gil's Refined Ranking System

[gilgamesh]

"The Cincinnati Cobra" Ezzard Charles

With a record of 95-25-1 (52 KO's). Charles competed in 13 Heavyweight Championship fights with a record of 9-4 in them.

He has 20 Quality wins (Teddy Yarosz, Charley Burley 2x, Joey Maxim 4x, Jimmy Bivins 4x, Lloyd Marshall 2x, Archie Moore 3x, Elmer Ray, Jersey Joe Walcott 2x and Joe Louis)

He has 6 All Time Great wins (Burley 2x, Moore 3x and Louis) and 2 Gold Star wins (Yarosz and Bivins in their 3rd fight) I give this particular victory over Bivins the Gold star distinction due to it being the most conclusive finish of any of the bouts in their series.

As a Heavyweight Ezzard's record stands at 39-21, and his score is 112

When taking in his whole career overall including his bouts at Light Heavy and Middleweight. His overall score comes to 519 points

Note: Like many fighters Ezzard Charles fought on well past his best, and suffered many losses against men that previously couldn't have beaten him. This unfortunately damages his all time standing, but when you see the level of victories he amassed in his prime. It is clear that Charles fought about as tough a crop of opponents as any fighter you'll come across in the annals of the sport.

It is unfortunate that none of Ezzard's Light Heavyweight bouts survive on video. It is also unfortunate that the last 4 or 5 years of his career cannot be stricken from the record because if they could his final standing would be much higher, but alas he did fight on past his best, and it is what it is.

[keithmoonhangover]

"The Cincinnati Cobra" Ezzard Charles

With a record of 95-25-1 (52 KO's). Charles competed in 13 Heavyweight Championship fights with a record of 9-4 in them.

He has 20 Quality wins (Teddy Yarosz, Charley Burley 2x, Joey Maxim 4x, Jimmy Bivins 4x, Lloyd Marshall 2x, Archie Moore 3x, Elmer Ray, Jersey Joe Walcott 2x and Joe Louis)

He has 6 All Time Great wins (Burley 2x, Moore 3x and Louis) and 2 Gold Star wins (Yarosz and Bivins in their 3rd fight) I give this particular victory over Bivins the Gold star distinction due to it being the most conclusive finish of any of the bouts in their series.

As a Heavyweight Ezzard's record stands at 39-21, and his score is 112

When taking in his whole career overall including his bouts at Light Heavy and Middleweight. His overall score comes to 519 points

Note: Like many fighters Ezzard Charles fought on well past his best, and suffered many losses against men that previously couldn't have beaten him. This unfortunately damages his all time standing, but when you see the level of victories he amassed in his prime. It is clear that Charles fought about as tough a crop of opponents as any fighter you'll come across in the annals of the sport.

It is unfortunate that none of Ezzard's Light Heavyweight bouts survive on video. It is also unfortunate that the last 4 or 5 years of his career cannot be stricken from the record because if they could his final standing would be much higher, but alas he did fight on past his best, and it is what it is.

So Tommy Morrison was more than twice as good as Ezzard Charles at heavyweight?

[gilgamesh]

Not exactly, he just lost less often, and has the advantage of many more of his fights having video evidence to accompany them.

Charles really took a sh*t load of losses in those last few years of his career, and that did a number on his points total. His skill level obviously isn't less than Morrison's, and is reflected in his much higher overall score which generally tells the tale better for these guys that went up to Heavyweight as opposed to always competed there.

[keithmoonhangover]

Not exactly, he just lost less often, and has the advantage of many more of his fights having video evidence to accompany them.

Charles really took a sh*t load of losses in those last few years of his career, and that did a number on his points total. His skill level obviously isn't less than Morrison's, and is reflected in his much higher overall score which generally tells the tale better for these guys that went up to Heavyweight as opposed to always competed there.

But he didn't beat anyone good, that has to mean something.

I think you're the only person on the planet who thinks Tommy Morrison was a better heavyweight than Ezzard Charles.

[gilgamesh]

Not exactly, he just lost less often, and has the advantage of many more of his fights having video evidence to accompany them.

