Why do fighters that retired undefeated get **** all over?

I think you make a good point.

Calzaghe I wouldn't say gets that much ****. He is considered a special talent, but there is a frustration that we didn't get to see him against better opposition.

Rocky gets picked on quite a lot, though. It's fair to state that his time at the top was fairly brief and that he had hard fights against fighters that were past their best, but many of these threads about how he would fare against modern, much bigger HWs seem like a bit of baiting to me.

As for Floyd, I think he seems to be a POS as a person and he wasn't very exciting to watch for the latter part of his career. And as with many champions there are some choices that can be questioned, but in his case those mostly came when he was in his mid 30's and already had had an ATG career. Waaayyyy too much is made of this.

With Ward I don't get the criticism at all tbh. He avoided no one and faced everyone at their best. He had one controversial decision and sorted that immediately after. Yes, he could have a "head first style" (as had Holy, Hopkins etc), but those things are for the ref to sort out. With many ATGs you can pick out things in their repertoire that aren't very clean, so why all this massive hate for Ward's I just don't to get. As for the accusation of low blows against Kovalev, I addressed that in an earlier post.

 

A lot of the dislike for Faitweather's record is due to his own actions.

Boxing is a sport and also an entertainment, but Fairweather went overboard with all his self promotion about 50-0 and TBE, and that fueled enduring ill will against him and his precious "undefeated" resume.

 

Lots of stellar posts by you in this thread.

 

Floyd is eminently dislikable and I just can't stand listening to the guy talk (so I don't), but I don't see why that should interfere with any meaningful analysis of what he did in the ring.

 

My impression is that in the case of Marciano the flak is not aimed to him as much as it is aimed to his fanboys.

IMO most ppl are OK with Marciano's 49-0, but the fanboys have made the undefeated record a contentious item by endlessly using it as sole argument to justify their most outlandish hypothesis.

Classic Forum is full of posts by Marciano fanboys arguing his hero would beat every and any ATG just because "Rocky went undefeated, therefore there is no way XXX could ever beat him".

Sadly, such simplistic argument has fueled a negative view of Marciano's record.

 

Well, not everybody can differentiate between what the person is inside the ring and outside the ring.

There is ppl around here who still deny Ali's greatness just because he was against the Vietnam War, and also you see people belittling Liston's record because he was supposedly connected to the mob, or Tyson because he was an abuser.

Thus it is understandable a lot of ppl don't want to give Fairweather his due recognition as a boxer.

 

Understandable maybe, but neither group should be taken seriously.

 

You two are among the nicest most balanced and unbiased posters in the place. As i moved along i hoped you would sort things out and am hardly surprised you did. Good on you.

 

Can you be more specific? What actions?

 

I think if you look at that record and look not only at who he beat, but who they beat and the fights they were in, or consider his physical disadvantages, even without the Pac fight, its some resume!!

 

It is.

I have a top 50 p4p all time list that is a work in progress. The top 30 are pretty much done and Mayweather, at #18, is the only unbeaten fighter amongst them.

I suspect Marciano will be the next highest unbeaten fighter, who may or may not make my 50.

So, I agree with you that Mayweather ranks highest of all the unbeaten fighters in history, and quite clearly so, imo.

 

That's a tricky question. In terms of p4p, yes, Floyd moved up many divisions and did excellent despite lacking raw power. But on the other hand, he was exceptionally talented and his skill/ring IQ were leagues ahead of 90% of hai competition. You could compare it to how the scientific Jack Johnson made many of the brawlers of his day look stupid. We rarely saw Floyd take on a truly skilled technician or someone who could match his speed.

Yes Floyd beat many "ranked" opponents, but context matters. Mosley was ranked, but he was also 40. Pacquiao was a champion, but he was also a little shopworn and had lost some of the speed and energy he had in his prime. I could go on.

 

Maybe sometimes you just get out at the right time like Marciano did. How would Julio Cesar Chavez be viewed had he walk out at 87-0=0??? No draw, no lost. ATG or fraud?

 

So, do you think Mayweather ranks higher in a p4p all time list than any other unbeaten fighter?

If you consider that question is too tricky to answer, do you at least concede Philospher's claim he has the deepest resume of all undefeated fighters isn't unreasonable?

After all, as they're all undefeated, it's purely the depth of their win resume (allied with their dominance during those wins, depending on your criteria), from a p4p perspective, that determines where they rank.

 

Readin' the thread tidal made me think how, simply, undefeated fighters are the one who got the most asterisks on their resume, as simply as it is.