Who was closest to being 'unknockoutable'?

Why do you disagree? Ali was down 5 times in his career, and Cooper almost KO'd him with that left hook. Shavers hurt Ali very badly more than once, Shaver knocked Ali down pretty bad too. You know, Whitaker could be KO'd easier than Holmes or Ali.

 

The Moore knockdown was a flash knockdown. And he wasn't that badly hurt from the lefthook Walcott dropped him with. That was a perfectly timed left hook that landed right on Marciano's jaw.

 

Why would Hagler step up to 190 to fight a banger? That would be just dumb. Going up 20 some lbs would be kind of hard for him to do wouldn't it? Once you get past the 180 mark, it would be sort of dangerous for a natural middleweight to go up and fight at 190. Those guys are a lot bigger. Now, if he was a lightheavy or something I would question why he didn't too.

 

For a guy who left himself wide open and took punches flush on the jaw

Aaron Pryor had a great chin. He was knocked down 3 times in the first round

but got up in seconds and didn't seem to be hurt. The punch Arguello landed

in the 13th round would of knocked out middleweights

 

Good point, I didn't even think about how Toney did taking punches moving up in weight...

 

This thread seems to really be doing the job in gaining a consensus for Hagler. When Marv was champion, a medical scan of his head revealed that his skull was coated in a one inch thick slab of muscle. (His skull was found to be normal). The average protective sheath for a human is one fourth that depth.

I get the impression that Toney is more defensively skilled than Hagler. Could he have withstood the sort of punishment Marv shrugged off?

Maintaining a sharp physical and mental edge for competition can certainly be highly beneficial in this regard.

When Qawi defended his LH title against Eddie Davis, he dropped Davis quickly, and nearly had him out in round one, before Davis began mounting an impressive resistance off the ropes that allowed him to last into round 11, where Dwight finally finished him. Eddie then rededicated himself to achieving peak physical and mental conditioning for his next title shot, Mike Spinks's first defense of the Universal LH title. It was expected that the lethal Spinks would dispatch Eddie as easily as Qawi nearly did.

Lo and behold, Eddie did not take a backwards step for 12 rounds, and absorbed everything the Jinx unloaded on him. To television viewers at home, it looked like Eddie did enough to earn the decision over Spinks.

Throughout the contest on CBS, every time Davis walked through another Spinks bomb, Gil Clancy would lecture Tim Ryan and the viewing audience, "There's that conditioning, Tim!" This performance was a marvelous object lesson in the value of peak conditioning for withstanding a potent attack. Eddie never displayed a twinge of distress in that challenge, and he never achieved that level of finely tuned preparation again. Hagler always managed to maintain his, both mentally and physically. (The consistently great MW Champs usually do.)

 

I keep hearing this claim and would like the source if possible.

 

Sandy Saddler!!!

 

I don't know about the report on Marvin. I am assuming it is the muscle that allows you to move your hair forward, or where one would have hair.

 

Marciano was a weak puncher.