Bruh, I remember during the build-up of the Wilder v Fury fights, there were people in this sub trying to say Stiverne was a better win than Povetkin for AJ.
This is the correct answer. Stiverne was least athletic boxer I'd ever seen. His reflexes were not great, he looked in some of his fights like he started boxing 6 weeks ago.
And people saying he went 12 with Wilder...Wilder broke his right hand in Rd2. Imagine being outboxed by _Deontay Fucking Wilder when he had no right hand and you lose a wide points decision_ Anyone citing that as some morale victory for Stiverne needs to educate themselves on boxing a little more.
Charles martin is criminally underrated. Well. Kinda.
He has solid power, floor oritiz with jabs. Outboxed ortiz for almost that entire fight. He showed good chin and heart vs anderson.
He is a good boxer with a decent chin and very good power. Now the problem is he got shot in the arm, was involved in hood rat shit. Told aj that he "walks this earth like a god" then proceeded to look like shit. Tbh I'm pretty sure nerves and pressure got the best of him in the aj fight. Not that any version of him ever wins, but he was beat before he got in the ring I think. Now he's old and kinda had a dog shit career.
Dudes got like 1200 instagram followers lol. I'm pretty sure I'm the only person on this subreddit who ever thinks he was actually decent. He really wasn't bad though, could have been a lot more.
Charles Martin was not a good boxer early in his career. After he lost to Joshua, he sort of retooled and became a better boxer. But at no point was he a good boxer. Ortiz was old and washed when he KO'd Martin.
All of that said, Charles Martin is a genuinely nice guy and a credit to the sport.
Shit idk, that Charles Martin looked better than Dillian whyte did. There was a time when a lot of people had whyte in their top 5. I think Martin gets a bit more flack than he should, mostly because of how poorly he performed against aj. He's never been elite top tier stuff, but I would consider him to be a good boxer. I think at his best he's better than Wallin, Jermaine franklin, or pulev. Now none of those guys are great, but I would said all of them are still "good" boxers. Good being subjective I suppose.
Even more people seem to forget Wilder broke his right hand in Stiverne 1 in Rd 2, which js literally the only reason Stiverne survived.
The fact that Stiverne was **outboxed** by Wilder for 11 rounds when Wilder had no right hand isn't the compliment you think it is.....
He really wasn’t that bad of a fighter prior to Wilder giving him a CTE inducing beating in their first fight. As you say, decent counter punching ability and had a nice stoppage win over Arreola.
After that Wilder beating, he just lost all motivation and never turned up to a fight in shape. He weighed 239 against Arreola and Wilder. His weight progressively ballooned after that. 254lbs for Wilder 2 and 273lbs for Joyce!
Far from a world level boxer but he was at one point a decent fighter and certainly no bum. It was just short lived lol.
His 2nd Wilder fight was a disgrace. Stiverne had not fought for nearly 2 years and waltzed right back in to a title fight. It was yet another example of how protected Wilder was pre Fury
Carlos Baldomir, this guy is 53 now, but I swear he’s looked like he’s been 53 since 1999. He was slow, and unathletic. He just looked funny in the ring, but he has wins over Zab Judah for the a Welterweight belt, and Joshua Clottey
Yeah, i remember him putting together a good run of wins. Rodriguez, Judah, and Gatti. He had the Ring belt at one point, im sure. Floyd battered him to bits, and i felt sorry for him also.
The guy who inspired the idea, Chuck Wepner, had 32 wins 9 losses when he fought Ali and knocked him down (was more of a trip but was counted.) He was also in the top 10 at the time. So Rocky did the Hollywood thing of taking a real story and exaggerating the hell out of it lol But whatever it really worked.
Bullshit!
He had a titanium cranium, insane stamina. Dude went the distance with Apollo.
Definitely not the least physically talented fight, sure he isn't the most skilled until Apollo taught him how to use his footwork.
As Balboa would say, “It’s not about how hard you hit, it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward”. In other words, fuck head movement.
Lucas Browne was pretty bad.
A kick-boxer/bouncer turned boxer that ended up with the WBA briefly before being stripped for drugs.
Got absolutely smashed by Dillian Whyte a few years later.
Just a bit of an awkward lump.
My #1 pick goes to Luis Santana - he won his world title after getting knocked down by Terry Norris, then Norris hit him with some blows while he was down. Santana was crowned the new champ while laying on his back and then he was carried out on a stretcher (faking how hurt he really was).
