Tommy Burns against modern Heavyweights

[RandomPoster]

Could Tommy Burns, in his prime and only being 5'7" 175 pounds, still have a legitimate chance against modern Heavyweights?

In particular, how would he do against Wladimir Klitchsko, Nikolai Valuev, or George Foreman (1970s). I understand that he would be considered an undergdog, except could he have pulled off an upset against any of those three?

[SaadOffTheDeck]

I'd think not.

[elmersalsa]

He was too small for his weight in his time. Even then, he was considered small by heavyweight standards, let alone in today's time.

[Ambling Alp II]

But Burns had a lot of title defenses. That automatically makes him a serious threat against anyone.

[SaadOffTheDeck]

But Burns had a lot of title defenses. That automatically makes him a serious threat against anyone.

True, and only in one division. That's crucial.

[jamamb]

tommy a middleweight today?

[APerno]

Compare him to some of the great LHW, that would be a fair comparison; why even bother hypothetically matching a 5' 6" 175 lb man against a 6' 6" 255 lb man, no matter what title you hang on it, it is a fight no one wants to see.

How would Burns have matched up against Gene Tunney in 1923, or Bob Foster in 1971? How about Burns-Tiger, that would make for a great fight.

[Kalan]

But Burns had a lot of title defenses. That automatically makes him a serious threat against anyone

The only real Title Defense Burns had was against Jack Johnson...who he should have been fighting all along instead of all the 2nd raters.

In fact, Johnson should have been in the box off for the vacant Heavyweight Title... It's like Floyd Patterson fighting Pete Rademacher and Tom McNeeley cuz they were easy marks who couldn't box or punch -- instead of dangerous Sonny Liston who wiped him out in a round.

Johnson would be a viable Heavyweight Today like David Haye was for a while -- and Povetkin was... His peak weight was for Jeffries at 208... But with modern training methods and nutrition Johnson could get that up to a fast 220.

Burns would be a Super Middle Today fighting Chris Eubank -- who's almost 6 feet tall and blazing fast.. Burns wouldn't fare well in that one.

[Ambling Alp II]

So maybe we should not look at the sheer number of title defenses since a champion can always find an easy opponent to beat. Maybe should actually look at quality of competition. Perhaps elmer can share the benefit of his wisdom on this.

[SaadOffTheDeck]

So maybe we should not look at the sheer number of title defenses since a champion can always find an easy opponent to beat. Maybe should actually look at quality of competition. Perhaps elmer can share the benefit of his wisdom on this.

He thinks vitali faced great opposition.

[Kalan]

Vitali Klitschko faced the best opposition who would get into a ring with him. Nobody ever outboxed him or knocked him down.

He was a 3-Time Heavyweight Champion -- his best 15 opponents and the results

Corrie Sanders... 39-2... Wins Heavyweight Championship... 8 round stoppage
Herbie Hide... 31-1... Wins Heavyweight Championship... KO 2
Sam Peter... 30-1... Wins Heavyweight Championship... 8 round stoppage
Tomasz Adamak... 44-1... 2-Division World Champion and never stopped before. KO 10
Juan Carlos Gomez... 44-1... Former World Cruiserweight Champion. KO 9
Chris Arreola... 27-0 undefeated top ranked contender. 10th round stoppage
Kevin Johnson... 22-0-1 undefeated top ranked contender. Swept every round on 2 cards
Odlanier Solis...17-0 undefeated Olympic Gold Medal winner. 1st round KO win on knee injury
Kirk Johnson... 34-1-1... Only previous loss was a ticky-tac DQ… 2 round KO
Timo Hoffman... 22-0... Bigger and taller than Vitali... Swept every round in 2 cards
Ed Mahone... 21-0-2... Undefeated contender... KO 3
Manuel Charr... 21-0 undefeated top ranked contender. Stoppage on cut in 4 rounds
Shannon Briggs, 51-5-1... 2-time Heavyweight Champion. Swept every round of a UD

Chris Byrd, 30-1... VK was winning easily on all scorecards when forced to retire due to a completely severed rotator cuff assembly... VK entered the ring with a slight tear thinking he could fight through it, but it soon got a lot worse and Vitali retired after the 9th.

