We often hear the greatest heavyweights are often fighters who were big for their era. E.g. Johnson, Liston, Ali, Lewis, Klitshcko, etc. Pound for pound fighters get their recognition in other weight classes, but never in heavyweight. So i would like to give some recognition to the little guys who had to defeat bigger men. Who is your top 5 of all time?
Some obvious names that stand out to me are guys like.. Patterson Frazier Tyson Byrd who clearly struggled against Liston, Foreman, Lewis and Wlad respectively.
small relative to other heavies in their time? In no order: Sam Langford - defeated many top heavies including the 6'4 220 lb Harry Wills. Ko'd much larger men despite only being 5'8, and 180 lbs. Chris Byrd - defeated Vitali (controversial, i know), has good wins over Tua and Golota. The fact that he was undersized AND lacked power makes him special IMO. If he had power, he would be unbelievable. Jerry Quarry - credible wins over larger harder hitting guys like Earnie Shavers and Ron Lyle. Have to think of the other 2 spots.
Didn't Marciano fight mostly small guys as well? Not that he couldn't have beaten bigger guys like Louis, Liston, etc.. but we never really got to see it. So I don't think he should be top 5.
Usyk is definitely the most sucessful on paper (along with Holyfield). Although he has beaten a Fury thats in terrible shape. Joshua is a solid win though. And Holyfield abused PEDs to extremes. I'm sure Frazier with PEDs could beat Foreman too. So that has to be taken into account.
Nobody ever mentions him, but Weaver put together a good career while usually giving up height and weight in his big fights.