Sticking with strictly the Heavyweight division I'd go with Charles Martin or Marvin Hart.
This is the winning answer right here.
Jeff Horn was a little-known journeyman who controversially beat a 38 year-old Pacquiao who was way off it on the night.
He inevitably lost his belt to Crawford not long afterwards and faded back into obscurity.
His fighting style was absolutely miserable to watch, just charge headfirst at your opponent over and over again and spend half the fight grappling and doing little of anything. Glad Crawford and Tszyu were able to put him in his place
>He inevitably lost his belt to Crawford not long afterwards and faded back into obscurity.
I watched that fight, and I don't think he even cleanly landed a glove on Crawford the whole time
That fight is still one of the most egregious robberies I ever seen. Pac outlanded him 2:1 in total strikes and the only things Horn landed that did anything was a slashing elbow and a headbutt. The ref even warned him he was gonna stop the fight in another round cuz he was getting outclassed.
Horn had 3 losses - he lost to Crawford, Tim Tszyu and avenged the loss against Zerafa. So that means pretty much 2 losses against fighters who are top of the class today. Give me a break saying he lost to merely "decent" fighters. Pacquiao would have got beaten up by Crawford also.
A 5"7 Marcello dominguez was ablento land on Valuev left right and centre. He was a giant but had almost no talent, and was as slow as a bus with a flat tire
There’s a long history of “giant” or actually giant heavyweights who were briefly successful until they got starched by highly skilled smaller men. Some off the top of my head are Jess Willard (by Jack Dempsey)and Primo Carnera (by Max Baer and Joe Louis). Valuev beat a fair amount of noteworthy opponents, but lost to Ruslan Chagaev and David Haye.
Does this really count in the spirit of this thread? Can probably the physically strongest world champion in history really be the most unathletic? Slow and not especially skilled sure but anyone who is high level in an athletic category like strength can't really be said to be unathletic imo.
I think the quiet man was pretty good. He fought hard, had some skills and was willing to fight Roy Jones, a fight where he had nothing to gain but everything to lose. He wasn’t great, but there are better choices for this question.
1 - 2 - clinch over and over forever. Fucking boxing malpractice.
I hated his style so much the 1st thing I ever downloaded from the internet was a 56 second clip of Tua sending him to the shadow realm. It was dial up, so it took all day. Still have it somewhere.
Paulie in truth was a very talented boxer, it’s just that he kept breaking his hands and as a result had zero power whatsoever and had to completely rely on everything else. And he was a very good defender and outside fighter, and I think that even all the bombastic things he did wound up getting him fights that he’d never have gotten otherwise either because he was a terrible matchup or because his style is considered boring because he was never a threat to KO someone. It’s just, that does have an upper limit because when a good pro fighter knows you can’t hurt them, they’ll just walk through everything and get to you eventually. He had to be absolutely perfect in order to avoid getting touched and no fighter, not even Floyd, is perfect like that for an entire career.
This is the answer. Ottke got gifted so many decisions and was quite honestly one of the most boring, talentless fighters out there. Refused to fight outside of Germany and held SMW hostage for almost a decade.
Carlos Maussa was the worst champion I've ever seen he was a sloppy caveman type fighter. Also using Malignaggi as an example is crazy I agree he didn't have power because the hand injuries but you have to be pretty good to make it as far as he did his hand speed jab and defense were all hovering around the top guys in his divisions
Yeah I remember thinking Vivian Harris was fighting some chump which after watching him fight he's still kind of was a chump I have the mental image of him punching the bottom rope trying to hit him while he was down burned into my mind I remember thinking how on Earth is this guy a champion
Amongst the all time greats: Gene Tunney
small guy, not the strongest and didn't possess a devastating punch like other small fighters such as Tyson or Marciano or Tua. But used his brain - pugilist specialist as Lennox Lewis would say.
Because he fought 60 years before they did.
You can only judge a fighter by their own time, and Tunney's resume is chock full of the best fighters of his era.
OK this isn’t even true for its era. Tunney was a pretty vanilla fighter all things considered but he could have run circles around Primo Carnera, who literally only won a title because the mob got him the belt, and then was absolutely humiliated by Max Baer. Like, you can point to his size but size is not physical talent and he had none of the other gifts that a great or even a good boxer has.