Charles really took a sh*t load of losses in those last few years of his career, and that did a number on his points total. His skill level obviously isn't less than Morrison's, and is reflected in his much higher overall score which generally tells the tale better for these guys that went up to Heavyweight as opposed to always competed there.

But he didn't beat anyone good, that has to mean something.

I think you're the only person on the planet who thinks Tommy Morrison was a better heavyweight than Ezzard Charles.

I doubt it, but I'm likely in the minority. Many people wouldn't even remember Charles or Morrison at this point.

Charles had more skill without question, but all the losses can't and shouldn't be dismissed.

Past his prime or whatever the case. A loss is a loss, and Ezzard has too many of em to be completely overlooked.

It also doesn't help him that almost all of Morrison's fights are on video while the vast majority of Ezzard's are not. It's easier to assess someone's performance in a fight you can actually watch, so on that basis Tommy has a lot more points because I actually get to see most of his work.

In many cases the fighters of the past are victims of circumstances beyond their control. I actually did make a mathematical mistake on Charles though that will give him a bit of a boost when I correct it. Will have to get back home and consult my notes though to see where the Mistakes were and what needs correcting.

[gilgamesh]

Also note that Charles does rate well above Morrison as a fighter overall when taking in the picture of his entire career. That's the most important thing.

There's a reason why most people don't bring up the name Ezzard Charles when talking about the all time best Heavyweights, and large amount of losses certainly plays a part.

People like to pretend that a fighter losing past his prime doesn't matter and shouldn't hurt his legacy, but the reality is that it does.

If Roy Jones hadn't had the career he had from Tarver 2 onward he's probably still considered P4P #1 of the last 3 decades by most, but unfortunately for him that's not the case.

[keithmoonhangover]

Not exactly, he just lost less often, and has the advantage of many more of his fights having video evidence to accompany them.

Charles really took a sh*t load of losses in those last few years of his career, and that did a number on his points total. His skill level obviously isn't less than Morrison's, and is reflected in his much higher overall score which generally tells the tale better for these guys that went up to Heavyweight as opposed to always competed there.

But he didn't beat anyone good, that has to mean something.

I think you're the only person on the planet who thinks Tommy Morrison was a better heavyweight than Ezzard Charles.

I doubt it, but I'm likely in the minority. Many people wouldn't even remember Charles or Morrison at this point.

Charles had more skill without question, but all the losses can't and shouldn't be dismissed.

Past his prime or whatever the case. A loss is a loss, and Ezzard has too many of em to be completely overlooked.

It also doesn't help him that almost all of Morrison's fights are on video while the vast majority of Ezzard's are not. It's easier to assess someone's performance in a fight you can actually watch, so on that basis Tommy has a lot more points because I actually get to see most of his work.

In many cases the fighters of the past are victims of circumstances beyond their control. I actually did make a mathematical mistake on Charles though that will give him a bit of a boost when I correct it. Will have to get back home and consult my notes though to see where the Mistakes were and what needs correcting.

When you were watching these fights, did you see Morrison beat any contenders in their prime? Did you see Morrison, in his prime get obliterated by Michael Bentt? Did you see prime Morrison fail to beat Ross Puritty?

[gilgamesh]

I did. I also saw Ezzard Charles fail to beat Walcott twice and, and Marciano twice and John Holman. And that's just what I saw, not counting what I didn't. You guys look at it like I'm discrediting somebody when In fact I have a great ton of respect for both fighters and I consider Charles the better fighter overall by double the point spread.

Don't make mountains out of mole hills. Look at what my system has produced and look at the Boxrec all time Top 40 and tell me what's more off base. My system may not always be perfect but at least it follows the same logic. There's no rhyme or reason to the Boxrec rankings.

[gilgamesh]

"The Cincinnati Cobra" Ezzard Charles

With a record of 95-25-1 (52 KO's). Charles competed in 13 Heavyweight Championship fights with a record of 9-4 in them.

