BoxRec

21-30 You surely couldn't begrudge him that position on the ladder come to think of it I wouldn't argue if he was put in the 11-20 bracket

One issue with ranking heavyweights is that often heavyweights fail to fight many of the best fighters in their own era which makes it difficult to know who was best in a particular time period.

Wladimir Klitschko has a big advantage over Norton in dominance and longevity.

Ambling Alp II wrote:Yes really. Not even close. Incredible how overrated they are by many people.

Wladimir has a glass jaw and poor stamina. The best fighter he ever beat was Chris Byrd. Big deal. He got embarrassed by three different opponents, none of whom were that good at all.

Vitaly-What are we supposed to impressed about? He didn't do anything particularly well. He was slow and easy to hit. He had two major fights in his career; he lasted six rounds against an obese Lennox Lewis and quit against Byrd. Best win fighter he ever beat was Corrie Sanders. Big deal.

Look at your list and see where you have Ali, Holmes, Quarry, and Young. Look at your list and see where you have Chris Byrd and Corrie Sanders.

the obese Lennox lewis Thing is extremely overrated. He had a Little bit of overweight but he only weighed about 3 kilograms more than he weighed against tyson. he was not obese by any means although probably not quite 100% prepared. (remember the fight was on short notice -but for both fighters although vitali never gained weight).

yes vitali lost that fight but it was an extremely Close fight until he got the cut. maybe he would have lost more badly against a better prepared LL but still lennox is a top3 fighter ever and there are not 10 fighters in history who could have beaten lennox at that night.

Norton would have been destroyed by lennox even if lennox weighed 270.

Vitali is not in the same class as lennox but then again not a lot of fighters are. I have lennox at 3 just behind Ali and Louis. you could also argue tyson for his Peak above him but in "career value" lennox blows him away. but no way lennox is outside the top5 all time.

apart from Lennox vitali did not face great fighters but he beat anyone of his opponents easily except for Byrd (he lead against him on Points too). vitali was never behind on Points in his career and he had an extremely tough fight against a slightly underprepared ATG Lennox lewis.

he also won 15 world Championship fights against admittedly mostly underwhelming opponents.

wlad had a weaker chin but vitali always was an extremely tough fighter who beat most of the guys he faced. I don't see how anyone could rank him outside the top15 (albeit I don't have him in my top10).

the only fighters that I see beating prime vitali are: Ali, tyson, lewis, holmes, Foreman and maybe bowe and Holyfield.

A great fighter with a huge win but obvious frailties too. I think somewhere between 25-50.

What are the obvious frailties?
25 I can see. 50, no way.

I'm going to pick a couple of guys. Would you rate Schmeling or Charles higher? If so why?

I would rate Max Schmeling between 20-30 range, and the great Ezzard Charles around 15-20 range at heavyweight

Interesting I'd bet on Norton over Max, and I'd bet on Charles over Norton.

So we kinda sort agree that he fits in between those two.

Charles

Then I'm not sure. Not much in it.

Once you get past about #20 you can make a case for so many of them.

Has anyone ever seen the photograph of Ken Norton knocked out on the canvas
by Jose Luis Garcia?
I saw it sometime ago somewhere in one of the (pay)newspaper archives.
Norton looked like he was knocked out cold.
I think it was this newspaper clipping that Eddie Futch had tapped to Norton's locker the day afterward
just to remind him (at the time) to take his training more seriously for an oppnent.
I wonder if Jose Luis Garcia ever had the photo matted and framed in his home years later?

Ambling Alp II wrote:My goodness, you sound like a politician's spin doctor.

hear this for the second time within a few months.
hmm.

Ambling Alp II wrote:-Yes Young was a helluva lot better than Byrd. Watch Norton-Young and then watch Byrd against the Klitschkos. Not even close.

agree. i was referring to sanders.

Ambling Alp II wrote:-It was an obese Lewis who fought Vitaly. And Vitaly still could not get past the 6th round no matter how you spin it.I have never seen a guy get more mileage out of getting stopped in 6 rounds.

in all fairness, he was cut. badly cut, but
being stopped by cut is a different thing from
being knocked down or out, especially when
your spirits are "obviously" in tact, you dish
out as much as you take and you are ahead
on all cards. plus lennox was at edge of being
taken out himself in the second. to me it looks
like you are spinning something if you make
it look like a glamorous and easy win for a
fat old lennox.