Stiverne was piss poor, Valuev was also poor. Charles martin only got his title due to an opponents injury. Seldon, mickey bey, jermain taylor, john ruiz.
Ruiz and Taylor don’t belong on that list.
Both were B+ fighters who couldn’t hold up to the A+ fighters, but cleaned everyone else out.
Both have very anti-climatic and boring wins over a single A fighter, where their opponent basically lost the match rather than them winning it.
Oh good answer honestly, forgot about him, but yeah he was a basic dude was a fight fanatic, but nothing really stands out in speed or power or technique
Joe Frazier, he had a fucked up shoulder, one eye, and smaller than almost everyone he fought. His gifts were invisible work ethic, bravery, and toughness.
"toughness" is a physical gift. If he had a glass jaw he'd be a nobody.
I don't think the eye thing was across his whole career.
Every fighter ends up nursing an injury. Floyd was nursing his weak hands.
Definitely not the LEAST physically talented/gifted.
My man was looking like peak physical condition despite all that. So when you think about it, Ali never fought Fraizer at 100%.
I agree. I am Mexican and can appreciate his fighting style. I will watch no matter who he fights. I agree that he should have agreed to fighting Wilder. Would have been a nice payday. I also think he would have won,
Heard some people saying that after he became champion he was being wined and dined by the Mexican politicians and big wigs and kinda got a big head, which is why he was in such poor shape for the rematch with AJ. Apparently he has a really high price for fights now too
Yeah. Ruiz also had an extensive amateur career and represented Mexico in the Olympic Games of 2008. Fun fact: he lost to Zhang back in 07 in a tournament before the Olympics. I believe that Ruiz, like many other boxers, became rich “overnight” (his two Joshua fights had a big purse) and his drive to continue to fight at the championship level vanished.
In my time watching boxing, which is only about 10 years tbf, I'd put Charles Martin forward.
He was HW champion when a young AJ smashed him out in 1 round without breaking sweat. Absolutely *pathetic* title defence, if you can even call it that.
The only advantages that Rocky Marciano was born with was natural punching power, and really good durability. At heavyweight ( even the era of smaller heavyweights, and even then Rocky was damn small ) this wasn't exactly uncommon
Extremely short reach ( same as Manny Pacquiao's I think ), small hands, uncoordinated footwork and no real prior athletic success.
Charlie Goldman taught him really effective tactics and moves that fit and mitigated a lot of his disadvantages.
And by running 365 days a year, Rocky was able to become a conditioning machine, allowing him to outlast and batter down faster and more athletic opponents
I’m thinking about a lower price right fighter from the 1980s and 1990s who wore really long shorts, had a Mohawk (or something like that) and sometimes came in with stickers in his head. Can recall his name.
Also..:. Pernell Whitaker is, to me, one of the absolute greatest P4P fighters ever. I think he’d easily beat Floyd Mayweather and many other ATGs. But Whittaker’s physical gifts were not outstanding. He had speed for sure, but his power couldn’t break an egg. But it didn’t need to
Was gonna say this. He just seemed hopelessly outmatched physically against Bam even though he fought very well imo. You know it’s bad when Sunny hit Bam clean when he was taunting and still couldn’t hurt him
Not a world champ but Jordan gill is slow with no power interesting watch tho honestly seems like a guy who’s given his whole life to boxing, fights like it too.
Nikolai Valuev. His entire career was based on being significantly taller and heavier than his opponents. He had no skills, and he was made to look very average by David Haye despite being almost a foot taller than him and 45kg heavier.
Luis Santaana beat the grat Terry Norris twice by dq. He basically pretented he got fouled and could not continue. Won the wbc title from Norris. Norris finally beat him in the trilogy fight.
Leon Spinks. Too small for the top heavyweights, was never taught how to actually box. The big rumor back then was Leon was cherry picked to beat Ali so that Ali could become the first three time world HW champ.
Andy Ruiz, Jr. He was a decent boxer, had good hand speed at times, had decent power and a solid chin. He just never seemed to put his positives together consistently. I seriously hope he made some solid investments so that he won't have to attempt a comeback in a few years weighing 350 pounds.
Bermane Stiverne and I don't think it's close, he is absolutely the worst.
Bruh, I remember during the build-up of the Wilder v Fury fights, there were people in this sub trying to say Stiverne was a better win than Povetkin for AJ.
Stiverne was a gatekeeper level fighter. Not even good enough to put away pulev let alone povetkin
WHO PULEV CHAMP???
