Wladimir Klitschko moves to a tie for 4th all time with 15 wins in title fights.

Good post Iceman.

I wonder how Lewis, Tyson, Holmes, Ali etc would have done against the opposition Wlad has faced in his "15 title wins" run.

 

A little off topic, but speaking of Wlad, today is his birthday. He is 34. And his brother bought him a motrocycle

 

:good

 

What a load of crap. Never had a genuine HW championship title fight?atsch
Even if you don't count his first WBO defenses, what about IBF title with Byrd, number 1 HW ?
And the you say his fight with Ibragimov was genuine? Whats the difference? It was for WBO.

 

I have a ton of respect for both Klits but let's not get carried away. If he beats Haye and Tua and gets to 20 defenses after that, he'll have a much better argument.

 

As long as they didn't get too complacent, I think that all of those men would have beaten the entire list... That is not to say that Wlad's comp is bad by any means, but I just don't see any of those 15 opponents as posing any real threats to the greats you mentioned, with the obvious exception of Hasim Rahman who did manage to upset Lewis..

 

Complacency and consistency are huge factors, though. I'd favor all that list over Wlad's competition in a one fight scenario, but to have the consistency to do it fight in, fight out over the course of a long championship tenure is quite rare. Usually a slip up will happen at one point or another, even to the ATG's who've ruled for years. Marciano, the one guy who retired unscathed, was champion for 3 years before he retired. Lewis' longest stretch was 4 if you start from when he took the WBC vs McCall, only 2 years if you go from Holyfield. I think sometimes people forget how hard it is to hold the heavyweight championship for a significant period of time.

It's really a double edged sword- the more dominant a fighter is, the more his competition comes under fire. For some (not me) Wlad's competition would be viewed in a better light if anyone could just take some rounds off of him, never mind beat him. That he's not even giving rounds away when he's clearly not operating at 100% urgency himself just gives the glass-half empty crowd more reason to pile on how bad the division is. If we were to put the championship competition of Wlad against the defenses of Holmes or Tyson, however, I think people might be surprised at how well they'd stack up.

 

Irrelevant.

Jones had *not* been beaten for his WBA HW title when he fought Tarver.

 

Incorrect.

Joe Calzaghe is the rightful owner of the WBA HW title.

 

But what you forget is Lewis faced the best the division has to offer, Wlad has not.

 

You're kidding right?

Don King purchased that IBF title from Lennox Lewis for exactly the price of one Range Rover and a bag full of cash.

Add to that the FACT that Byrd was already a previous Wlad KO victim.

 

he did not Koed him in first fight. And Byrd beat pretty much everyone.

 

Byrd was number 1? says who?

Ibragimov becomes somewhat more legitimate because it was a unification, and Chagaev as it was for the Ring Belt.

The HW division has never been so fragmented for such a long time, every other era we have had an undisputed or linear champion.

It is downright disrespectful to say he has had 15 championship fights. he hasn't. Technically, he hasn't even had 1.

The title that retired with Lewis was altogether more prestigious, it was linear, and had been undisputed a few fights back but for a bull**** stripping. It was in all but name undisputed, and the lineage can be traced way back.

Wlad's unified title is not worthy of equal comparison. You cant argue with that. No other dominant recognised HW champion has held such a small portion of the title, be it in titles or lineage, and disregarding belts stripped along the way.

Klitschko needs to stick around after Vitali and become undisputed champion to really leave an unquestionable legacy.

 

I´m a Wlad fan but stats like this mean little if you´re using them to compare Wlad to the champions of the past like Ali or Louis, simply because back then there was either just one world title or at least fewer than now. When you count any of the WBA, WBC, IBF or WBO as "the world title" you also have to count: Ruiz 2 time world champion, Rahman 2 time world champion, Valuev 2 time world champion, Byrd 2 time world champion. I bet Ruiz has about as many "world" title fights as a lot of the great fighters of the past. You can´t seriously use this way of comparing fighters of today and the past.

 

You know what, I really don´t think there is any sensible or good answer to any of this. Boxing is so messed up with all these multiple belts. They go up and down in value like stock on the stockmarket. In many of the lower divisions, the WBO belt has counted like the others or even higher at times, depending on who´s been holding it and who have been fighting for it.

Also, I have been having a hard time considering the WBA heavyweight belt to be worth much, ever since they stripped Lewis of it. Controversial decisions in title fights since then, lousy beltholders, corruption, the same fighters getting shots over and over again, steroid scandals and champions giving up the belt have really devalued it severely IMO.