BoxRec

Which 5 professional boxers do you think are underrated? Why?



Which 5 pro boxers do you think are overrated? Why?



Please explain.

Underrated

Mike O'Dowd- Sterling record, rarely see him on a Middleweight top 20.

Kid Gavilan- I think he approaches top 10 all time and I never see him rated there.

Eddie Booker- He had just hit his prime when the eye forced his retirement.

Newsboy Brown- He has a case for top 3 Flyweight, far superior resume to Wilde who is the defacto top guy there

Baby Arizmendi- He has incredible wins and some great draws and losses, light punching feather competitive all the way up to Welter.


Overrated

Vitali klitschko- the only fighter I can think of that is acclaimed for getting his ass whipped. He faced weak opposition in a weak era.

Ricardo lopez- Brilliant fighter, but I see him atop greatest Mexican fighters lists and he doesn't have the resume for top 10.

Julio Cesar Chavez- Nobody rates shit, great fighter but he never beat a great fighter.

Mike McCallum- he's been called underrated for so long it's a flipped script. the mythical ducking of him from the fab 4 is outrageous.

Pascual Perez- His ledger is nowhere near where he's rated. The perfect example of the flawed methodology of rating fighters careers based on whom you think would win. Jimmy Wilde is another one.

SaadOffTheDeck wrote: ↑06 Nov 2017, 04:49......


Overrated

Vitali klitschko- the only fighter I can think of that is acclaimed for getting his ass whipped. He faced weak opposition in a weak era.

Ricardo lopez- Brilliant fighter, but I see him atop greatest Mexican fighters lists and he doesn't have the resume for top 10.

Julio Cesar Chavez- Nobody rates poo, great fighter but he never beat a great fighter.

Mike McCallum- he's been called underrated for so long it's a flipped script. the mythical ducking of him from the fab 4 is outrageous.

Pascual Perez- His ledger is nowhere near where he's rated. The perfect example of the flawed methodology of rating fighters careers based on whom you think would win. Jimmy Wilde is another one.

Amazing how we all see things so differently. I'd have had Ricardo Lopez in the underrated category.

Duran was a great fighter at lower weights but at the weights he would have fought McCallum (154 and 160) he was clearly worse than McCallum and ducking would make sense. You wouldn't pick Duran to beat Lennox Lewis at heavyweight I assume despite being better lb for lb. This is the same idea just less extreme.

Upon further reflection I think McCallum is overrated--he lacks a knockout loss in his prime to Iran Barkley and that is clearly a prerequisite for greatness. It's too bad the fight was never made.

I also think Wilde is overrated.

McAllum is overrated on these forums. Marciano is underrated now after being overrated lol.

quote=SaadOffTheDeck post_id=4792821 time=1509958197 user_id=21688]
Underrated

Mike O'Dowd- Sterling record, rarely see him on a Middleweight top 20.

Kid Gavilan- I think he approaches top 10 all time and I never see him rated there.

Eddie Booker- He had just hit his prime when the eye forced his retirement.

Newsboy Brown- He has a case for top 3 Flyweight, far superior resume to Wilde who is the defacto top guy there

Baby Arizmendi- He has incredible wins and some great draws and losses, light punching feather competitive all the way up to Welter.


Overrated

Vitali klitschko- the only fighter I can think of that is acclaimed for getting his ass whipped. He faced weak opposition in a weak era.

Ricardo lopez- Brilliant fighter, but I see him atop greatest Mexican fighters lists and he doesn't have the resume for top 10.

Julio Cesar Chavez- Nobody rates poo, great fighter but he never beat a great fighter.

Mike McCallum- he's been called underrated for so long it's a flipped script. the mythical ducking of him from the fab 4 is outrageous.

Pascual Perez- His ledger is nowhere near where he's rated. The perfect example of the flawed methodology of rating fighters careers based on whom you think would win. Jimmy Wilde is another one.
[/quote]

Underrated:

Max Baer - he had crazy power and fantastic stamina. His boxing skills were average but nature talent allowed to destroy many fighters. He get psychological injury because of killing a man in the ring and he was afraid of beating at his full capacity. After getting the belt he changed his life and stopped training as earlier. And he got both hands injuries. Despite all these problems he stayed a dangerous opponent for a long time. In my opinion, he is the most underrated fighter who hadn't reached his full potential. Prime Max Baer had a strong chances to beat everyone.

Buddy Baer - skilled boxer with huge power and size. He'd been in Joe Louis and Max Baer shadow. He would've been a competitive fighter in any time.

Michael Spinks - flawless technique, attack and defence. Rational moving, excellent tactics. He seems like one of the most skilled fighters ever but he many people remember him as just a man who was smashed by prime Tyson.

Jimmy Ellis - his style was used later by Lennox Lewis and Tony Tucker. Viscous and slick boxer. He is like water. He can change style depending on opponent. Excellent infighting, great jab. Jimmy had all the chances to become a champ but in his time competition was too hard.