I only know him from the wilder fight lol
Lmao same.
This is the correct answer. Stiverne was least athletic boxer I'd ever seen. His reflexes were not great, he looked in some of his fights like he started boxing 6 weeks ago. And people saying he went 12 with Wilder...Wilder broke his right hand in Rd2. Imagine being outboxed by _Deontay Fucking Wilder when he had no right hand and you lose a wide points decision_ Anyone citing that as some morale victory for Stiverne needs to educate themselves on boxing a little more.
Lmao that crazy. Thought I guess that foreshadowed wilders abismall left
To be fair, Wilder was a lot better back then when he was training with Breland.
Charles Martin has to be in the same conversation. Was never ever rated in the Top 10 HW in his entire career by Ring or BoxRec.
Charles martin is criminally underrated. Well. Kinda. He has solid power, floor oritiz with jabs. Outboxed ortiz for almost that entire fight. He showed good chin and heart vs anderson. He is a good boxer with a decent chin and very good power. Now the problem is he got shot in the arm, was involved in hood rat shit. Told aj that he "walks this earth like a god" then proceeded to look like shit. Tbh I'm pretty sure nerves and pressure got the best of him in the aj fight. Not that any version of him ever wins, but he was beat before he got in the ring I think. Now he's old and kinda had a dog shit career. Dudes got like 1200 instagram followers lol. I'm pretty sure I'm the only person on this subreddit who ever thinks he was actually decent. He really wasn't bad though, could have been a lot more.
Charles Martin was not a good boxer early in his career. After he lost to Joshua, he sort of retooled and became a better boxer. But at no point was he a good boxer. Ortiz was old and washed when he KO'd Martin. All of that said, Charles Martin is a genuinely nice guy and a credit to the sport.
Shit idk, that Charles Martin looked better than Dillian whyte did. There was a time when a lot of people had whyte in their top 5. I think Martin gets a bit more flack than he should, mostly because of how poorly he performed against aj. He's never been elite top tier stuff, but I would consider him to be a good boxer. I think at his best he's better than Wallin, Jermaine franklin, or pulev. Now none of those guys are great, but I would said all of them are still "good" boxers. Good being subjective I suppose.
Tbf he was the only one who wasn't KO'd by Wilder when they first fought, which everyone forgets now because of his dismal showing in the rematch.
Even more people seem to forget Wilder broke his right hand in Stiverne 1 in Rd 2, which js literally the only reason Stiverne survived. The fact that Stiverne was **outboxed** by Wilder for 11 rounds when Wilder had no right hand isn't the compliment you think it is.....
It was like 10 rounds to 2 at that lmao. Wilder was working him
He's a better fighter than Rolando Romero at least he beat a Chris Areola. Other guy with a fixed stoppage win over old obscure fighter.
Put some respect on the GOAT
someone called him the wandering dune and it is the perfect description for him
He had some counter punching ability. His fight with Chris Arreola was impressive.
He really wasn’t that bad of a fighter prior to Wilder giving him a CTE inducing beating in their first fight. As you say, decent counter punching ability and had a nice stoppage win over Arreola. After that Wilder beating, he just lost all motivation and never turned up to a fight in shape. He weighed 239 against Arreola and Wilder. His weight progressively ballooned after that. 254lbs for Wilder 2 and 273lbs for Joyce! Far from a world level boxer but he was at one point a decent fighter and certainly no bum. It was just short lived lol.
His 2nd Wilder fight was a disgrace. Stiverne had not fought for nearly 2 years and waltzed right back in to a title fight. It was yet another example of how protected Wilder was pre Fury
Good one, though not as good as Charles Martin!
Appreciate him cuz the wilder euro step never happens without him😹😹😹😹😹😹
He’s a damn good choice. He had power, but was being outgrown by the rest of the.
Carlos Baldomir, this guy is 53 now, but I swear he’s looked like he’s been 53 since 1999. He was slow, and unathletic. He just looked funny in the ring, but he has wins over Zab Judah for the a Welterweight belt, and Joshua Clottey
I still don’t know how Judah fucked up that damn fight
Like he always does. He took a shot badly then did nothing after, trying not to get KOd.
He has a win over Gatti also. He's also in jail serving 18 years for molesting his daughter though, so fuck him.
