BoxRec

I think every popular fighter was overrated atleast a little bit, so Terap going nuts over Ali hype... and Jaclem and Controversial going nuts over Marciano hype just doesn't make sense.

If you can think of some popular fan favorites that weren't over rated, please name them.

Tantum wrote:I think every popular fighter was overrated atleast a little bit, so Terap going nuts over Ali hype... and Jaclem and Controversial going nuts over Marciano hype just doesn't make sense.

If you can think of some popular fan favorites that weren't over rated, please name them.

Max Schmeling was underrated. The reason is, that for the americans he's a foreigner.

Some days ago i read an opinion, that he even did not belong into the hall of fame, because he lost too much important fights in his prime.

Hmmm......i think that's not realy the truth. Maxie lost 10 fights in his entire career. two of them after ww2, four of them until 1928, before his american career even started.
okay...so here are 4 defeats in his prime left. 3 came against comming or reigning (undisputed !) world heavyweight champions (Jack Sharkey 1932, where the verdict was very controversal; Max Baer 1933, Schmelings worst fight of his entire career, and Joe Louis 1938, a fight with very special circumstances). the point-defeat against Steve Hamas, shortly after the Baer-desaster, was forgotten the following year, when Max knocked him out easily.
then you must see, that most of his big fights where "away-matches" for him, far away from his home.
If you now consider his big wins: Johnny Risco (first to knock him out), Paolino Uzcudun, Young Stribling (first to knock him out), Mickey Walker, Walter Neusel (ranked 3 that time !), Joe Louis (no more comment necessary) and Harry Thomas (both first time knocked out by Maxie).
......what do you think ?

...My, as a german fellow, (natural subjective) opinion is, that if Maxie would have been an American or would have had become one of your country, he would be mentioned like the names of Dempsey, Louis, Marciano, Ali and Tyson......

greetings from bonn, Germany
friedie

ps: even after the second Louis fight Max recovered, winning the european heavyweight championship one year later by a first round k.o. against heuser.....a third match with Joe Louis did not happen only because of ww2.

Not all were overrated.

Max Schmeling was a Fan Favorite??

I said Fan Favorites.

Tantum wrote:Max Schmeling was a Fan Favorite??

I said Fan Favorites.

no....he IS still one !!!

(besides he was one in america and he's still one in europe....)

Max Schmeling has a huge fan base?


I meant fighters like....

Ali, Louis, Marciano, Frazier, Foreman, Robinson, Leonard, Hearns, Hagler, Duran, Pryor, Arguello, Chavez, etc...

I wasn't sure which one to vote for(definitely not the 3rd option, though). I'm thinking, if every popular fighter is overrated, are they really that overrated? I mean, it's sort of like, if everyone suddenly grew to 6'5", would a 6'5" person still be tall? If they're all equally overrated(although I don't believe that), then they should rank about where they should... unless you're saying that the less popular ones should rank among the popular ones but don't get to due to their lack of popularity..
Well, the fact is, we can never know or even strongly define the term 'overrated' when applying it to fighters.

Tantum wrote:Max Schmeling has a huge fan base?


I meant fighters like....

Ali, Louis, Marciano, Frazier, Foreman, Robinson, Leonard, Hearns, Hagler, Duran, Pryor, Arguello, Chavez, etc...

Sorry....it seems you realy don't understand me......Max Schmeling HAS indeed a huge fan base. he is germanys sportsman of the 20th century, before names as Beckenbauer and Boris Becker.......probably he's the best european boxer of all times......

See, if you ask someone here in Europe about fighters, o.k., they know Ali, Louis, Foreman and Tyson....but Pryor ??? Arguello ??? who's that ?

this is an international, not an american boxing site, isn't it ?

it's like the sport of soccer.....for the us-americans it's just a sport....for the rest of the world it is THE sport no. 1..........




the girl 's nice

I think Schmeling doesn't get the credit he deserves because everyone has heard it: "Max Schmeling is the only boxer in history to ever win the world heavyweight championship on a foul."

And then later on, Louis destroyed him in the rematch.

People forget that he and Louis are still squared at one win each, that Schmeling was beating Sharkey in the "foul" fight, and that he lost the title to Sharkey on a lousy decision. And yes, he remained a world-class fighter even after the loss to Louis, and probably would have gotten a rubber match if the Fuhrer had behaved himself. He was the German and European champ when the war started.

In the fights after the war, he was just trying to make some money by cashing in on his name.

It's pretty hard to overate guys like Robinson and Louis but I guess everybody is overrated by someone. It's an interesting thought anyway.

tomato can wrote:It's pretty hard to overate guys like Robinson and Louis but I guess everybody is overrated by someone. It's an interesting thought anyway.

i agree 100% with the can.

jsc1973 wrote:I think Schmeling doesn't get the credit he deserves because everyone has heard it: "Max Schmeling is the only boxer in history to ever win the world heavyweight championship on a foul."