Ambling Alp II wrote:-You don't hold the injury loss to Byrd? Well you should. He quit. He lost. It's that simple. Doesn't matter what he did the rest of his career. In one of the biggest fights of his life he quit.

i have respect for how people make their living
and how they need to protect their income source.
it was early in his career, the fight was in his bag
and he got injured. no big deal whatsoever for me
that be thought better not risk my career, i can
take this guy any time later. danny williams on the
other hand had the opposite utility function. it was
his last chance of making a buck to win that damn
fight, so he hung in there and got lucky.

Ambling Alp II wrote:-Wladimir gassed out against veteran in front of his home crowd? That is some serious spin. He lost to a journeyman.

that was definitely the case. i saw that fight back
then and that was the opinion of everybody.

Ambling Alp II wrote:I was hoping to compare him to someone like Schmeling or Walcott. That would be much more interesting.

walcott is great, schmeling overrated throughout
the board. he basically had one big win, because
he saw a technical flaw in young louis and was
taken out in one in the rematch. yes, he should
have won the rematch against sharkey, but was
lucky to win the first. i do not have him in the
top 20 of all time.

Jimmy Young (at least at the time he fought Norton) was a helluva lot better than Corrie Sanders.
do we really have to argue that?

Vitaly's cut against Lewis. A cut counts. It's not an legit excuse. It's part of not having a good defense. Fighters who have good defenses get cut a lot less than those that don't.
A great fighter would have knocked Lewis out within 6 rounds before he got stopped by the cut anyway.

You think it was a good career move for Vitaly to quit against Byrd? OK, if you want to argue that fine, though I disagree. However, you have to take the downside... He lost. It happened. It counts.

Wladimir gassed out against Purrity? Shows poor stamina. That's part of boxing. He lost. It counts.

You can use these "my dog ate my homework" excuses for any fight. You can use them for any fight that the Klitschkos won as well. You can use them for any fight that Norton lost.

Cuts counts. Quitting counts. Getting gassed out counts.

Ezzard wrote:Charles

Then I'm not sure. Not much in it.

Once you get past about #20 you can make a case for so many of them.

I think you can certainly make a decent argument that Norton was better than Charles.
Charles best wins? 2 against Walcott. Certainly nothing to sneeze at. However, Norton trumps that with Ali.
People keep saying that Norton did do enough beside the Ali fight. OK, what else (at heavyweight) do we have with Charles? I guess you would go with Elmer Ray, then maybe Rex Layne or a way over the hill Louis. Norton beat Young and Quarry.

Norton got ko'd early in his career by Garcia, and also got blown out by Foreman and Shavers. Those should be counted against him to a certain extent.
However the close losses to Ali and Holmes boost his stock if anything.

Losses? Charles lost to Marciano twice, Walcott twice. Nothing embarrassing there. He also lost to Valdes and Layne, whom he should have beat. Not exactly embarrassing, but a great heavyweight really should have beaten Johnson.

Charles and Norton are about as close as you can can get.

Schmeling and Walcott has similar results as well.

Ambling Alp II wrote:

Ezzard wrote:Charles

Then I'm not sure. Not much in it.

Once you get past about #20 you can make a case for so many of them.

I think you can certainly make a decent argument that Norton was better than Charles.
Charles best wins? 2 against Walcott. Certainly nothing to sneeze at. However, Norton trumps that with Ali.
People keep saying that Norton did do enough beside the Ali fight. OK, what else (at heavyweight) do we have with Charles? I guess you would go with Elmer Ray, then maybe Rex Layne or a way over the hill Louis. Norton beat Young and Quarry.

Norton got ko'd early in his career by Garcia, and also got blown out by Foreman and Shavers. Those should be counted against him to a certain extent.
However the close losses to Ali and Holmes boost his stock if anything.