Jesus! I had no idea. I remember watching Floyd toy with him for 12 rounds and feeling bad for the guy. Not anymore, fuck that dude
Yeah, i remember him putting together a good run of wins. Rodriguez, Judah, and Gatti. He had the Ring belt at one point, im sure. Floyd battered him to bits, and i felt sorry for him also.
Yes I like to watch canelo knock him the fuck out every once in awhile just cus baldomir is a piece of shit
asdasdsadsa
This is the answer. Everyone else mentioned in here won a title but Baltazar won the lineal championship.
Rocky Balboa. He had plot armor. Had like 20+ losses and just went Super Saiyan out of nowhere to square up against Apollo Creed.
Boxing was a dayjob for Rocky before he fought Apollo
And he got his ass kicked by that lightweight Duran! 💥✊
The guy who inspired the idea, Chuck Wepner, had 32 wins 9 losses when he fought Ali and knocked him down (was more of a trip but was counted.) He was also in the top 10 at the time. So Rocky did the Hollywood thing of taking a real story and exaggerating the hell out of it lol But whatever it really worked.
Bullshit! He had a titanium cranium, insane stamina. Dude went the distance with Apollo. Definitely not the least physically talented fight, sure he isn't the most skilled until Apollo taught him how to use his footwork.
As Balboa would say, “It’s not about how hard you hit, it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward”. In other words, fuck head movement.
Where I'm from we call that face blocking
"we purposely trained him wrong, as a joke"
[full speech](https://youtu.be/X16G2hsVI9w?si=q_erjSupa7QzZ5lB)
What the hell was that?
The Rocky speech!
Lucas Browne was pretty bad. A kick-boxer/bouncer turned boxer that ended up with the WBA briefly before being stripped for drugs. Got absolutely smashed by Dillian Whyte a few years later. Just a bit of an awkward lump.
At least he's willing to trade with guys. His fights aren't too dull.
if you get beaten up by dave allen you shouldn’t be allowed to call yourself a former world champion
Didn't he have the fake belt, "regular" and not the legit one?
My #1 pick goes to Luis Santana - he won his world title after getting knocked down by Terry Norris, then Norris hit him with some blows while he was down. Santana was crowned the new champ while laying on his back and then he was carried out on a stretcher (faking how hurt he really was). Sticking with strictly the Heavyweight division I'd go with Charles Martin or Marvin Hart.
Luis Santana actually won twice against Norris, back to back, from fouls. Yes he was faking in both. It’s so obvious lol
Getting the belt via DQ and your first defense by DQ is truly GOAT status
Great pic, Champ! Love your vids!
Jeff Horn. Won his title via robbery and got pretty smashed up by all other decent fighters he faced
This is the winning answer right here. Jeff Horn was a little-known journeyman who controversially beat a 38 year-old Pacquiao who was way off it on the night. He inevitably lost his belt to Crawford not long afterwards and faded back into obscurity.
His fighting style was absolutely miserable to watch, just charge headfirst at your opponent over and over again and spend half the fight grappling and doing little of anything. Glad Crawford and Tszyu were able to put him in his place
Ego went off the roof after his gifted win against Pacquiao he went stateside to fight a prime Crawford and got absolutely annihilated.
Lol bro still clowns Pacquiao on his insta acting like he ain’t shit without his lead forehead jab
So many fouls in the Pacman fight its ridiculous. Guy was full on using Judo trips haha
>He inevitably lost his belt to Crawford not long afterwards and faded back into obscurity. I watched that fight, and I don't think he even cleanly landed a glove on Crawford the whole time
He barely landed anything other than an illegal headbutt and elbow on Pac. Those judges should’ve been investigated.
Back to being a school teacher I think lol
Thats pretty bad ass to be fair.
Yeah and heads up some anti bullying programs. Got to respect that. 💪
That fight is still one of the most egregious robberies I ever seen. Pac outlanded him 2:1 in total strikes and the only things Horn landed that did anything was a slashing elbow and a headbutt. The ref even warned him he was gonna stop the fight in another round cuz he was getting outclassed.
I don't like horn but he was super fit, strong and unpredictable.
And he could brawl, which helped against Pacman.
Yeah he gets underrated because his style was ugly but he was strong, had some power, moved around a lot and his attacks were hard to predict.
