Who is the most under rated heavyweight?

Leon Spinks.
People judged him too harshly off what he became later on, when he was just a broke, washed-up journeyman with a name and coke/alcohol abuse history.
And he tends to get judged too harshly because he beat The Greatest and then lost the title straight back to him. If he'd beaten another top 10 ATG heavyweight he'd probably be given more credit for the achievement, ironically.

For a fighter with so few professional fights under his belt he was very impressive indeed, even for a few years during his obvious rapid decline. He was never even given a chance to develop any sort of seasoned style as a professional, he was pretty much just fighting his old amateur style and relying on stamina to keep it going for 10 or 15 rounds instead of 3 !

People talk about guys like Mike Tyson and Riddick Bowe being "wasted talent" but that's crazy. They were brought along briliantly and achieved plenty. But Leon Spinks, there was a fighter whose talent was wasted, and ironically it was an almost-instant success that was the catalyst for it.

Definitely underrated.

 

Patterson. His crushing losses to Liston shouldn't define his legacy any more than Frazier's devastating defeats at the hands of Foreman. Let's face it, the powers that be kept Floyd from becoming champ a third time. His loss to Quarry was questionable and his victory over Ellis was stolen from him.
Other underrated heavyweights should include Braddock, Spinks, and Jeffries.

 

John Tate is an underrated champion I think
He was a great boxer and good skills

 

Lennox Lewis
Wladimir Klitschko
Bob Fitzsimmons

 

People are probably going to make fun of me, but I truly believe it. David Haye. He is underrated, and it is his own fault for taking the easiest possible path through the heavyweight division twice. I was hoping he could come back and beat some big names, but looked in serious decline against Bellew. I just hope he went in to the fight with an injury.

 

Ingemar Johansson's another one who's underrated.
For some reason a lot of people seem to think he was somewhat lucky to catch and KO Eddie Machen (#1 contender) and Floyd Patterson (champion) in consecutive fights.
He brutally knocked them out. It was pure savagery.
He was definitely a force of nature in those fights but I believe he went a bit soft when he won the title, lost his hunger and grew over-confident, and paid the price against an avenging Patterson.
As they say, it's even more difficult holding onto the title than it is winning it !

 

Yes, in head-to-head match-ups Joe Frazier is criminally underrated by many, I believe.

 

Jeffries - Seen as top 1-5 up to the late 1960's. Lack of film hurt him.

Tunney - Very skilled, retired too soon

Liston - Outside of the Ali quoting / dives, he cleaned house.

 

Mike 'Dynamite' Dokes. Possibly the best of the bunch of talented but underachieving '80s heavyweights. When he won the WBA title in dramatic though controversial fashion again Weaver in '83, it look like at 24 with his fast hands, decent power and solid chin, that finally there was a real legitimate threat to long standing recognised champ, Larry Holmes. Maybe he contributed to own downfall with his drug problems and subsequent inactivity in the ring but he certainly had the potential to have achieved so much more.

 

Michael Bentt is underrated.
People (usually Tommy Morrison admirers) act like he was some unknown bum who got lucky in a fight with Tommy Morrison and that was some sort of bizarre "fluke" result.

In fact, Michael Bentt was one of the very best American amateurs in the mid-to-late 1980s.

He turned pro under Manny Steward and was badly matched in his professional debut, given the very awkward switch-hitting tall southpaw Jerry Jones (who a few years later would beat and knock down ranked contender Carl Truth Williams) in what was supposed to be an easy debut, and Bentt started out his pro career with a stoppage loss from that. I think Steward dumped him !
There was no doubt that Bentt had talent though, so it was no great surprise to me when he defeated Tommy Morrison in 1993.