Would Jimmy Bivins be P4P #1 Today ?

And why is the answer yes ?

 

Oh, easily Bivins. Time for the long ass Bivins wank. Some bleeding hearts might get spanked, but hey, Bivins is super underrated on the forum and it's about time someone gave him the respect he deserves. Think of this as an unofficial Jimmy Bivins deep dive.

First of all, he legitimately beat a prime Charley Burley when he only had like 15 fights, and barely had any size on him (it was like 7 lbs). Even Ezzard Charles pauses at that, and he's the Burley conqueror. Bivins then proceeded to defeat 2 former Middleweight champions in Teddy Yarosz and Billy Soose, making Soose retire. That alone is about as impressive as Usyk's Cruiserweight run imo. Usyk beat a few more name fighters and stayed at CW longer, but none of the guys he beat are actually on the level of Burley or Yarosz (and I'd definitely consider Soose superior to like, Glowacki). Its close, but you can definitely make a case case Bivin's brief MW run >= Usyk's CW run.

Then we've got his 175 run. He's considered a top 10 LHW ATG for a damn reason. Beat pre-prime versions of Ezzard Charles and Archie Moore, literally the top 2 LHWs ever, let's get that out of the way. Knocked out Moore in 6 and dropped Charles 3 times to win a decision. He also beat former and future Light Heavyweight champions Melio Bettina, Anton Christoforidis x2, Gus Lesnevich, and Joey Maxim. As well Lloyd Marshall smack dab in the middle of his prime. From 1940-1945, Bivins went 11-2-1 vs Ezzard Charles, Archie Moore, Charley Burley, Lloyd Marshall, Teddy Yarosz, Billy Soose, Joey Maxim, Gus Lesnevich, Melio Bettina and Anton Christoforidis. All of them Hall of Famers or world champions, mostly both. He also beat Oakland Billy Smith. He is kind of a black sheep compared to the rest, which is why I excluded him from the list, but he should be noted.

Yeah, Usyk gets utterly outclassed here. Straight up. Easy to see why. His whole career falls short to Bivins' work below HW.

And guess what, Bivins was one of the more successful Light Heavyweights who campaigned at Heavyweight. He didn't become champion like Tunney or Spinks, or even got a title shot like Conn, but out of the LHWs who didn't become champ, Bivins easily had the most success at HW. He struggled early on, dropping losses to 200+ HW contenders Tony Musto and Lem Franklin who just outsized him, as well as the former #1 contender Bob Pastor whose spot was recently taken by Billy Conn after their fight. But Bivins was still learning, he only had like 30 fights when those losses happened. So he adapted and started dominating the big boys. He wasn't the #1 Heavyweight contender in 1943 and the duration Heavyweight champ for no reason

He proceeded to avenge his loss to Bob Pastor 6 months after that initial loss. Then he went 2-0 vs Tami Mauriello, who by 1946 was the #1 contender and fought Joe Louis for the title. Bivins also beat the #7 rated Heavyweight Lee Savold (another future Louis opponent), and more notably went 2-0 vs Lee Q Murray in back to back fights.

Murray was the #3 Heavyweight in the world, was 6'3 and weighed anything between 202-210 lbs, and his record was 31-4. Bivins schooled him on both occasions, easy work. Bivins here casually beating world class men the size of Opetaia and Usyk despite being a 5'9 blown up Light Heavy. He also beat the the top 5 rated Heavyweight Curtis Sheppard, who while not all that skilled, was a murderous puncher, even decisioning Murray twice earlier in his career by dropping him like 6 times in each fight (that's where 2 of those 4 losses Murray had came from). Bivins went 3-0 against Sheppard. Bivins also went 2-0 vs future Ezzard Charles Heavyweight title defence challenger, Pat Valentino.

But things kinda went downhill after he lost to Jersey Joe Walcott in 1946. It was an incredibly close fight, and 2 cards favoured Bivins with 1 favouring Walcott. But because Walcott had knocked Bivins down, the ref saw the cards, added the KD, and awarded the fight to Walcott. We should give Bivins credit for that effort alone. Definitely one of the more underrated losing efforts ever. But Bivins kinda never recovered from that, immediately losing twice to the same Lee Q Murray he was dominating before.

However he did end up winning the series 3-2 in their 5th fight, with Murray himself holding a very respectable 54-9 record. So it wasn't as if Bivins was washed or anything. Bivins even continued having success vs HW contenders. Beating future Louis opponent and top 10 contender Omelio Agramonte, as well as other top 10 Heavyweight contenders like Johnny Flynn (2-0), Rusty Payne and Turkey Thompson. He had some success vs Light Heavyweights too, beating guys like Booker Beckwith, Charley Doc Williams and going 1-1 vs Leonard Morrow (who KO'd a prime Archie Moore in an upset) and Clarence Henry.

But as he was leaving his prime, Charles and Moore came to their own. And suddenly the losses piled up, and he ended up with 4 vs Charles and 4 vs Moore. It looks bad numerically on his record, but c'mon, it's Moore and Charles. He also finally ended up fighting Joe Louis, and was unfortunate enough to get in the ring with Harold Johnson as he was rising. More losses piled up. By the time 1951 rolled up, he was a spent force. But that 1940-1945 run, and the achievements he managed to acquire after that Walcott loss ? Usyk could never.

 

Yeah, we can. Do you think his losses derail his resume to the point where Usyk is superior ?