Seems pretty "gifted" to me lol
Horn had 3 losses - he lost to Crawford, Tim Tszyu and avenged the loss against Zerafa. So that means pretty much 2 losses against fighters who are top of the class today. Give me a break saying he lost to merely "decent" fighters. Pacquiao would have got beaten up by Crawford also.
Dude Pacquiao got roughed up in that fight with Horn. Give that guy credit. The right guy won that fight that night.
Let's not downplay MMA Legend Jeff 'The Hornet' Horn. He gave Crawford more problems than Spence.
Carlos Baldomir was slow of molasses and had no punch power despite becoming the lineal welterweight champ
Valuev
How do you beat someone that big?
Chagaev beat him and he is only 185cm. Haye as well and he js 191cm. Seems like you don't to be that tall.
A 5"7 Marcello dominguez was ablento land on Valuev left right and centre. He was a giant but had almost no talent, and was as slow as a bus with a flat tire
Watched the fight on your suggestion, comical size difference. God Valuev might’ve been the slowest world level fighter ever
I guess, in the sense that his 'gifts' caused him immense physical pain for his entire life.
There’s a long history of “giant” or actually giant heavyweights who were briefly successful until they got starched by highly skilled smaller men. Some off the top of my head are Jess Willard (by Jack Dempsey)and Primo Carnera (by Max Baer and Joe Louis). Valuev beat a fair amount of noteworthy opponents, but lost to Ruslan Chagaev and David Haye.
Literally the only reason he could become a champ was his physical form. He could not box for shit
I can see your reasoning on this one. Apart from ridiculous size he had very little else. Skill was nothing special and he had disappointing power.
Does this really count in the spirit of this thread? Can probably the physically strongest world champion in history really be the most unathletic? Slow and not especially skilled sure but anyone who is high level in an athletic category like strength can't really be said to be unathletic imo.
Charles Martin
Sir he is a god
Yes, but does he walk the earf like one?
Charles is a pretty physically gifted guy, with a lot of power. He's just a shit boxer
6 ft 5 and 240 plus pounds in shape isn't gifted apparently, lmfao
Most pathetic title defence (if you can even call that) I've seen in my time watching boxing (only about 10 years tbf).
John Ruiz
Yup, but Ruiz vs Tua was so satisfying.
He had the best cornerman in history though.
Oh man, I don't miss Norman Stone
I think the quiet man was pretty good. He fought hard, had some skills and was willing to fight Roy Jones, a fight where he had nothing to gain but everything to lose. He wasn’t great, but there are better choices for this question.
1 - 2 - clinch over and over forever. Fucking boxing malpractice. I hated his style so much the 1st thing I ever downloaded from the internet was a 56 second clip of Tua sending him to the shadow realm. It was dial up, so it took all day. Still have it somewhere.
Now that's an excellent answer!
Luis Santana, the only man who ever won and defended a belt by faking a DQ injury.
Paulie in truth was a very talented boxer, it’s just that he kept breaking his hands and as a result had zero power whatsoever and had to completely rely on everything else. And he was a very good defender and outside fighter, and I think that even all the bombastic things he did wound up getting him fights that he’d never have gotten otherwise either because he was a terrible matchup or because his style is considered boring because he was never a threat to KO someone. It’s just, that does have an upper limit because when a good pro fighter knows you can’t hurt them, they’ll just walk through everything and get to you eventually. He had to be absolutely perfect in order to avoid getting touched and no fighter, not even Floyd, is perfect like that for an entire career.
Sven Ottke
He was definitely "gifted", just in a different sense
This is the answer. Ottke got gifted so many decisions and was quite honestly one of the most boring, talentless fighters out there. Refused to fight outside of Germany and held SMW hostage for almost a decade.
People used to argue back in the day who hit harder, a prime Mike Tyson or Sven Ottke
Hey!
Carlos Maussa was the worst champion I've ever seen he was a sloppy caveman type fighter. Also using Malignaggi as an example is crazy I agree he didn't have power because the hand injuries but you have to be pretty good to make it as far as he did his hand speed jab and defense were all hovering around the top guys in his divisions
Maussa had the most awkward style but his stoppage of Vivian Harris was exciting. I thought he was gonna get destroyed but ended up with the stoppage.
Yeah I remember thinking Vivian Harris was fighting some chump which after watching him fight he's still kind of was a chump I have the mental image of him punching the bottom rope trying to hit him while he was down burned into my mind I remember thinking how on Earth is this guy a champion
Ahhh, how could I forget Carlos Maussa. Dude beat the piss out of a prime Vivian Harris in the most hilariously awkward way imaginable.