Losses? Charles lost to Marciano twice, Walcott twice. Nothing embarrassing there. He also lost to Valdes and Layne, whom he should have beat. Not exactly embarrassing, but a great heavyweight really should have beaten Johnson.

Charles and Norton are about as close as you can can get.

Schmeling and Walcott has similar results as well.

Think we need to put buster Douglas up high in your list then based on the reasoning of one good win over an all time great secures your greatness. And Michael spinks.

Ambling Alp II wrote:Vitaly's cut against Lewis. A cut counts. It's not an legit excuse. It's part of not having a good defense. Fighters who have good defenses get cut a lot less than those that don't.

there was never a heavy weight title bout with
so tall and heavy athletes and they decided to
slug it out. no surprise someone got cut. i am
not disputing the loss was legit, i dispute that
it was a landslide victory of a washed out champ.

Ambling Alp II wrote:A great fighter would have knocked Lewis out within 6 rounds before he got stopped by the cut anyway.

maybe, maybe not.

Ambling Alp II wrote:You think it was a good career move for Vitaly to quit against Byrd? OK, if you want to argue that fine, though I disagree. However, you have to take the downside... He lost. It happened. It counts.

i don't think it was a goof career move, i do
think it was not as terrible as his critics pretend
it was.

Ambling Alp II wrote:Wladimir gassed out against Purrity? Shows poor stamina. That's part of boxing. He lost. It counts.

shows a stupid overambitious unexperienced
boxer who didn't know that some people you
can't knock out. i don't have excuses for his
losses against brewster and sanders, but purrity
is a stupid glitch, nothing else.

Ambling Alp II wrote:Cuts counts. Quitting counts. Getting gassed out counts.

yes, they count. obviously. but not to the extent
haters propagate.

I rank the great Ezzard Charles over Ken Norton at heavyweight. His accomplishments at heavyweight was superior than Ken Norton.

Charles beat the great Joe Louis. It was his greatest accomplishment by being universally recognized as The Real Heavyweight Champion of the World. He made 9 world title defenses. He beat 4 HOFs at heavyweight: W15 Joe Louis, W15 Jersey Joe Walcott, W15 Joey Maxim, and W10 Jimmy Bivins (last fight). He also at heavyweight got good wins over Elmer Ray ( WKO9) in their second meeting, WTKO7 Gus Lesnevich, WTKO11 Rex Layne, and WKO2 Bob Satterfield. We could say that among his wins, the Louis fight was when The Brown Bomber was out of his prime, but, still a great win. Between 1947 to 1951, Charles won 17 straight fights at heavyweight.

Ken Norton, in my view, beat the great Muhammad Ali 3 times. He also has other good wins over Jerry Quarry, Duane Bobick and Jimmy Young. Besides that, I don't see other great wins. In his first title defense as the WBC World Heavyweight Champion, he lost to the great Larry Holmes. We could say that Ali was not in his prime, but, a win over Ali post exile is better than a win by Charles over an out of prime Louis. But, Charles became the real and universally recognized worldwide champion. Charles was a better heavyweight.

I think Ken Norton and Max Schmeling are in the neck to neck in rankings. J give Schmeling the edge, though. Both to me are in the 20-30 range, maybe 20-25 range.

elmersalsa wrote:I think Ken Norton and Max Schmeling are in the neck to neck in rankings. J give Schmeling the edge, though. Both to me are in the 20-30 range, maybe 20-25 range.

please tell me your arguments for schmeling.
i am not cynical here, i really don't see it.

man wrote:

Ambling Alp II wrote:Vitaly's cut against Lewis. A cut counts. It's not an legit excuse. It's part of not having a good defense. Fighters who have good defenses get cut a lot less than those that don't.

there was never a heavy weight title bout with
so tall and heavy athletes and they decided to
slug it out. no surprise someone got cut. i am
not disputing the loss was legit, i dispute that
it was a landslide victory of a washed out champ.

Ambling Alp II wrote:A great fighter would have knocked Lewis out within 6 rounds before he got stopped by the cut anyway.

maybe, maybe not.

Ambling Alp II wrote:You think it was a good career move for Vitaly to quit against Byrd? OK, if you want to argue that fine, though I disagree. However, you have to take the downside... He lost. It happened. It counts.

i don't think it was a goof career move, i do
think it was not as terrible as his critics pretend
it was.

