Wladimir Klitschko Retires - Where Does He Rank ?

I think he had a big advantage being a big heavyweight like Lennox, but he has to rank up there in the top 10.. Fought everyone and was dominant, and he learned to use his size better with experience. A class act and great fighter. No doubt.

 

you guys place Vlad over Tyson? Tyson has this image and he is the news all the time. I would love to see peoples top 20 heavyweight list.

 

How do you define an era then ?

You've got a guy like Joe Louis who reigned as undisputed champion for a decade or more wih 25 defences, and you have Marciano, who reigned a little over 3 years, or Tyson who reigned a little over 3 years including splintered titles. Dempsey, who managed 5 defences in a 7 year reign and missed his top contender.
Patterson and Liston don't get an era ? Holyfield, Tyson's contempoary who beat him twice, doesn't get an era ?
What's the definition of an era ?

 

Hard to put him outside the top 10 and l don't particularly enjoy watching his fights, but the results speak for themselves. I think somewhere between 7-12 seems reasonable.

 

This wasn't adressed to me, but I don't think it's all that hard.

Fourth after Louis, Ali and Holmes in terms of title wins. Probably fourth or somewhere there abouts in terms of wins over ranked opponents. Hardly lost a round as a champion (and I mean that literally) until losing his crown to Fury. Went 10 years (most of them as champion) without being even slightly troubled by an opponent.

Even with his three embarassing losses, I think the achievements listed above gives him a very reasonable argument for top 5.

 

Those do not know cannot list ,you must be accentuating the positive forget the negative,dont notice of Mr In Between because the trestle with the pestle has the brew that is true.If he leans to the East ,shoot to the west.Who is on first? Simples really.

 

That is unreasonable in my view. It is also difficult to argue in an objective manner with Klit fans about Wlad's ATG status.

- The argument in favour of klitschko is his longevity and number of title defenses.

- The mark against him is his resume: weak area, defeats and quality of fights.

In my opinion resume is clearly the most important factor to take into account in terms of legacy

 

Realistically Wlad isn't a top 20 heavyweight. He was fortunate enough to fight in a weak era. A era where American (black Americans in particular) chose to play basketball and football over boxing. Wlad is lucky to face no talent bums like Ray Austin, Derrick Jefferson, Steroid Alexander Povetkin and others.

Any half way decent fighter with a punch, and moved forward without fear would always beat him. Even whe Wlad was young and fighter guys like Everett Martin he looked scared when ever a fighter threw punches back.

 

You can use this reasoning to prove Ottke was greater than Carl Froch or Nigel Benn. Or Trinidad >> Ray Leonard.

You fail to mention none of those 3 guys never had a tag team partner who avenged their losses for them. Louis beat guys who are ranked on the ATG list during his reign. Ali fought over 20 hall of famers and ATGs.

Wlad has no wins against ATGs or hall of famers and you could argue he lost and struggled against all the best guys he ever faced. None of them on the ATG list.

He benefited from a terrible era and German house hold officiating where he beat the same ordinary guys by clinch box over and over again till he met an A level fighter who boxed his ears off.

Greatness isn't determined on paper and paper stats is all Wlad has. You can't show me his greatness on film because it doesn't exist.
There's a stronger case for Tyson Fury being a genuine ATG than Wlad.

 

Agreed. You have to discount every positive and emphasize every negative for Wlad (while giving the other guys every benefit of the doubt) to "justify" a rating that low.

The man fought world class competition for 18 years and was #1 contender 17 years apart. I find the idea that world caliber boxers forgot how to fight for that long hilarious.

The same thing happened with Holmes though, who didn't get rated as high as he is now until well after his retirement. If ruling over 1, let alone 2-3 l, generations of challengers was that easy, more guys would've done it. I'd rather reward consistent dominance than punish it since it's way harder to do.

 

This. A couple of years from now (unless AJ doesn't scoop up all the titles, which he might) everybody will be raving about the strong era, the strong competition because of the many belt holders etc etc whereas it's (to use a metaphor) actually just the same trees fighting for a spot in the patch of sunlight that the ancient toppled oak left in the forest.

 

To me it's pretty simple.

If you look at Wlad in terms of record, he's right at the top.
Ditto for H2H ability.
Ditto for longevity.

There's a very few elite that are comparable in all respects to him, and in my mind we're talking about:

Louis, Lewis, Ali, Holmes ... probably also Foreman, thanks to his second stint.

Everybody else is going to fall short in one or another respect.

I'd say it's a question of where in the Top 5 he slots in.

 

Great post and I see it this way as well

 

See, this is the exact problem, it's not all that impressive when you look at under it functionally. It doesn't matter how many ranked foes you beat, when those ranked foes amount to F ALL is the overall scheme of things. Who cares how many ranked foes you beat, if the top ten is littered with ham n eggers? It means very little in the context of all time ranking. This is the same reason why Joe Louis suffers, and why I think he's overrated in a h2h viewpoint. He fought all time great fighters... Schemling, Conn, Walcott, Charles and Marciano... but his record against them isn't that great. But at least he fought them. You can't name one ATG fighter that WLAD fought, let alone beat. That speaks volumes about a ATG ranking, which is the exact problem Wlad faces. Then when you throw in 4 bad losses, to subpar competition, and it makes it incredibly hard to get near a top 5 ranking do ya think?

 

So basically his career is similar to a Joe Louis.