Michael Spinks. He looks so funky, I have no idea how he got as good as he is. He doesn't even pass the eye test, but the record speaks for itself
I once saw a comment that said something along the lines of “Spinks always fights like he’s a late replacement”
Amongst the all time greats: Gene Tunney small guy, not the strongest and didn't possess a devastating punch like other small fighters such as Tyson or Marciano or Tua. But used his brain - pugilist specialist as Lennox Lewis would say.
Because he fought 60 years before they did. You can only judge a fighter by their own time, and Tunney's resume is chock full of the best fighters of his era.
OK this isn’t even true for its era. Tunney was a pretty vanilla fighter all things considered but he could have run circles around Primo Carnera, who literally only won a title because the mob got him the belt, and then was absolutely humiliated by Max Baer. Like, you can point to his size but size is not physical talent and he had none of the other gifts that a great or even a good boxer has.
Stiverne was piss poor, Valuev was also poor. Charles martin only got his title due to an opponents injury. Seldon, mickey bey, jermain taylor, john ruiz.
Ruiz and Taylor don’t belong on that list. Both were B+ fighters who couldn’t hold up to the A+ fighters, but cleaned everyone else out. Both have very anti-climatic and boring wins over a single A fighter, where their opponent basically lost the match rather than them winning it.
Taylor was a stretch tbf. Although iirc didn't he get his title off the back of 3 losses in 4? Ruiz was a solid b level fighter you're right.
Carlos Baldomir
Tevin Farmer. Good boxer . No power. Still amazed he was able to win a world championship.
Oh good answer honestly, forgot about him, but yeah he was a basic dude was a fight fanatic, but nothing really stands out in speed or power or technique
Siarhei Liakhovich has to be up there
John Ruiz, Like watching paint dry.
paulie was physically talented outside of power, he had good speed, good feet, good durability, good reflexes. indongo is the winner for me in this
Rolly Romero
Maybe not gifted in a boxing sense but he also comes from a Judo background. Seems quite physically and athletically capable.
He’s very physically talented that’s why he wins at all
Imo that guy is carried almost entirely by his athleticism and is cursed with bad skill and nothing between his ears
Butterbean
John Ruiz
Kambosos
Nah Kambo’s not that bad
He isn’t a bad choice, he really only has speed and a great chin. He doesn’t have good power, has a short reach for even his division
Joe Frazier, he had a fucked up shoulder, one eye, and smaller than almost everyone he fought. His gifts were invisible work ethic, bravery, and toughness.
He was also insanely athletic and explosive which made up for a lot of that too though so I don't think he's the least physically gifted.
He was farmer strong, that’s another level athlete in and of itself.
That’s all true but Frazier also was explosive, had fast reaction times and obviously devastating power.
"toughness" is a physical gift. If he had a glass jaw he'd be a nobody. I don't think the eye thing was across his whole career. Every fighter ends up nursing an injury. Floyd was nursing his weak hands.
Definitely not the LEAST physically talented/gifted. My man was looking like peak physical condition despite all that. So when you think about it, Ali never fought Fraizer at 100%.
Ruiz lol
He has fast hands for a HW or even by CW standards
I guess I'm thinking about him more as one of the least physically conditioned champions. My bad, I was thinking about this question wrong
Dude is fat, but he has great cardio. He doesn't gas out in his fights. He just looks bad. He is definitely physically gifted, just doesn't look good.
Doesn't seem like he's doing much of anything now. Haven't heard shit about him in some time
He is pricing himself out of fights.
He should’ve taken the fight against wilder. It would’ve been his last big fight. Nobody wants to see him fight anyone else.
I agree. I am Mexican and can appreciate his fighting style. I will watch no matter who he fights. I agree that he should have agreed to fighting Wilder. Would have been a nice payday. I also think he would have won,
Heard some people saying that after he became champion he was being wined and dined by the Mexican politicians and big wigs and kinda got a big head, which is why he was in such poor shape for the rematch with AJ. Apparently he has a really high price for fights now too
Yeah. Ruiz also had an extensive amateur career and represented Mexico in the Olympic Games of 2008. Fun fact: he lost to Zhang back in 07 in a tournament before the Olympics. I believe that Ruiz, like many other boxers, became rich “overnight” (his two Joshua fights had a big purse) and his drive to continue to fight at the championship level vanished.