And then later on, Louis destroyed him in the rematch.

People forget that he and Louis are still squared at one win each, that Schmeling was beating Sharkey in the "foul" fight, and that he lost the title to Sharkey on a lousy decision. And yes, he remained a world-class fighter even after the loss to Louis, and probably would have gotten a rubber match if the Fuhrer had behaved himself. He was the German and European champ when the war started.

In the fights after the war, he was just trying to make some money by cashing in on his name.

Yes, Schmeling went 1 and 1 with Louis, but his first fight with Louis, Schmeling just came in with a good, effective game plan(which I give him credit for) and carried it out to wear Louis down for a late stoppage. In the rematch, with the way Louis utterly wasted him, do you think Schmeling was really 'even' with Louis, or would've had any serious chance in a 3rd fight?
Don't get me wrong, I do think Schmeling was underrated, and was a great fighter, but I think it's pretty clear Louis got the better of their meetings.

Marciano Frazier wrote:

jsc1973 wrote:I think Schmeling doesn't get the credit he deserves because everyone has heard it: "Max Schmeling is the only boxer in history to ever win the world heavyweight championship on a foul."

And then later on, Louis destroyed him in the rematch.

People forget that he and Louis are still squared at one win each, that Schmeling was beating Sharkey in the "foul" fight, and that he lost the title to Sharkey on a lousy decision. And yes, he remained a world-class fighter even after the loss to Louis, and probably would have gotten a rubber match if the Fuhrer had behaved himself. He was the German and European champ when the war started.

In the fights after the war, he was just trying to make some money by cashing in on his name.

Yes, Schmeling went 1 and 1 with Louis, but his first fight with Louis, Schmeling just came in with a good, effective game plan(which I give him credit for) and carried it out to wear Louis down for a late stoppage. In the rematch, with the way Louis utterly wasted him, do you think Schmeling was really 'even' with Louis, or would've had any serious chance in a 3rd fight?
Don't get me wrong, I do think Schmeling was underrated, and was a great fighter, but I think it's pretty clear Louis got the better of their meetings.

Agreed, i think a third fight may have gone as far as the second round.

Schmelling did extremely well in the first fight, he had a good plan and stuck to it.

In the second i feel Louis was a much better fighter and it showned, and i could not see a third fight going any other way that a Louis KO

terap wrote:Schmeling beat Louis completely---and methodically---in their first fight.

And he did that with the referee, Arthur Donavan, never once warning Louis (who was fighting on instinct for most of the fight after Schmeling knocked him down in an early round) for repeated low blows.

Schmeling beat Louis thoroughly in that fight.
And he beat a great, great fighter.

By the time of the second fight Schmeling was downhill---and Louis was not.
The second Schmeling fight was Louis' greatest performance.

The first fight of the two was the ONLY fight Louis lost while he was really Joe Louis.
What Schmeling did there was remarkable.

The two are even.

Any attempt to make nothing of Schmeling's beating of Louis shows ignorance and worse.

I WAS NOT trying to make nothing of Schmeling's defeating Louis. I was simply saying they aren't even, with the way Louis blew Schmeling away in the rematch. Schmeling put up a masterful display of a great game plan, exploiting Louis' technical flaws to the greatest he was capable of, but he never blew Louis away like Louis destroyed him in their rematch. It's sort of like, are Lewis and Rahman even? Because Rahman KO'd Lewis in 5 in a fight he wasn't dominating at all, and then in the rematch, Lewis completely dominated him and KO'd him in 4. I would say that Lewis has the edge overall in his fights with Rahman, despite the fact that they went 1 and 1.

"I was simply saying they aren't even, with the way Louis blew Schmeling away in the rematch. Schmeling put up a masterful display of a great game plan, exploiting Louis' technical flaws to the greatest he was capable of, but he never blew Louis away like Louis destroyed him in their rematch. It's sort of like, are Lewis and Rahman even? Because Rahman KO'd Lewis in 5 in a fight he wasn't dominating at all, and then in the rematch, Lewis completely dominated him and KO'd him in 4. I would say that Lewis has the edge overall in his fights with Rahman, despite the fact that they went 1 and 1"

some facts to think about...in the rematch Schmeling was injured badly by a blow into his back....(wich was no foul of cause, Schmeling just turned around the wrong time !!!) ...but Max was not realy unconscous after the fight (he was nearly standing on his feet, when the fight was stopped and remembered all of it.

so if you want to compare the two fights.....



if there would have been a third fight nobody knows. i think taken place in america louis would have been favorite (in germany it would have been much harder for him). if schmeling as a slow starter overlived the early rounds he would have had at least a chance to beat joe again.....

both boxers were of outstanding class in heavyweight history !



to rahman.....it's not a good example....schmeling dominated the first fight with louis, rahman didn't dominate lewis as you said.....