Ambling Alp II wrote:Wladimir gassed out against Purrity? Shows poor stamina. That's part of boxing. He lost. It counts.

shows a stupid overambitious unexperienced
boxer who didn't know that some people you
can't knock out. i don't have excuses for his
losses against brewster and sanders, but purrity
is a stupid glitch, nothing else.

Ambling Alp II wrote:Cuts counts. Quitting counts. Getting gassed out counts.

yes, they count. obviously. but not to the extent
haters propagate.

The Lewis loss wasn't a landslide; not saying that. Just a fight that a really good fight wins and great fighter wins easily.

The Purrity loss counts. Losses count. Whether its because of a knockout, decision, cuts, quitting, "gassed out", whatever it all counts. You do have to factor in the competitiveness of the fight and how good the opponent was at the time of the fight. However, if you want to be accurate, you can't just dismiss losses with the dog ate my homework excuses.

elmersalsa wrote:I rank the great Ezzard Charles over Ken Norton at heavyweight. His accomplishments at heavyweight was superior than Ken Norton.

Charles beat the great Joe Louis. It was his greatest accomplishment by being universally recognized as The Real Heavyweight Champion of the World. He made 9 world title defenses. He beat 4 HOFs at heavyweight: W15 Joe Louis, W15 Jersey Joe Walcott, W15 Joey Maxim, and W10 Jimmy Bivins (last fight). He also at heavyweight got good wins over Elmer Ray ( WKO9) in their second meeting, WTKO7 Gus Lesnevich, WTKO11 Rex Layne, and WKO2 Bob Satterfield. We could say that among his wins, the Louis fight was when The Brown Bomber was out of his prime, but, still a great win. Between 1947 to 1951, Charles won 17 straight fights at heavyweight.

Ken Norton, in my view, beat the great Muhammad Ali 3 times. He also has other good wins over Jerry Quarry, Duane Bobick and Jimmy Young. Besides that, I don't see other great wins. In his first title defense as the WBC World Heavyweight Champion, he lost to the great Larry Holmes. We could say that Ali was not in his prime, but, a win over Ali post exile is better than a win by Charles over an out of prime Louis. But, Charles became the real and universally recognized worldwide champion. Charles was a better heavyweight.

Charles really has only one heavyweight opponent that he beat that was still great at the time he beat them.
Louis was way past his best when Charles beat him and was no longer a great fighter.
Bivins was past his best and was losing as much as he was winning when Charles beat him the last time.
Maxim was never a great heavyweight.
Charles did beat Walcott twice. However, Norton beating Ali is a much bigger deal.

Charles did have wins over Lesnevich, Layne and Satterfield. I guess you could call them nice wins but nothing more. Beating Quarry, Young, is much more impressive.

evrenb wrote:

Ambling Alp II wrote:

Ezzard wrote:Charles

Then I'm not sure. Not much in it.

Once you get past about #20 you can make a case for so many of them.

I think you can certainly make a decent argument that Norton was better than Charles.
Charles best wins? 2 against Walcott. Certainly nothing to sneeze at. However, Norton trumps that with Ali.
People keep saying that Norton did do enough beside the Ali fight. OK, what else (at heavyweight) do we have with Charles? I guess you would go with Elmer Ray, then maybe Rex Layne or a way over the hill Louis. Norton beat Young and Quarry.

Norton got ko'd early in his career by Garcia, and also got blown out by Foreman and Shavers. Those should be counted against him to a certain extent.
However the close losses to Ali and Holmes boost his stock if anything.

Losses? Charles lost to Marciano twice, Walcott twice. Nothing embarrassing there. He also lost to Valdes and Layne, whom he should have beat. Not exactly embarrassing, but a great heavyweight really should have beaten Johnson.

Charles and Norton are about as close as you can can get.

Schmeling and Walcott has similar results as well.

Think we need to put buster Douglas up high in your list then based on the reasoning of one good win over an all time great secures your greatness. And Michael spinks.

