Which of the lineal heavyweight champions would Sam Langford have beaten?

Maybe you are right; but it certainly means they are elite. Now, if Langford is beating and drawing with better fighters than Fulton and Tate, but struggling with them, we have to ask why.

Right, but his record versus men of 6'6 is horrible, inspite of the fact that they weren't anything like the best fighters he fought, even in and around that time.

Reports for Fulton describe him countering the more ponderous right with some success but struggling to do any work with that left hand. The footage we have of Tate in an actual fight shows him basically only throwing the jab.

Slipping this punch, closing a foot of reach advantage, then punching or trapping against a reasonably mobile opponent - which both Wlad and Lewis are - across another foot, this time vertical, is a monumental technical task. The evidence of this is Sam's KO of Bill Tate, who, to my eye, was horrible, the evidence against are his struggles with Tate and Fulton, which seemed to be based principally on height and reach.

Now we have him up against the two best tall jabbers in the history of the sport.

This being the case, I think tentatively drawing certain conclusions is reasonable.

 

Fighters on the slide become vulnerable first and foremost to the styles/whatever that they are most vulnerable to anyway. Footwork and reflexes abandoning a fighter leave him in just as much trouble against a swarmer, boxer or speedster. These are absolutely crucial fundamentals.

Yes, but these guys weren't better than the fighters that Sam was beating and drawing with. That's the point and it's all but undeniable.

What did you expect when you started this thread?

But I know that he did, without the film.

Drawing conclusions based upon fights that fighters had past their prime is perfectly reasonable in deducing how that fighter would do against various styles/whatever - and you've asked specifically for this kind of speculation.


I'll summarise:

Evidence for Langford versus massive fighters in his prime - non existant

Evidence for Langford versus massive fighters past his prime - indicates he struggles.

Additionaly, the technical and tactical difficulties involved in beating fighters who are a foot taller and have a reach advantage of a foot plus are absolutely colossal. I would suggest that evidence in support of a fighter's abilities in this area is neccessary before they are assumed. I think that what limited evidence we have indicates that they would be beyond him when also happening to box in the top twenty head to head all time.

 

Tell me his name, i'll **** him up.

 

Langford was competitve in the world class, but seems to have been vulnerable to the physical advantages of fighters so vastly inferior to Lewis and Wlad that for me, this class gap becomes more important than Langford's condition, which was enough to keep him competitive with Harry Wills and others.

Arguing that he was as past-prime as Holmes Ali is not supported by the evidence at hand, and nor is Langford's supposed superiority versus fighters a foot taller than him.

 

Boxrec and wiki list Fulton as 6'6 1/2, and Wills as 6'2. What makes you assured that the difference was 1 and a half rather than 4 and a half inches?

Sure. But this is the problem with your argument. It is entirely undermining. Even if I conceed, right now, entirely, that you are correct, and Langford's results versus Tate and Fulton are irrelevant in decoding his chances against Lewis, where is your evidence to the contrary? Where is the evidence that he did very well against men of this height? There is none.