Seems like his median score has usually been top 15, but I've always been high on Vit and he seems to be getting some well deserved respect after his HOF induction, so I thought I'd try another thread. Personally, while his "win" resume isn't that great, not as good as his brother at least, his "loss" resume (i.e. how many losses and the context) is much better. Also, he does have two of the greatest accomplishments in HW history: 1. coming back after four years without a fight and beating one of the eras best HWs(admittedly a weak era) without even a tune up fight to regain a title and: 2. The greatest rounds won to rounds lost percentage in HW history. By far. No one is even close. So where do you rank him in terms of legacy ( not in terms of H2H)? I'd rank him tied with his brother at #10. Better in some ways, worse in others, and considering it was the "Klitschko" era, I think a tie is appropriate.
Disagree, but that's fair. For me, Wlad nearly lost to a near prime Peter, Vitali blanked a full prime one, and then Wlad somewhat less impressively beat a mentally shot Peter. Sanders was a better win than any Wlad had except maybe Byrd and Povetkin. Vitali had about 60% of the other top 20 wins Wlad had, but had 3 fewer losses and the losses he had we're much better. Plus the two accomplishments I mentioned in the OP that Wlad didn't have. But I fully admit it's a debatable point. Also, no irony? No sarcasm? No mockery from you? Have to admit, I'm dissappointed. Maybe an apocryphal story about a run in you had with one of the brothers opponents?
Wlad ended up accomplishing more than Vitaly and dominated alone for few years. But, domination usually gets dumped into the weak era or low opposition perspective. However, he had a career defining fight with Lennox Lewis. So it feels like he probably was the best one after all. There is to many legends, that made the sport too much in the heavies for him to possibly be in the top 10 and in modern times everything gets loved and then vilified in the span of 3 days. In fantasy matchups he should be a top 10, fighters that big and skilled just did not exist prior to Lewis. But, in value and gathered respect he is around 15. It will be interesting to see where he is in 10-20 years, not considering the current and future bunch. Time does place some athletes in better perspective. With all the hype and Nintendo's game, Tyson marked the imagination of people so much they had him beating Godzilla, King Kong and Jesus all at once. No one alive, dead or resurrected could beat him. Meanwhile, Larry Holmes was never truly loved or respected during is days and the next 10-20 years. Now there both in the top 5-10 on most lists. So, maybe people will stop to hating and disrespect ingthe Klit at some point. I for one, love the Klit and i think it should have its rightfull place between the labia's.
Vitali simply doesn't have any good enough wins to be considered a top 25 all time heavyweight. He quit against Byrd and got stopped by an old, shot, and fat Lennox Lewis. He feasted on extremely weak competition. Wlad is a top 25 All time heavyweight, but Vitali isn't anywhere close.
I agree. I think his potential was more than his accomplishments. Vlad? He has good wins and got better with Emanual Steward, who made him I think twice the fighter. He made him use his jab more and relax and let the knockouts come with his size..
Looks like most posters (rightly, in this case)disagree with you. Alot of subjectivity here, tbf. You'd have to put people like Floyd Patterson WELL above Vitali not to put him in top 25. Who did Patterson beat? His best wins were probably worse for his era than Vits were for his, and Patterson had less of them, and ALOT more and worse losses. Really hard to put Patterson above Vitali, and Patterson is a clear top 20-25 HW. Realistically, the real debate is, is Vit a top 10-15 HW or a top 15-20 HW. But, AJ, Wilder and Fury may wind up staking a strong enough claim to top 15 that Vit is left with 15 to 20 in a few years.
Great fighter, certainly top 25, but not enough signature wins to be top 15. Also, he cheated his way out of the Charr fight. That drops him ten points right there, in my estimation.
