the likes of Mercado, Cobb and Tillis..

Cooney without Holmes standing in his way might have been interesting for a while, but I doubt he had the staying power to remain at the top for long.. Tim Witherspoon busted him up in sparring and was ejected from Cooney's camp as a result.. Of course, sparring doesn't mean everything, but lets just say that his people wanted nothing to do with him... Weaver and Dokes may have been beatable opponents for Gerry, but I still don't see him establishing a significant reign.

 

Ken Norton had the boxing ability, fighting will, and physical conditioning to beat some of the 80's crew.. But, regardless of being shot at the time of the Cooney fight however, I'm still not so sure that he would have prevailed against him, even at his best.. Gerry was a fast starting puncher who knew how to impose his size on Ken and Norton did not do well against big hitters... Witherspoon and Bruno could have posed similar problems... I do think Ken would beat some of the division's better boxers of the day such as Tate, Page, Tubbs and Dokes... But the era was loaded with big men who could punch as well, and this is why I'm hesitant to procalim Norton as a dominant force, had he been prime during this period...

 

Norton would've beaten most of them on conditioning alone. He'd need to be careful against Coetzee and Cooney, Bonecrusher too, but I believe he was overall better than either of them and would win.

I think if you matched him against, say, the eight best guys from the era, he'd probably win 7 and get stopped in an upset in the eighth.

 

Old Ken Norton deserved a draw vs Holmes if not beat him , why wouldn't a younger Norton beat Holmes ?

 

For as close as it was, Holmes still deserved the win... He was fighting with a torn bicep muscle and its also debatable as to exactly how "past it" Norton really was for that fight.. Of course it wouldn't be long after that Ken would fall into the abyss and abruptly end his career, but in 1978 he was still looking pretty sharp.

 

Holmes -norton was not a close fight. there were hard fought rounds but norton was outboxed in all the quieter rounds.

Norton beat Ali in a close fight when muhammad was carrying a freak injurey but he had a close run thing with young, beat a shot quarry and stander but was waxed by foreman and shavers. Its not a deep enough a resume to guarantee any kind of dominance at the best level of any era.

Ken did not fight ron lyle, mathis, bonnavena, mac foster, al blue lewis, joe bugner, joe frazier or tiger williams. If he had he may have been 50-50 against them just like kenny would be against page, coetzee, tate, witherspoon, thomas, dokes and weaver.

 

Whilst I agree that Holmes legitimately beat Ken Norton, I disagree that it wasn't close.. You make some additional good points in the rest of your post, although some of those scenarios are a tad over simplified.

 

Regardless of the meaningless scoring system it is reasonable to assume that a 30 years old Norton would have done better than a 35 years old one .
Only for Ali it is allowed to be considered well past it while at age 31 , and for Tyson too of course .
Why did Norton start so late really ? and he beat no1 of note prior to his first fight with ali . I read about their sparing session , but that was all of his elite experience up to their first fight .

 

I think a Peak Spoon can KO Peak Norton late.

If Ken comes in light at a slim 205lbs like he was for Ali II, then his body might not hold up well to the nuclear righthand of Tim.

...Speaking of which, one of them bombs flush on the chin, would at least badly hurt & freeze Norton.

 

Its just a question of dominance. Ken was a top class HW who on his day is good enough to have an even chance with great fighters -but he wont keep it up. hes not knocking over an entire era because he was 50-50 at elite level. sure he could beat weaver but he could just as easy lose to him. same with most of the other top fighters. He beats some he loses to some but hes too good to get beat by all of them.

 

Norton was a funny character. His weird defense actually worked wonders against technically sound guys who threw jabs and straight right hands. And whereas most guys can more easily avoid the looping roundhousers....they were the guys who were able to work around Norton's crab defense. Being technically unsound actually worked well against Kenny, ironically.