He has 20 Quality wins (Teddy Yarosz, Charley Burley 2x, Joey Maxim 4x, Jimmy Bivins 4x, Lloyd Marshall 2x, Archie Moore 3x, Elmer Ray, Jersey Joe Walcott 2x and Joe Louis)

He has 6 All Time Great wins (Burley 2x, Moore 3x and Louis) and 2 Gold Star wins (Yarosz and Bivins in their 3rd fight) I give this particular victory over Bivins the Gold star distinction due to it being the most conclusive finish of any of the bouts in their series.

As a Heavyweight Ezzard's record stands at 39-21, and his score is 112

When taking in his whole career overall including his bouts at Light Heavy and Middleweight. His overall score comes to 519 points

Note: Like many fighters Ezzard Charles fought on well past his best, and suffered many losses against men that previously couldn't have beaten him. This unfortunately damages his all time standing, but when you see the level of victories he amassed in his prime. It is clear that Charles fought about as tough a crop of opponents as any fighter you'll come across in the annals of the sport.

It is unfortunate that none of Ezzard's Light Heavyweight bouts survive on video. It is also unfortunate that the last 4 or 5 years of his career cannot be stricken from the record because if they could his final standing would be much higher, but alas he did fight on past his best, and it is what it is.

I had miscalculated the worth of some of Ezzard's title wins as I should've listed his 2 victories over Walcott as Gold star victories, and added an extra 5 to his NBA Title defenses prior to gaining Universal Recognition by beating Joe Louis.

With his mathematical mistakes correct Ezzard's score as a Heavyweight comes to 221 points.

And his overall score comes to 628 points

EDIT: I was able to find video of Ezzard's bout with Bernie Reynolds. An additional bout I had previously missed. The result there nets him an addtional 4 points to his overall and Heavyweight scores.

[gilgamesh]

James "Buster" Douglas

With a record of 37-6-1 (24 KO's). Douglas competed in 3 Heavyweight Championship fights with a record of 1-2 in them.

He has 4 Quality wins (Greg Page, Trevor Berbick, Oliver McCall and Mike Tyson) and 1 All Time Great win (Tyson)

His overall score comes to 97 points

[keithmoonhangover]

James "Buster" Douglas

With a record of 37-6-1 (24 KO's). Douglas competed in 3 Heavyweight Championship fights with a record of 1-2 in them.

He has 4 Quality wins (Greg Page, Trevor Berbick, Oliver McCall and Mike Tyson) and 1 All Time Great win (Tyson)

His overall score comes to 97 points

I still can't get my head around this. Tommy Morrison gets more than double the points of Buster Douglas? That's completely insane.

[gilgamesh]

James "Buster" Douglas

With a record of 37-6-1 (24 KO's). Douglas competed in 3 Heavyweight Championship fights with a record of 1-2 in them.

He has 4 Quality wins (Greg Page, Trevor Berbick, Oliver McCall and Mike Tyson) and 1 All Time Great win (Tyson)

His overall score comes to 97 points

I still can't get my head around this. Tommy Morrison gets more than double the points of Buster Douglas? That's completely insane.

What the f*ck are you so hung up on Morrison for? I've covered dozens of fighters.

I'll give you an answer one more time though before I just ignore these "WHAT THE F*CK MORRISON IS HIGHER?!!!" comments altogether.

Morrison won 48 out of 52 total bouts for a winning percentage of 92 %

Buster Douglas won 37 out of 44 for a winning percentage of 84%

Morrison has a KO percentage of 78%

Douglas has a KO percentage of 55%

Morrison was knocked out 3 times in his career

Douglas was knocked out 5 times in his career

Morrison often fought and won in more spectacular and exciting fashion, while Douglas often coasted to lackluster decisions.

They each have 4 Quality wins. Buster has the biggest win between the 2 of them obviously, but was beaten twice as often in less total fights.

So there's your answer.

[keithmoonhangover]

James "Buster" Douglas

With a record of 37-6-1 (24 KO's). Douglas competed in 3 Heavyweight Championship fights with a record of 1-2 in them.

He has 4 Quality wins (Greg Page, Trevor Berbick, Oliver McCall and Mike Tyson) and 1 All Time Great win (Tyson)

His overall score comes to 97 points

I still can't get my head around this. Tommy Morrison gets more than double the points of Buster Douglas? That's completely insane.