"but his first fight with Louis, Schmeling just came in with a good, effective game plan(which I give him credit for) and carried it out to wear Louis down for a late stoppage. "


why the word "just" ????

that's acting like a real champ ! Like Ali's "game plan" against foreman ?!


...and the best plan is no garantee to beat the best fighter of the world.

terap wrote:Friedie,

Your comments are very good here, I thank you for making us more aware of Schmeling.

Can you tell us what he is doing and what is going on with him at this point in time?

He will be 98 in September.
I know he is a big multimillion dollar businessman in Germany because he has had the Coca-Cola franchise there for many many years.

hi terap,

Max gave his last official interview some years ago. He lives in a good health (for a 97 year old man) at his "gut hollenstedt" near hamburg but you don't hear much of him nowadays. He founded an organisation some years ago to help the poor and young sportsmen and church-organisations(put one million dollar into it !). Sometimes he meets some actual sportsman and boxers like vlad klitschko (cause they want to see him, they use to visit him; in germany it's like "visting the pope" !).

did you read his biographie ? reading it i learned a lot of the past time...the 20ties, 30ties ans 40ties. It's available in english language (amazon....). It's very interesting to look at Schmelings career and his interesting life, meeting personalities as Roosevelt, Clark Gable, Al Capone, Pope Pius, Marlene Dietrich, John D.Rockefeller....and you learn a lot about his conflict with the nazi-regime....

Friedie wrote:

terap wrote:Friedie,

Your comments are very good here, I thank you for making us more aware of Schmeling.

Can you tell us what he is doing and what is going on with him at this point in time?

He will be 98 in September.
I know he is a big multimillion dollar businessman in Germany because he has had the Coca-Cola franchise there for many many years.

hi terap,

Max gave his last official interview some years ago. He lives in a good health (for a 97 year old man) at his "gut hollenstedt" near hamburg but you don't hear much of him nowadays. He founded an organisation some years ago to help the poor and young sportsmen and church-organisations(put one million dollar into it !). Sometimes he meets some actual sportsman and boxers like vlad klitschko (cause they want to see him, they use to visit him; in germany it's like "visting the pope" !).

did you read his biographie ? reading it i learned a lot of the past time...the 20ties, 30ties ans 40ties. It's available in english language (amazon....). It's very interesting to look at Schmelings career and his interesting life, meeting personalities as Roosevelt, Clark Gable, Al Capone, Pope Pius, Marlene Dietrich, John D.Rockefeller....and you learn a lot about his conflict with the nazi-regime....

Great to hear that Max is in good health and is still going.

Thanks for the info.

I can think of one immensely popular British boxer whom, in my opinion, was grossly underrated.

Frank Bruno, who had three failed world title shots before outpointing Oliver McCall in his fourth, was regarded as something of a clown and a gentle giant but was loved by the British media and people. However, few of those who loved him were boxing fans and, consequently, failed to appreciate his abilities.

Let's not forget that he was outboxing Tim Witherspoon in 1986 before being stopped. He fought bravely against Tyson in 1989 before being stopped on his feet in the fifth. He was ahead on the judges cards before being stopped by Lennox Lewis in the seventh round in 1993.

His defining moment came when he decisioned McCall in 1995. No mean feat for any boxer. I only wish he had defended his title successfully at least once before his capitulation to Mike Tyson.

Just what makes a fighter 'overrated' ????

WHO DETERMINES when a fighter is 'overrated' ????

Who actually 'OVERRATES' a fighter???

The modern media is bigger than it ever was before, and it grows every day. (How many TV channels do you get today compared to what you got 20 - 30 years ago?) How many internet sites are devoted to boxing? The internet (as we know it) didn't even exist 11 years ago! Obviously, there is far more coverage than there ever was before, far more articles than ever before, far more OPINIONS than ever before. There are more fights on TV than there ever was before. Hell, for a long time after the old "Friday Night Fights" series was cancelled, the only fights on TV was the occasional fight on "Wide World of Sports". So...the modern fighters get more hype, is it really a surprise, given the size of the modern media?

Is it really a surprise that some of the oldtimers are overlooked...given the fact that the media of their era is dwarfed in comparison to the modern media...not to mention that the people who would have actually seen them fight are now all passed away?...given the fact that many of the greatest fights were not even filmed and some that were have deteriorated due to the poor quality of film...given the fact that the only real information about some of the oldtimers is burried in libraries on microfilmed newspaper articles?

As far as fighters being 'overrated', maybe it's a state of mind...
Nobody, NOBODY can really say for sure that one great fighter would definitely beat another great fighter from another era...it's all really opinion...and so is being 'overrated' or 'underrated'...opinion. You can't really say that anyone is 'overrated' or 'underrated' when comparing them to the all time greats...because nobody (that I know of) has complete and total knowledge of all the boxers who ever fought...

except God...and I don't recall seeing any ratings compiled by Him!