Underrated reason why Holmes was the best of his era

Does being lineal champion magically imbue the holder with huge talent? Wasn't Shannon Briggs the lineal champion after beating lineal champion Formean? I did mention this in an earlier post, saying that Foreman's defeat of Moorer in its execution and timing..and meaning, was pure Holywood and yes, can be viewed as more significant in the boxing world....but Holmes beating Mercer was a better fistic achievement, and by a long way.

 

If ratings were done on 'best win', we may as well throw Douglas in the all-time Top 10, Turpin in the middleweight top 10 and Honeyghan in/near the welter top 10. Maybe even throw Billy Backus in there?

That's the thing, if someone wants to go on best win, fine, anyone can have any criteria they want. But beating ranked fighters is definitely one of the better ones.

Ring did its 100 years issues in 2022, they did the all-time top 100 (pfp) as obviously any list has some subjectivity, but one of its key criteria was beating ranked fighters (and you can't get that more objective than that). Suffice to say, we don't need to state who finished higher- Larry is #31 (not bad at all, when every weight is considered).


And if anyone's looking for the gap between Larry and Big George, don't bother, Foreman isn't in there.

 

You can't get much worse than Leon Spinks either. Like Ken Norton said when asked to rate the top 10 heavies in 1978- after he'd dethroned Ali "anyone could beat Leon Spinks".

 

Without wishing to derail this thread further, Neon Leon v Moorer? Now that might be a fun fight. Spinks also throws light on the best 'head to head' win beating consistently beating ranked fighters because his win over Ali is clearly not enough to place him over other more established heavyweights that DIDN'T beat Ali but did meet and beat many ranked opponents...AND because the version of Ali he beat was very, very poor. Which, with pleasing and entirely accidental circularity brings us back to Moorer's legitimate lineal claim being somewhat tarnished by the quality on the night of the ATG (in my opinion) he beat to claim it. Who'da thunk Holyfield would have heart problems. Guy had a heart as big as his head!!

 

Hard to accept Mercer was better than Moorer when the runs on the board in career accomplishments all cut Moorer’s way. The Heavyweight title makes that moot anyway.

I’ve never seen beating Mercer for Holmes being taken as worth more than Moorer for Foreman & I doubt I will again anytime soon outside this board. It’s a reach, to put it mildly.

 

Ranked fighters doesn’t in & of itself have intrinsic meaning. The quality of those fighters & their era is what makes those results meaningful.

 

That's why I rate Holmes beating Mercer more than George beating Moorer. Moorer was number 1, lineal champion, but those titles don't change my opinion that Mercer was a better boxer, a better achievement based on his style, his performances over the years. Mercer's losing performance over Lewis was a better performance than Moorer ever had at heavyweight, unless you feel differently?

...which is why I rate the Mercer win over the win over no1 and lineal champion Moorer. Mercer was simply a better fighter. Did Moorer ever show a performance like Mercer did in losing to a mostly prime Lewis? Hell, I would have taken Tommy Morrison to spark Moorer at heavyweight. There must have been a queue of opponents salivating when Moorer became lineal champion!!

Fascinating topic and I fear we will never agree...but the great thing is, we don't have to. Thanks for your thoughtful replies.

 

Erm, dunno why that came out as a double similar post...but hopefully you see my point..?

 

Excellent post.

I wonder how those claiming Foreman ranks above Holmes because he climbed the higher mountain with their respective best wins, compare Douglas to Wlad, for example.

Douglas has by far the best single win, whilst Wlad shits all over Douglas in time spent as the best HW in the world, title defences and number of ranked opponents beaten.

Personally, Douglas is no where near my top 30, whilst I have Wlad #7.

I appreciate Foreman had a vastly better career than Douglas outside of their best wins, my comparison is solely linked to the importance of the single best win vs the quality in depth of the wider resume.

 

Most of my life both I and the boxing people I've known think of Norton as a strong ATG. So he got stopped by 3 of the greatest punchers in heavyweight history...no shame there. It's time people started thinking more in terms of overall performance when it comes to Norton imo. His fight against Holmes alone was an ATG performance that goes beyond what most of the current crop might ever accomplish. Norton had crazy heart, a terrific but bizarrely underutilized jab, and an overhand right that was absolutely no joke. His bodywork was quite often exemplary, those left hooks really dug in.

 

Forty two year old Holmes fought a pretty competitive fight against a prime Holyfield,at least if not more competitive than Foreman did ..

 

Again and again and again and again--AGAINST WHO?

Yes, he beat a lot of the Ledouxz and Zanons of the world. We get that.

 

Lineage means very little given all the poor champions there have been over the year. Leon Spinks and Jimmy Braddock were lineal and nobody sees beating them as any sort of major accomplishment.

Moorers unbeaten record might be due to ducking every top heavyweight of his era besides Holyfield and Tua unless you count Foreman who I believe was unranked going into the fight and only entered the rankings by virtue of beating Moorer

 

Moorer would annihilate the best version of Leon. That's how bad Ali was.

 

I’m not going to say Moorer was a drastically or clear-cut better fighter than Mercer, but all the runs on the board are in his corner. If they both fought either man might win, but it is hard for me to accept Mercer is better when Moorer is clearly the more accomplished of the two if they shared an era.

Moorer is getting run down a bit here. He was a damn good fighter - his chin & focus were weak points, & he’s certainly no all-time great, but I don’t see him as a paper champion either - that should be reserved for less gifted fighters. Mercer lost a competitive fight to a pre-prime (but very good) Lewis, & we were all impressed, but you can’t really hang a career on such a thing. Ask Donovan Ruddock.