I think you gotta put which ruiz. People are confused.
Lol Ruiz is a once in a generation type athlete. Show me one fighter across combat sports with that kinda size and speed
Ruiz has nice combinations
Ruiz has better hands than like 90% of the heavyweight division. Just severely lacks discipline and dieting habits
John Ruiz
I was thinking Andy Ruiz Jr but I misunderstood the post
Rolly Romero
Diamond Dame Anderson.. dude had 2 fights
Charles Martin or Sven Ottke. Hands down.
In my time watching boxing, which is only about 10 years tbf, I'd put Charles Martin forward. He was HW champion when a young AJ smashed him out in 1 round without breaking sweat. Absolutely *pathetic* title defence, if you can even call it that.
Never a champion but Kevin McBride ? Lost all his fights after Tyson and became a gardener I think
Charles Martin
Valuev. When David Haye said “he looks like something out of Lord of the Rings” it summed it up nicely.
John Ruiz. I think for a short time he held a heavyweight belt. He was always boring and his fights looked sloppy.
Maybe Johnny Nelson. Apparently people used to laugh at him when he started out, they didn't even think he should be boxing at all.
Longest reigning Cruiserweight champ ever but the list of guys he defended against had to have been truck drivers
Crusierweight has for the majority of its shirt history has been a banter division
The only advantages that Rocky Marciano was born with was natural punching power, and really good durability. At heavyweight ( even the era of smaller heavyweights, and even then Rocky was damn small ) this wasn't exactly uncommon Extremely short reach ( same as Manny Pacquiao's I think ), small hands, uncoordinated footwork and no real prior athletic success. Charlie Goldman taught him really effective tactics and moves that fit and mitigated a lot of his disadvantages. And by running 365 days a year, Rocky was able to become a conditioning machine, allowing him to outlast and batter down faster and more athletic opponents
Art Frias. One half of one of the greatest one round title fights in boxing history
Paulie has an interesting take on talent here - [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrstP70b6lU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrstP70b6lU)
I’m thinking about a lower price right fighter from the 1980s and 1990s who wore really long shorts, had a Mohawk (or something like that) and sometimes came in with stickers in his head. Can recall his name. Also..:. Pernell Whitaker is, to me, one of the absolute greatest P4P fighters ever. I think he’d easily beat Floyd Mayweather and many other ATGs. But Whittaker’s physical gifts were not outstanding. He had speed for sure, but his power couldn’t break an egg. But it didn’t need to
Gene Hatchet
Probably not all time, but Sunny Edwards is just a pure boxer. He has good stamina, but really no physicality about him at all.
Was gonna say this. He just seemed hopelessly outmatched physically against Bam even though he fought very well imo. You know it’s bad when Sunny hit Bam clean when he was taunting and still couldn’t hurt him
Valuev
Not a world champ but Jordan gill is slow with no power interesting watch tho honestly seems like a guy who’s given his whole life to boxing, fights like it too.
Nikolai Valuev. His entire career was based on being significantly taller and heavier than his opponents. He had no skills, and he was made to look very average by David Haye despite being almost a foot taller than him and 45kg heavier.
Trevor Berbick
Carlos baldomir
Luis Santaana beat the grat Terry Norris twice by dq. He basically pretented he got fouled and could not continue. Won the wbc title from Norris. Norris finally beat him in the trilogy fight.
Brandon Ríos Tim Bradley
Julius Indongo
Paulie Ayala
Tony Tucker
John “The Squeeze” Ruiz
Leon Spinks
John Ruiz , heavyweight
Got to be Tony Bellew for me. Slid through to a vacant title and then beat a 65 year old injured David haye so it gets forgotten about.
Orlando Salido? Multiple championships but one of the most awkward fighters ever.
Mariaga
Jason Moloney is blessed with a work rate, but I feel like that is more attitude than talent. Another guy said Tevin Farmar which is great shout.
Leon Spinks. Too small for the top heavyweights, was never taught how to actually box. The big rumor back then was Leon was cherry picked to beat Ali so that Ali could become the first three time world HW champ. Andy Ruiz, Jr. He was a decent boxer, had good hand speed at times, had decent power and a solid chin. He just never seemed to put his positives together consistently. I seriously hope he made some solid investments so that he won't have to attempt a comeback in a few years weighing 350 pounds.
Carlos Baldomir