Primo Carnera vs. Gerry Cooney

Depends on how vastly (I wouldn’t consider Primo’s to be vastly superior in this case) but while I don’t keep count, probably more often than you would seem to think by the question.

We could go over hundreds of examples in boxing: Loma had a handful of fights with a loss and was beating guys with vastly superior resumes; Holmes beat Norton; Sandy Saddler destroyed Willie Pep, Ray Leonard beat Duran in the rematch, etc, etc. Almost every time a bright prospects steps up for the first time it’s by definition against someone with a vastly superior resume, yet they win often enough.

I tend to put a lot of stock in styles, speed, chin resistance vs. power and a lot of other more matchup-oriented things than I do resume. Am I wrong sometimes? Often … but I’m equally as often wrong when picking the guy who happens to have the better resume, haha.

And it goes for all sports, btw. The college basketball team with the best resume rarely wins the NCAA Tournament, a 3-2 NFL team that lost one of its games to a lowly team will very often beat a 5-0 team with a couple of really good wins, etc.

 

I know you like to think that the term "top contenders" represents some kind of a universal standard which somehow supports a measurement of cross-era equivalence... ...but it just doesn't.

Not that it matters in a fantasy head-to-head speculation.

You do not get to decide what the bottom line is for everyone. You might have needed to see Cooney beat other opponents who were not on Holmes' level - I did not and do not need to.

And, Cooney didn't need to be one of the best of his era to be my pick against Carnera.

That's right. It isn't. Because it is a superior measure of Cooney's abilities than would be a subset series of lower quality bouts. You seem to have a hard time accepting that I can form an opinion on that basis - but that's not my problem.

And, again - I've seen enough of Carnera to be quite confident in believing he would have been pitifully over-matched against Cooney.

In your opinion - Not in mine. And, more importantly, it's irrelevant to my pick.

 

So in other words when we pick against a disparity in resume, it is typically either an up and coming talent whos resume has not been written yet, or a past prime fighter with a good resume, who is not what they used to be.

Neither of those conditions is going to be the case in this fantasy fight.

Both of them are stipulated to be in their prime, and neither of them is likely to add to their resume.

 

It is not an ideal measure of cross era equivalence, but it at least enforces some discipline on the matter.

If you think that level C in one era, is better than level A in another era, then at the very least you are intrioducing a massive asumption, and one that carries a burden of proof.

You are right, I don't get to decide what the bottom line is for you.

However that is still the bottom line, whether you agree or not.

I simply can't give Cooney more credit for losing to Holmes, than I give to the alphabet champions of the era, for at least beating someone of consequence.

 

Who had the better resume? Buster Douglas or Mike Tyson? Both were in their primes.

You and I can come up with 100 of those. When Holyfield fought Qawi, Dwight had the better resume. Holyfield was untested. He won.

Just because a fighter has not yet passed a particular test doesn’t mean he cannot or will not. You know this.

Having a better resume doesn’t mean a fighter wins head to head. The resume is what they’ve done to that point, not what they’re capable of doing.

What you have with Cooney is a guy who only lost to an ATG, Holmes, in his prime and was competitive. He bombed everybody else out pretty much. Maybe Carnera beat some better fighters than Cooney did, but he also lost to some worse fighters than Cooney did. Regardless, it doesn’t mean Cooney loses to Primo.

 

Hmmn - Applying the wrong or an inappropriate method or tool for the job at hand shows a lack of discipline.

I do find your tendency to shift the accountability for proof in such a spatially unaware, yet assertive fashion, somewhat amusing.

The counterexample would be: If you think that level C in one era, equates to level A in another era, then at the very least you are introducing a massive assumption, and one that carries a burden of proof.


But, so what? The bigger message was that it doesn't matter either way in a fantasy head-to-head speculation.

Then don't. It has little bearing on the matchup in question anyway.

And, once again, you ignore the bigger point made, which is that Cooney needn't have been one of the best of his era to be the pick against Carnera.

 

Did you pick Douglas?

If not, then you went with the resume, which was the wisest course, at the time.

No a fighter having a better resume, dose not mean that they will win head to head.

However it does mean, that you should at least be reluctant to bet against them.

Cooney's resume is a done deal.

He was what he was, and that is a failed contender.

I don't think much of the alphabet titlists of that era, but every single one of them surpassed Cooney.

Carnera surpassed every single alphabet champion of that era on paper.

Could some of hem have beaten him?

Very plausibly.

