Very good or great? Volume 1: Ken Norton

It was for the #1 WBC spot... the winner should have faced L. Spinks. Spinks wanted to fight a rematch with Ali (big money and he had already beat Ali once) instead of defend against a very tough Norton. The WBC proclaimed Norton it's Champ.

 

As much as i like Ken (he's one of my favourite fighters) i can't call him great. His flaws are there for all to see, but he maybe didn't get the breaks he should have. His style put him in the "who needs him" catergory and he was largely avoided. Even taking this into account he still falls just short of top class. On his day though he could give any heavy of any generation problems.

 

Hookie, what Frazier did that I don't believe Ken ever could have done was establish himself as the undisputed heavyweight champion by stepping into the splintered void left by Ali being forced into exile. He went from minority NYSAC recognition over the man who defeated him in the 1964 US Olympic trials, to official unification over WBA titlist Ellis (who many thought would prevail, based upon his superior showing over Bonavena, who had given Joe hell twice), to popular recognition through the FOTC and knockdown of the decade. Smoke did something which wasn't done again until Tyson came along. Joe won ten consecutive heavyweight title fights from Mathis, Sr. to Stander. Eight of those wins were stoppages, and a ninth produced one of the few final round knockdowns in heavyweight title history during the classic championship round era. (Ali later did this to Wepner, and Weaver to Tate. Off hand, I'm not sure what other heavyweights did this in title competition with the 15 round limit in place.)

Anyhow, it's a good conversation to hash out, with spirited discussion being generated.

Does Ken get to ten defenses with Joe's challengers? 1968 Bonavena, 1969 JQ and FOTC Ali were hell. Bob Foster was comparably sized to Garcia, and far greater with much more experience. Mathis, Sr. was far from a joke at his best, as the film of his savaging of Chuvalo reveals.

 

good not great

 

Honestly, I would never rate Norton ahead of or even equal with Frazier... but I think they were closer than some will admit. Sure, Frazier has better numbers but H2H it's pretty close IMO... Frazier ahead of Norton though.

 

In a division of underachievers, it's always nice to see the careers of guys like Ken Norton. He always gave you what he had and was always in shape. What more can you ask for?

He had that oddball style of his & his jab is extremely underrated. It was long and stiff and if he could land it, it really did set things up for him. And nobody has a more dedicated body punching attack in that division since. A brutal 2 handed assault to the breadbasket and just how many heavies can really absorb body punishment all that well?

He was barely a blip on the radar screen when he licked Ali as a huge underdog the first time. And that's a terrific win any way you look at it.

I really thought he was going to become an announcer when he started doing some commentary around 76.

 

He did do substantial work for NBC from the mid 1970s to early 1980s, with bouts like Shavers-Williams, Shavers-Ali, Jerry Martin-James Scott (where he unexpectedly and correctly predicted the upset winner beforehand), some early matches by Dokes, and a number of others. But very few competitors have the lengthy career behind the microphone Sean O'Grady has enjoyed.

 

Neither one. But a worthy win and a humiliating loss (especially if by stoppage) Norton can be seen as a gatekeeper for the greats , if one got stopped by him , a great he's not , if one had extreme troubles with him , the greatest he's not and it is a certainty , unless one had some viable excuses of course , which can explain many things.

 

Very good.

It's hard to call this man a great considering the division he was in.

Stylistically he proved an equal to ali, no doubt.

But he got whipped by foreman and the big fight with frazier never materialised.

In the next era he seemed equal to holmes but then shavers knocked him silly.

A fighter with a good style to pose difficulties in terms of a 15 round distance fight but I wouldn't call him great.

 

very good but not great.

 

Norton is one of those guys whose resume you can't take at face value. Personally I think he was robbed of much more than just one fight at Yankee Stadium; he was robbed of a big chunk of legacy, which affects him to this day, right down to this very thread. Nobody gave Ali more trouble, and that incluces Frazier in my opinion. Ali figured Frazier out, even though figuring someone out and then executing a game plan are two different things. I don't think Ali figured Norton out. And honestly if we exclude Holmes and Berbick, I think Norton was the only guy Ali never figured out.
The public wanted Ali as its champion and all other fighters were going to enter the ring handicapped against him.
So on paper Ken was very good. With a little extra luck and fairness, we'd probably all be calling him great.

 

Muhammad candidly admitted that he never figured Ken out in an interview he did reviewing his career with Cosell upon the resignation of his WBA Title in September 1979, mentioning that Norton saw right through his bluster and bombast, and baffled him with Ken's own peculiar brand of unorthodoxy.

But what if Ken had been awarded the decision in Yankee Stadium? We know how lethal the manner of Frazier's dethroning in Jamaica has been to his legacy, even with the FOTC already under his belt. Who gets the first shot at Norton after Ali III? The pressure to try redeeming himself against Foreman would be overwhelming. And if he can somehow manage to avoid George until Young eliminates Foreman, can he evade a streaking Shavers until Holmes upends Earnie in 1978? Because in the public imagination, his credibility as a champion would hinge on being able to prove he could defeat somebody who had previously trashed him before an international audience with all the marbles on the line.

If we were to accept that he was robbed of a big chunk of legacy in September 1976, how many pieces of that chunk does he have left when Shavers or Foreman punch him out in a round or two to take that title? It took Patterson nearly a decade of valorous redemption to rehabilitate his credibility after Liston, time Ken didn't have at his age. (Norton's final match before turning 30 was his win over Ali, a realization which startles many.) Once becoming a champion, he wouldn't have the same latitude to cherry pick his way through the minefield of top heavyweight sluggers he had as a contender. One year after Norton III, Ali successfully defended against at least one challenger Ken would have been hard pressed to survive for any length of time against. Did he have Frazier's brass plated lead balls? (I think part of the reason Joe had compromised mobility in the Foreman rematch was because he was dragging his huge nuts on the ground when he took on George that second time with no world title to gain for it. Now, Smoke's huge nuts have caused him to be confined to a wheelchair.)

 

I think if Norton had won in '76, we would've seen Norton-Ali IV. Ali had so much bargaining power and clout, that I think he'd have gotten a rematch. Norton might've beaten him again. In the meantime, it's hard to say what else might have happened. It would've been great for Norton if Young still crossed paths with Foreman and got him out of the way. Shavers was inconsistent and looked awful in early '78, so despite the equation of Norton's chin vs. Shavers' punch, I don't think it's an absolute guarantee that Earnie would win. A victory against Ali in '76 would have been HUGE and even if he got flattened by George, Earnie, Ron or any of those monsters, he'd still be better evaluated today by a long shot. So I don't it's fair to imply that a victory over Ali wouldn't have gained him that much legacy anyway.

 

Well, a victory over Ali did get him into Canastota as early as 1992. Is Ken even in the IBHOF today without that win? (Remember, it was only a split decision by a margin of one round, and UPI unofficially had Ali the winner, 6-4-2.)

Shavers looked awful in March 1978 only because Holmes abruptly produced his best performance prior to 1982, using a template Norton was utterly incapable of replicating. (Larry used a movement pattern extremely unusual for an orthodox heavyweight, circling, at times "flying" around the ring counterclockwise, something SRL was noted for, but very few other top tier competitors of the era.) But Earnie surprised a lot of people with his stamina and conservatism against Ali, including probably ringside commentator Norton, who had previously supplied ringside analysis for Shavers-Tiger Williams.

 

I see Ken beating the likes of Bonavena,Mathis etc. And he DID beat Quarry.