Lennox Lewis, 40-2-1... VK was winning on all scorecards when it was stopped on cuts on his left eyelid caused by foul blows... If they went to the scorecards Vitali wins Unanimous TD 6 -- Lewis promised a rematch but retired when Vitali was made his mandatory challenger.

[Cojimar 1946]

I'm confused by people's logic here. They rightly think Burns size would be a problem against heavyweights of later eras but somehow size isn't a problem for 70s heavyweights like Ali and Frazier? Frazier would be giving up more than 40 pounds and 7 inches in height against Joshua.

[Kalan]

Frazier wouldn't be in the running today... A short little, wide open, walk-in hooker??? ... I knew Foreman was going to plow him a new one.

[Ambling Alp II]

I'm confused by people's logic here. They rightly think Burns size would be a problem against heavyweights of later eras but somehow size isn't a problem for 70s heavyweights like Ali and Frazier? Frazier would be giving up more than 40 pounds and 7 inches in height against Joshua.

I know that you are often confused.
Let me try to explain this.
There is an ideal size range . You can be too small or too big.
It's not like the bigger the better. ie 215 is better than 175, so 255 must be better than 215, and 295 must better than 255 and so on.
If bigger was better, than the biggest heavyweight would be the best at any one given period of time in boxing history. That has almost never been the case.

If you are too small, generally you would not have the power to hurt a great heavyweight of ideal size. He probably would not have the ability to take the punishment. He would also have height and reach problems if the bigger heavyweight knows how to take advantage of this.

However, you can be too big. At a certain point size stops being at advantage. at a later point, it can be a disadvantage. If a fighter is too big, he is probably to slow with both handspeed and with his feet. He will have a lot of trouble catching a heavyweight of ideal size if that heavyweight is good enough. He also will be probably be a bigger and slower target and easier to hit. If he is too big he usually will have worse stamina.
Of course there are rare exceptions to this with small and big heavyweights.

[BitPlayer]

He'd be able to beat a lot of them, but not any of the top guys.

[Kalan]

I'm confused by people's logic here. They rightly think Burns size would be a problem against heavyweights of later eras but somehow size isn't a problem for 70s heavyweights like Ali and Frazier? Frazier would be giving up more than 40 pounds and 7 inches in height against Joshua.

I know that you are often confused.
Let me try to explain this.
There is an ideal size range . You can be too small or too big. It's not like the bigger the better. ie 215 is better than 175, so 255 must be better than 215, and 295 must better than 255 and so on.If bigger was better, than the biggest heavyweight would be the best at any one given period of time in boxing history. That has almost never been the case.

There is no "ideal size" for a Heavyweight... That is an ignorant, brain dead idea to start with... There's an ideal weight for each boxer.

I remember reading a foolish analysis that Joe Frazier was the ideal size for a Heavyweight.. That he had enough power to hurt anybody...and was tough enough to take any man's punch... That once he got inside the longer arms of a bigger, taller man they would be at his mercy... Some of those ridiculous notions---the common wisdom before the fight---were behind his being a big favorite to beat George Foreman.

Foreman didn't blitz Frazier because he was more skillful or tactical.. He didn't win on experience and ring savvy.. Speed, cleverness, and tactical brilliance weren't George's forte.. He beat him because he was bigger, taller, stronger, and a ripped to the gills at 6'3" X 217. That was the "ideal size" for George Foreman---not an ounce of excess.. But that didn't do it.. A big help was a decisive edge in punching power, particularly with short hooks an uppercuts Joe Frazier's head was the ideal height to get maximum leverage on.. It was another Liston-Patterson pairing.

Joe Bugner was bigger and taller than George Foreman. He had a longer reach and he could absorb a punch well. Why didn't he beat Frazier? Bug planned to fight Joe like Foreman did.. That's like BuzzBox trying to dance like Fred Astaire.. Bug had mediocre power. His feet, stance, balance, and footwork were so messed up that he couldn't slip or duck a punch.. Hitting Bug was like throwing a pine cone at the side of a barn.. Frazier won an easy decision -- as his son Marvis did a few years later when the kid had 9 fights.. They were both much smaller than Bug.

But given the same superior athletic talents, raw intelligence, character, ambition, love of the game, physical toughness, work ethic, and superior coaching -- height, weight, and reach advantages are great assets to have.. A man 7'1" X 295 with a 100" reach beats a 6'6" X 255 with an 84" reach if he were given similar gifts and driving ambition at birth.. If you have a brain in your head you know that.

