Which heavyweight champions were just contenders who got lucky?

Charles Martin is the first name that came to my mind.

 

I suppose there are a fair few who “ got lucky. “ but luck or not they still had to fight and win.

 

I never saw Willard that way to be honest.

He was the right person at the right time, and very possibly the only white contender who could have done it.

 

Dunno, if you can write the rules, it helps. I mean, give Greb a ten-round fight with Willard in 1919, who wins?

 

None. If the man trained his whole career won at the top level and got a shot and won he deserves his due.

 

Except for Briggs... Screw that guy and his fake win over Foreman lol.

I'm fine with the rest.

 

Some men who definitely don't belong in this discussion:

Corbett
I know that Corbett bashing is in vogue at the moment, but he was the best heavyweight in the world, with the possible exception of Peter Jackson. You have to give him that if nothing else.

Hart
I don't think that he was as good as Jack Johnson, but he did beat Johnson, and that separates him from the other heavyweights of the era. Even if you question the decision, Johnson had dominated all the other top men, sometimes multiple times.

Burns
You can't rehabilitate Hart, without rehabilitating Burns.

I will assume that Sharkey and Patterson are not being advanced as serious candidates.

 

None of the lineal champs.

They all had to get in the ring and actually take it.

 

Buster fought an inspired, perfect fight, led all the way and overcame adversity in the form of being decked to beat up and batter his man in the ninth as though nothing ever happened the round before, then knocked his opponent into bolivian in the very next round..and you think that was ....luck??

 

It's all cyclical...in the next few years Corbett will ascend to the heights of greatness like Primo Carnera. The revisionistas can work wonders you know.

 

Not the same way, but I think Gunboat Smith MAY have been able to do it.

 

He might have been able to do it, but he was waiting for Johnson to get old.

Willard took the chance when he was offered it.

If Smith could have done it, then fortune definitely favored the brave!

 

Who are the revisionists?

Corbett was regarded as a top ten all time heavyweight, into the Louis years and beyond.

Most of the criticism of Carnera, was retrospective, or sensationalism in the press.

The people who look at the primary evidence, can sometimes work wonders for you!

 

Carnera confessed his fraudulent ways...

 

Those Cheeseburgers can be deadly, the Ronald McDonald variety, the classical gas that they can cause in the ring. They can sure floor an opponent for the full ten count. Lol.