What the f*ck are you so hung up on Morrison for? I've covered dozens of fighters.

I'll give you an answer one more time though before I just ignore these "WHAT THE F*CK MORRISON IS HIGHER?!!!" comments altogether.

Morrison won 48 out of 52 total bouts for a winning percentage of 92 %

Buster Douglas won 37 out of 44 for a winning percentage of 84%

Morrison has a KO percentage of 78%

Douglas has a KO percentage of 55%

Morrison was knocked out 3 times in his career

Douglas was knocked out 5 times in his career

Morrison often fought and won in more spectacular and exciting fashion, while Douglas often coasted to lackluster decisions.

They each have 4 Quality wins. Buster has the biggest win between the 2 of them obviously, but was beaten twice as often in less total fights.

So there's your answer.

So Morrison beat more cans and stopped them? For someone with your vast knowledge of boxing, I can't believe you bring that up.

The biggest flaw in your system is the difference between boxers who retired in or close to their prime. Marciano, Bowe and Morrison don't have the kind of later career losses that the likes of Tyson, Norton and Charles continued long past their prime. Counting Tyson-McBride or Charles-Alvin Green as any kind of knock on their legacy complete and absolute nonsense.

[gilgamesh]

Ignoring a fight a man stepped in the ring and lost is absolute nonsense to me. I can't make exceptions for one fighter and not another. All fighters are scored equally.

Look at my current Heavyweight all time Top 40 and compare it Boxrec's. Which makes more sense?

There is no perfect system, but at least mine follows a logic that makes sense. You may not agree with it every time, but it follows the same pattern that you can at least wrap your head around. That's really the best you can hope for when it comes to all time rankings and that sorta thing. It's a near impossible thing to categorize, but I'm trying my best, and honestly enjoying the process. I'm seeing a lot of great fights I've never seen before in doing this, and it's been a lot of fun. Even with the disagreements and fusses

I expect more disagreement tomorrow in all likelihood because of how much Usyk will jump forward, but remember that he is defending the UNDISPUTED Heavyweight Championship against Verhoeven, and that's as valuable as the Championship of any of the classic eras because he's earned that right by being THAT Champion of our time.

[gilgamesh]

And hell more importantly than that, my system also shows that anyone that's within 300 or 400 points of somebody can still possibly have beaten them (Norton and Frazier are beyond 600 points back from Ali, but they beat him). Even making my all time list at all is a great honor. Even having enough accomplishment to have warranted my attention to have put you on my list means you're somebody I greatly respect. Anybody I take the time to cover is somebody I feel deserves respect. So where you guys are all seeing disrespect I definitely see the opposite. Have you taken the time out of your lives to watch every single available fight of every fighter I have listed? Because I have. I respect these guys. This is my hobby. I enjoy this sh*t.

If I'm saying a guy is the 45th best Heavyweight of all time. I'm not saying he's a chump. The chumps are the people he knocked over to earn his spot in the Top 45. Anybody that won enough fights and made enough noise to earn his place into the conversation is someone I respect.

So don't take personal offense when a guy lands 1 or 5 or 10 notches ahead of someone else. If I've taken the time to cover them. I think highly of them. I thought they were worth remembering.

[keithmoonhangover]

Ignoring a fight a man stepped in the ring and lost is absolute nonsense to me. I can't make exceptions for one fighter and not another. All fighters are scored equally.

Look at my current Heavyweight all time Top 40 and compare it Boxrec's. Which makes more sense?

There is no perfect system, but at least mine follows a logic that makes sense. You may not agree with it every time, but it follows the same pattern that you can at least wrap your head around. That's really the best you can hope for when it comes to all time rankings and that sorta thing. It's a near impossible thing to categorize, but I'm trying my best, and honestly enjoying the process. I'm seeing a lot of great fights I've never seen before in doing this, and it's been a lot of fun. Even with the disagreements and fusses

I expect more disagreement tomorrow in all likelihood because of how much Usyk will jump forward, but remember that he is defending the UNDISPUTED Heavyweight Championship against Verhoeven, and that's as valuable as the Championship of any of the classic eras because he's earned that right by being THAT Champion of our time.