Now finding a super sized man with the same athletic gifts as an outstanding 6-footer is difficult.. Only one 7-foot basketball player in 74 makes it to the NBA.. and the few who do are generally very slow and not that athletic.. But the world has 7 billion people in it.. Believe it or not, several thousand of them are over 7 feet tall.. The most mentally and physically gifted of those would make a great boxer -- if he weren't sitting in the back row of his mechanical engineering class somewhere in Uzbekistan -- so the other students don't have to look over him.

[BoxBuzz]

Once in a while you speak to your strength.....this appears to be one of those times......or like the ol' stopped clock, you are correct once in every 24/12 hour period depending on whether we are talking civilian or military intelligence.


Well.....except for that last paragraph where you were leaning dangerously into the ol Wilt the Stilt gobbledeegook that always trips you up.

[Kalan]

You were tripped up at birth... They forgot to slap your ass to make you start crying and you turned blue... You've had problems since.

[BoxBuzz]

That is fictional and rumoresque at best, most likely you made that up out of whole cloth, just like you make up precisely 54.3% of your contributions.

Your insidious mix of fact and fiction requires a full time group of authenticators to fact check/certify, qualify and investigate your claims, so that the good folks who depend on this forum for high quality info are spared the pain of being led down the primrose path.

Fortunately we have a very qualified group of volunteers that help sort out your more exploitive and outlandish assertions.

As for the other 45.7% of your semi accurate, or rather synthesized yet truth-like if often subjective statements.....do carry on. You will seldom be called out on those items.

[Kalan]

I wasn't trying to be factual about your birth... I was being sarcastic about your lack of intelligence and your sheer pomposity.

You think you're clever... You're just a pain in the ain...

If you want to go through points of my above post and dispute them, try that... You lack the reasoning capacity to do that so you broadside.

[pound per pound]

Could Tommy Burns, in his prime and only being 5'7" 175 pounds, still have a legitimate chance against modern Heavyweights?

In particular, how would he do against Wladimir Klitchsko, Nikolai Valuev, or George Foreman (1970s). I understand that he would be considered an undergdog, except could he have pulled off an upset against any of those three?

Burns would be giving upon average nearly a foot in height, 7" in reach, and about oh 70 pounds vs Modern heavyweights. I can't see him doing well vs Joshua, Povetkin, Wilder, or Parker.

You might as well ask a flyweight to stop a light heavyweight. Not a fair thread!

[Kalan]

True... This is ridiculous... Hypotheticals shouldn't be argued that are simple common sense to most thinking individuals.

[APerno]

If he is too big he usually will have worse stamina.

On stamina Big George Foreman got to be, first the epitome of, and then the exception to this rule.

[Ambling Alp II]

I would not even go that far. Old George did not have great stamina. He had to fight at a very slow pace in order to last 12 rounds.

[Kalan]

If he is too big he usually will have worse stamina.

On stamina Big George Foreman got to be, first the epitome of, and then the exception to this rule

It's not a rule.. It's somebody's dumb idea.. Jeffries was very big compared to many of the men he fought, but outlasted them.. 186-pound Tommy Loughran didn't do a very good job of wearing down Primo Carnera.. Vitali always did well in the late rounds, or as the fight went on, with the exception of the Byrd fight when he suffered a severe injury but wasn't breathing hard at all and winning all the way..

Joshua was 10-pounds heavier than Klitschko and he was wearing him down quickly in the 10th and 11th with his heavier hands.. Klitschko said he was the best trained of his life--which I guess they always say that.. Size helps you a ton.. It takes less effort to hit a short little guy.. And he has to work much harder to get to you.. You notice it in sparring too.. Smaller guys are running and trying maneuver around you and you're boxing the crap out of them and wearing them out like Wladimir Klitschko did to Chris Byrd and Eddie Chambers.. They had nothing left.

Foreman said he learned a secret.. How to relax and pace himself.. Let the other guy miss punches and wear his ass out then jump on him.. Mike Weaver said this was his plan for John Tate.. Let Tate throw and throw and throw -- and pitch the sink at him in the 14th and 15th.