Worst lineal heavyweight champion of all time

No Hart, Carnera, Braddock or Johansson on the list? I'm looking at them and Neon before narrowing down.

Edit - Maybe Sharkey too.

 

Excellent. Primo imo needed to be there, the only one worse is maybe Leon. I think it's out of those two for me.

 

Marvin Hart

 

Not even in the discussion.

 

For me there is a clear cut answer, and it is Leon Spinks.

A lineal champion must by definition have one good win, and Spinks is the only one who only has that one good win.

For all the other contenders for the dishonor such as Hart, Braddock, Moorer, Briggs, or whoever, you can point to some sort of elite level wins outside of the unavoidable lineal title winning effort.

 

Marvin Hart.

 

Leon Spinks would have blown through Marvin Hart. I'd put money on it.

Edit: I seem to remember footage of Hart, looking crappy. But now that I look for it, I can't find it. I think I was confuserated.

Looking on Boxrec, Hart's record is better than I thought and Leon Spinks' is a lot worse than I remember. So ... maybe I am wrong here.

 

Hart was a bit of a flash in the pan, but he was not a one hit wonder.

He was the only person who beat Jack Johnson, anywhere close to his prime, and that was outside of winning the title.

 

I see he has some useful wins like o'Brien as well.

 

Spinks had an awful overall record, and even in his prime was blown out by Coetzee in 1. Couldn't last 3 vs Holmes, and by mid 80s turned into walking punching bag.

Shannon Briggs had 3 wins over 'name' opponents - robbery vs 48 y.o. George Foreman (Shulz, Alex Stewart and Morrison performed much better vs younger Old George), weird KO vs 45 y.o. Ray Mercer (Mercer tried to get DQ when he got hit to the back of the head. but was counted out instead) and come-from-behind 12th rd KO at 2:59 vs Lyakhovich who was never that good to begin with. Also lost in his prime to 9-9 opponent Cedrick Fields and was destroyed by small Darroll Wilson (who was stopped by Tua in 1 and by old Witherspoon in 2). Was schooled by Botha but got undeserved draw.

I haven't seen much of earlier weaker champions, but these two are the worst lineal champions with weakest resumes in the last 70 years.

 

Yeah? This bloke puts him numero uno!!

http://thegruelingtruth.net/boxing/10worstheavyweight-champions-time/

 

Moorer was a much better fighter than the others on your list, I think was much better than Oliver McCall also, he was dreadful while losing to Bruno all he did vs Lewis was time his sloppy right hand because Steward had trained him to do that, Lewis was really out of sorts at this stage of his career and if he had met Moorer at that point would have easily beaten even Bruno was beating Lewis two fights before the McCall bout until he got caught, Moorer fought better vs Holy in the rematch than McCall would of vs Holy different level.