Not at all.
As I pointed out Norton was much more than a one-hit wonder. He beat Quarry and Young. Spinks and Douglas next best wins aren't nearly as good.
Norton also gave Ali two other close fights.
Norton gave a prime Larry Holmes all he could handle in a great fight. It was the closet fight Holmes had in his prime. How many other guys could have done that? A dozen maybe?

Charles' 4th fight with Walcott is widely regarded as one of the worst decisions in heavyweight championship history.

I think you can certainly make a decent argument that Norton was better than Charles.
Charles best wins? 2 against Walcott. Certainly nothing to sneeze at. However, Norton trumps that with Ali.
People keep saying that Norton did do enough beside the Ali fight. OK, what else (at heavyweight) do we have with Charles? I guess you would go with Elmer Ray, then maybe Rex Layne or a way over the hill Louis. Norton beat Young and Quarry.

Norton got ko'd early in his career by Garcia, and also got blown out by Foreman and Shavers. Those should be counted against him to a certain extent.
However the close losses to Ali and Holmes boost his stock if anything.

Losses? Charles lost to Marciano twice, Walcott twice. Nothing embarrassing there. He also lost to Valdes and Layne, whom he should have beat. Not exactly embarrassing, but a great heavyweight really should have beaten Johnson.

Charles and Norton are about as close as you can can get.

Schmeling and Walcott has similar results as well.[/quote]

Think we need to put buster Douglas up high in your list then based on the reasoning of one good win over an all time great secures your greatness. And Michael spinks.[/quote]

Not at all.
As I pointed out Norton was much more than a one-hit wonder. He beat Quarry and Young. Spinks and Douglas next best wins aren't nearly as good.
Norton also gave Ali two other close fights.
Norton gave a prime Larry Holmes all he could handle in a great fight. It was the closet fight Holmes had in his prime. How many other guys could have done that? A dozen maybe?[/quote]

I disagree...you could make arguments all day long to suit your favour.

Ambling Alp II wrote:

elmersalsa wrote:I rank the great Ezzard Charles over Ken Norton at heavyweight. His accomplishments at heavyweight was superior than Ken Norton.

Charles beat the great Joe Louis. It was his greatest accomplishment by being universally recognized as The Real Heavyweight Champion of the World. He made 9 world title defenses. He beat 4 HOFs at heavyweight: W15 Joe Louis, W15 Jersey Joe Walcott, W15 Joey Maxim, and W10 Jimmy Bivins (last fight). He also at heavyweight got good wins over Elmer Ray ( WKO9) in their second meeting, WTKO7 Gus Lesnevich, WTKO11 Rex Layne, and WKO2 Bob Satterfield. We could say that among his wins, the Louis fight was when The Brown Bomber was out of his prime, but, still a great win. Between 1947 to 1951, Charles won 17 straight fights at heavyweight.

Ken Norton, in my view, beat the great Muhammad Ali 3 times. He also has other good wins over Jerry Quarry, Duane Bobick and Jimmy Young. Besides that, I don't see other great wins. In his first title defense as the WBC World Heavyweight Champion, he lost to the great Larry Holmes. We could say that Ali was not in his prime, but, a win over Ali post exile is better than a win by Charles over an out of prime Louis. But, Charles became the real and universally recognized worldwide champion. Charles was a better heavyweight.

Charles really has only one heavyweight opponent that he beat that was still great at the time he beat them.
Louis was way past his best when Charles beat him and was no longer a great fighter.
Bivins was past his best and was losing as much as he was winning when Charles beat him the last time.
Maxim was never a great heavyweight.
Charles did beat Walcott twice. However, Norton beating Ali is a much bigger deal.

Charles did have wins over Lesnevich, Layne and Satterfield. I guess you could call them nice wins but nothing more. Beating Quarry, Young, is much more impressive.

Charles achieved much more at heavyweight. We could say that beating Ali was better than a out of prime Louis, but, but, we forgot the significance of the situation. Charles made 9 world title defenses. Norton lost it in his first title defense.

elmersalsa wrote:

Ambling Alp II wrote:

elmersalsa wrote:I rank the great Ezzard Charles over Ken Norton at heavyweight. His accomplishments at heavyweight was superior than Ken Norton.

