The more impressive 1st round KO?

Great question. Tyson vs Spinks takes it for me.

 

That's one of these unanswerable questions. When it comes to the odds it's Liston. When it comes to historical significance it's Louis. When it comes to commercial appeal it was Tyson. I will take Mike because he's my favorite out of those 3 and Spinks is my favorite out of the 3 "losers". You can't go wrong either way.

 

I sometimes think the Spinks KO is a bit overrated, just because of Spinks’ knees being bad. As someone with bad knees myself, one realises healthy knees are really quite important. I suppose only Spinks could say how much they affected him though. I’ll go with Liston - Patterson

 

We can also add that Spinks was never stopped in his career and was down only 1 time and I don't think it was even a proper knockdown.

 

Ask Mike himself about what it’s like to try to fight on bad knees after Jake Paul schooled his old ass.

 

Tyson-Spinks for sure.

 

I went for Patterson Liston 1, in what turned out to be a minority pick.

Of course all these wins are incredible, but what separates them?

While Schmeling and Spinks didn't go on to do very much after these losses (nothing in Spinks case), Paterson was still beating ranked contenders a decade later.

I don't personally feel that being past their best was the dominant factor in the other two losses, but Paterson was arguably as good as he had ever been, or ever would be in his loss.

You can argue it either way in terms of whether Schmeling or Patterson was greater, but Schmeling was no longer the champion when Louis beat him, and it was downhill from there.

Spinks was the champion when Tyson beat him, but I don't think anybody ranks him above Patterson on an all time heavyweight list, and it was his last fight.

So I am going with Paterson Liston I.

To make the feat even more impressive, he did it twice, proving that it was not a fluke.

 

I'd say Tyson - Spinks.

Spinks was proven, undefeated, and legitimately the lineal champion.

 

Louis vs Schmeling for me. Joe had gotten Ko'd by Max in the first fight. I remember when Tyson Ko'd Spinks in 1 round it really was no surprise at least for me. As great as Spinks was, he really had no business in there with Tyson who was a Monster at the time.

 

Louis legit answered all questions around him in just over 2 minutes against a brotha that had battered for 12 rounds and tkod him, he got his win back the right way

 

Yeah I rate the win but Spinks was a bit of a blown up lhw even with the wins over Holmes( 2nd fight debatable) Cooney had a foot out the door at that point, Tyson was kinda of his worse nightmare

 

Spinks looked like he was going to crap his pants before the bell rang. I love Spinks, in fact he's my #1 ATG lightheavyweight, but even as great as he was he knew he had no way off keeping Tyson of of him. This wasn't an aging Holmes, a drunken Cooney, or Steffan Tangstad.