The bottom line however, is that Carnera stormed the castle.

 

I don't think that any bigger points were made to be honest.

Your argument seems to be that Cooney performed so magnificently in one losing effort, that we can dismiss the accomplishments of contenders and champions in era B, who routinely beat the kind of contenders that he never beat.

That is going to be a tough sell.

You could argue that Carnera's era was crap, but a lot of people think that Cooney's era was crap as well.

At least Carnera woudl be a big fish in a small pond by that logic.

 

Let's remove the word "bigger" and replace it with "main" then. They were the main points being made, which you chose to ignore and this is why you are needlessly re-litigating settled positions to the extent of producing a strawman.

My position is straightforward...

- Fantasy head-to-head bouts are typically assessed based on the best version of each boxer in the matchup.
- In a fantasy head-to-head speculation, a single good performance is sufficient to base a pick on.
- I don't particularly rate Cooney all that highly, head-to-head (I doubt many do) but I rate Carnera much lower.
- The Holmes/Cooney bout was fought at a markedly superior level to anything Carnera exhibited.
- Had Carnera provided more of a competitive challenge to Louis when they fought then I might have considered this fantasy matchup differently.
- I don't rate Carnera's run/record all that highly and I think there is little evidence to suggest that he improved greatly beyond Sharkey (I) and, in any event, I am less concerned with resume when it comes to head-to-head speculations.
- I disagree with your indexing of performance levels with titles and ratings much like your leaning towards the idea that the "top contenders" in one era are the equivalent to those in another.


At no time have I stated that Cooney performed "magnificently". Nor have I even implied that Cooney's effort against Holmes means we should ignore "accomplishments of contenders and champions" from another era. So, I really don't know what you're going on about by this point but, whatever it is, I am not trying to sell it - that's for sure.


Also - Let's not forget that you started out by attempting to diminish Cooney's effort against Holmes, suggesting Holmes might have had an off night against Cooney, even though it was one of Holmes' best performances. Then you suggested that Holmes had been made to look good by Cooney. The patent absurdity of both of those stances (their contradiction of each other notwithstanding) had you reverting to form and waxing lyrical about Carnera's record instead.

But Carnera's record doesn't figure in my pick because, in addition to the reason already given, I also consider the period during which Carnera fought to be one of the worst in heavyweight history. I also think he looks poor in any footage of him I have seen and since I find how a boxer actually performed in fights to be more relevant to making picks in fantasy head-to-head matchups, picking Cooney is a no-brainer in this case.

 

How do we determine the strength of top contenders of one era compared to another?

 

LOL, the only guy who won big money on Douglas-Tyson was the guy who wasn’t reluctant to bet against the resume.

Resume doesn’t win fights.

 

By way of approach/es not too dissimilar to how individual fighters are rated, I'd imagine.

 

That sounds like it might be an issue if you have two periods widely separated in time, with no fighters who overlapped across them.

A lot of how we rate individual fighters relies on counting top 10 guys they beat in their own time. But doing that might beg the question, since it assumes that top 10 guys are consistent across eras.

 

It depends whether you're talking from a greatness or H2H perspective.

Imo, greatness is based on how good a fighter was relative to the evolution of their era and what they achieved within their era. Whilst I accept one era can be inherently stronger than another, even relative to the evolution (or devolution depending on who you ask) of boxing, I personally tend to rate dominant (both consistency and longevity) fighters higher than others, who tend to deem their eras as weak. E.g. Pascual Perzez, Carlos Zarate, Bob Foster and even Joe Louis. Whilst I accept some eras can contain multiple outliers/ATGs, I.e. Ali, Fraizer and Foreman, or Charles and Moore AT LHW, I think once you're talking about top 10 contenders over several years, it becomes much less likely that one era is substantially stronger than another relative to the evolution/devolution of boxing.

H2H depends whether you think the playing field across vastly different eras is equal or not. Personally, I do not, especially in the post PED eras, but there are many posters on here that I respect who feel differently to me.

 

I'm willing to toy with the idea that Ali was the only outlier in the 60s and early/mid 70s. Just like Louis was in the 40s. Difference being that Ali had Parkinsons, so declined sooner.

Foreman and Holmes remained competitive but not extraordinary in the 90s, which, as you mention, has modern training complicating everything. You see the same level of performance becoming more normal among "old" men from 1990 to 2023, so perhaps Foreman's success in the 90s doesn't say quite as much about the 70s' superiority as we often imagine. It may have just been the first harbinger of things to come.