Charles beat the great Joe Louis. It was his greatest accomplishment by being universally recognized as The Real Heavyweight Champion of the World. He made 9 world title defenses. He beat 4 HOFs at heavyweight: W15 Joe Louis, W15 Jersey Joe Walcott, W15 Joey Maxim, and W10 Jimmy Bivins (last fight). He also at heavyweight got good wins over Elmer Ray ( WKO9) in their second meeting, WTKO7 Gus Lesnevich, WTKO11 Rex Layne, and WKO2 Bob Satterfield. We could say that among his wins, the Louis fight was when The Brown Bomber was out of his prime, but, still a great win. Between 1947 to 1951, Charles won 17 straight fights at heavyweight.

Ken Norton, in my view, beat the great Muhammad Ali 3 times. He also has other good wins over Jerry Quarry, Duane Bobick and Jimmy Young. Besides that, I don't see other great wins. In his first title defense as the WBC World Heavyweight Champion, he lost to the great Larry Holmes. We could say that Ali was not in his prime, but, a win over Ali post exile is better than a win by Charles over an out of prime Louis. But, Charles became the real and universally recognized worldwide champion. Charles was a better heavyweight.

Charles really has only one heavyweight opponent that he beat that was still great at the time he beat them.
Louis was way past his best when Charles beat him and was no longer a great fighter.
Bivins was past his best and was losing as much as he was winning when Charles beat him the last time.
Maxim was never a great heavyweight.
Charles did beat Walcott twice. However, Norton beating Ali is a much bigger deal.

Charles did have wins over Lesnevich, Layne and Satterfield. I guess you could call them nice wins but nothing more. Beating Quarry, Young, is much more impressive.

Charles achieved much more at heavyweight. We could say that beating Ali was better than a out of prime Louis, but, but, we forgot the significance of the situation. Charles made 9 world title defenses. Norton lost it in his first title defense.

Yet another example of why the sheer number of title defenses is not important. You have to look at who the title defenses were against.

Tommy Burns had 11. Should we rank burns higher than both of them?

Louis was done. It would not have taken that good of a fighter to beat him at that stage.
9 title defenses? Actually there were eight. All but one of them were against people Norton (or any really good heavyweight) would have had won fairly easily.
Yes Norton lost to Holmes. so would Charles. Would Charles have been so competitive? Maybe, maybe not.

evrenb wrote:I think you can certainly make a decent argument that Norton was better than Charles.
Charles best wins? 2 against Walcott. Certainly nothing to sneeze at. However, Norton trumps that with Ali.
People keep saying that Norton did do enough beside the Ali fight. OK, what else (at heavyweight) do we have with Charles? I guess you would go with Elmer Ray, then maybe Rex Layne or a way over the hill Louis. Norton beat Young and Quarry.

Norton got ko'd early in his career by Garcia, and also got blown out by Foreman and Shavers. Those should be counted against him to a certain extent.
However the close losses to Ali and Holmes boost his stock if anything.

Losses? Charles lost to Marciano twice, Walcott twice. Nothing embarrassing there. He also lost to Valdes and Layne, whom he should have beat. Not exactly embarrassing, but a great heavyweight really should have beaten Johnson.

Charles and Norton are about as close as you can can get.

Schmeling and Walcott has similar results as well.

Think we need to put buster Douglas up high in your list then based on the reasoning of one good win over an all time great secures your greatness. And Michael spinks.[/quote]

Not at all.
As I pointed out Norton was much more than a one-hit wonder. He beat Quarry and Young. Spinks and Douglas next best wins aren't nearly as good.
Norton also gave Ali two other close fights.
Norton gave a prime Larry Holmes all he could handle in a great fight. It was the closet fight Holmes had in his prime. How many other guys could have done that? A dozen maybe?[/quote]

I disagree...you could make arguments all day long to suit your favour.[/quote]

I have heard snappier comebacks from a bowl of Rice Krispies.
I don't like Norton more than I do Charles, or Spinks or Douglas or most of the guys we are talking about. I am comparing what Norton and others have done and am comparing them to one another.