Did you take points of Ali for the Berbick loss?

[gilgamesh]

Ignoring a fight a man stepped in the ring and lost is absolute nonsense to me. I can't make exceptions for one fighter and not another. All fighters are scored equally.

Look at my current Heavyweight all time Top 40 and compare it Boxrec's. Which makes more sense?

There is no perfect system, but at least mine follows a logic that makes sense. You may not agree with it every time, but it follows the same pattern that you can at least wrap your head around. That's really the best you can hope for when it comes to all time rankings and that sorta thing. It's a near impossible thing to categorize, but I'm trying my best, and honestly enjoying the process. I'm seeing a lot of great fights I've never seen before in doing this, and it's been a lot of fun. Even with the disagreements and fusses

I expect more disagreement tomorrow in all likelihood because of how much Usyk will jump forward, but remember that he is defending the UNDISPUTED Heavyweight Championship against Verhoeven, and that's as valuable as the Championship of any of the classic eras because he's earned that right by being THAT Champion of our time.

Did you take points of Ali for the Berbick loss?

Yes, and he's #1 with a bullet. So who gives a sh*t?

[gilgamesh]

Usyk takes a leap forward in the all time rankings after his victory today over Rico Verhoeven.

[gilgamesh]

"Merciless" Ray Mercer

With a record of 36-7-1 (26 KO's). Mercer competed in 2 Heavyweight Title bouts with a record of 2-0 in them.

He has 3 Quality wins (Francesco Damiani, Tommy Morrison and Tim Witherspoon), and 1 Gold star victory (Morrison)

His overall score comes to 145 points

[Jaywheel]

Usyk takes a leap forward in the all time rankings after his victory today over Rico Verhoeven.

[Bobbyptsd]

I have a question for you on your system, apologies if you've covered this before I haven't seen everything that's been said about it.
A while back you said that on the roids issue, it isn't consistent so you just don't take it into account. A win is a win and a loss is a loss and all that regardless. So just as an example you consider that Garcia beat Haney regardless of what the offcial record says. I agree with you on this by the way. But at that time you were talking about your opinion on the matter, this wasn't in the context of your system.
My question is, do you factor this into your system, or do you go by the official record? So would you count Toney's win over Ruiz and Garcia's over Haney as two examples, or would you just not factor them in at all as they are officially speaking NC?

[gilgamesh]

I have a question for you on your system, apologies if you've covered this before I haven't seen everything that's been said about it.
A while back you said that on the roids issue, it isn't consistent so you just don't take it into account. A win is a win and a loss is a loss and all that regardless. So just as an example you consider that Garcia beat Haney regardless of what the offcial record says. I agree with you on this by the way. But at that time you were talking about your opinion on the matter, this wasn't in the context of your system.
My question is, do you factor this into your system, or do you go by the official record? So would you count Toney's win over Ruiz and Garcia's over Haney as two examples, or would you just not factor them in at all as they are officially speaking NC?

The first situation of this type I've covered is James Toney vs John Ruiz, and this is how I handled it.

I still acknowledge it as a win for James Toney, and give him the points that would've come with a victory. However due to the verdict being overturned officially I do not reward him a Championship bonus for the WBA belt he should've won, and I do not deduct points from Ruiz for the "loss" due to the controversial nature of it.

I still saw Toney beat Ruiz. I still heard the aftermath. So I feel like this method still allows me to give credit to a good performance while still acknowledging the controversial nature of it, and thank you for that question. I hadn't gotten that one before. I appreciate original questions.

[gilgamesh]

Corrie "The Sniper" Sanders

With a record of 42-4 (31 KO's). Sanders competed in 2 Heavyweight Title fights and has a record of 1-1 in them.

He has 1 All Time Great win (Wladimir Klitschko)

His overall score comes to 192 points

[gilgamesh]

Trevor Berbick

With a record of 49-11-1 (33 KO's). Berbick competed in 3 Heavyweight Championship bouts, and has a record of 1-2 in them.

He has 4 Quality wins (John Tate, Muhammad Ali, Greg Page and Pinklon Thomas)

Overall his score comes to 35 points