Jimmy Bivins - speed, technique and versatility. He could've got more fame and recognition but his epoch was unknown. It was a shady time in boxing.

Overrated:

Mike Tyson - great boxer but too overrated. In his prime the division didn't have high level fighters. There was Trevor Berbick but he was not such a skilled fighter. There were Larry Holmes and Michael Spinks but they were unprepared. Larry in 90th was more prepared fighter. I think Mike Tyson got in lucky time.

Floyd Mayweather - he beat many tough fighters. But he has some controversal wins and he picked the time when his opponents past their prime. Post-prime ODLH gave him tough fight. It seems for me like draw or even MD win for Oscar. I don't see Floyd is favorite against prime ODLH, Ike Quartey, Felix Trinidad, Eric Morales and MAB.

Lennox Lewis - great opposition but has some questions. He has even fights against post-prime Evander Holyfield. It seems like young Evander would've won him. Also, I don't see how he beats prime Riddick Bowe. He is one of the best but he is not absolute dominator.

Wlad Klitschko - I think the time He dominated was too weak. His level is high but I don't remember any guy with real champ level in his opposition.

Hasim Rahman - slowness in hands. His attacks are visible and predictable. He is lucky to beat out of shaped Lewis and old Berbick. Hasim Rahman is quite well boxer but his championship is luck.

Some Brits for you....

Randy Turpin
John H Stracey
Colin Jones
Steve Robinson
Carl Thompson

Turpin in particular tends to get solely defined by his two fights with Sugar Ray and his huge win over Ray is sometimes dismissed as a bad night at the office by Robinson at the end of a long European tour. The fact that Turpin would go on to retake the European crown against Humez, beat a future HW contender like Cockell and lift titles at LHW tends to all get forgotten. He would give Olson and Mitri hard fights well after his Robinson wins.

Stracey is the other one for me....that absolutely huge win in Mexico just seems to have been half-forgotten

Bodyshot3 wrote: ↑07 Nov 2017, 15:50 Some Brits for you....

Randy Turpin
John H Stracey
Colin Jones
Steve Robinson
Carl Thompson

Turpin in particular tends to get solely defined by his two fights with Sugar Ray and his huge win over Ray is sometimes dismissed as a bad night at the office by Robinson at the end of a long European tour. The fact that Turpin would go on to retake the European crown against Humez, beat a future HW contender like Cockell and lift titles at LHW tends to all get forgotten. He would give Olson and Mitri hard fights well after his Robinson wins.

Stracey is the other one for me....that absolutely huge win in Mexico just seems to have been half-forgotten

Some good names. Stracey probably gets forgotten because Napoles was going on 36 and looked shot after the first round of that fight in Mexico City, and then Stracey got KO'd six months later by Palomino, so those outside of the UK see him as a one-hit wonder.
Colin Jones was one of those boxers who, if he'd fought in the 2000s or 2010s, would probably have won one of the alphabet belts and made a lot of money. Fun fighter to watch

NYDominican wrote: ↑06 Nov 2017, 02:12 Which 5 professional boxers do you think are underrated? Why? ... Which 5 pro boxers do you think are overrated? Why?

Vitali Klitschko is the most underrated fighter ever. He was 3 X Heavyweight Champion. He was never knocked down and was winning on points after EVERY fight he ever fought. He lost 2 fights due to injury and 1 of those should have gone to the scorecards. All 6 judges in his 2 losses were unanimous in having Vitali winning those fights when they were stopped – so he was never outboxed or outpunched in his life, but stopped on cuts caused by fouls in one fight and suffered a completely severed rotator cuff in the other when he was way ahead on points.

Eder Jofre became underrated by losing to Fighting Harada in Japan. But Harada is the only man to ever beat Jofre in 78 fights. Jofre had trouble making the weight for both fights and didn’t feel right, which only happened to him in Japan. He felt so weak after the rematch he took more than 3-years off of his career. He intended to retire for good, but felt real good after 3 years of rest and launched a comeback at 33. He won the World Featherweight Title from Jose Legra at 37 and retired at 40 after going undefeated for all 25 fights after launching his comeback. Jofre was ahead in the scoring in all 4 of his draws. He was a victim of the Brazilian scoring system of the period – where you had to defeat your opponent by at least 4 points on 2 judges' cards or it was a draw.

Rodolfo Gonzalez is unheard from in discussions of great fighters. He also lost twice in Japan – to Guts Ishimatsu – when he had massive trouble making weight. He said when he lost the title he felt so weak he could barely step into the ring or get off the stool each round. He did NO warm up before the fight because he couldn’t. His energy was so low he could barely stand. He thought he would get knocked out in the 1st round but he took a bad beating first. After the rematch he quit Boxing at a very young age for lack of energy. He felt bad for years but finally got his energy back years later. He was not the greatest boxer but he could hit. He was a threat to anyone.

Salvador Sanchez lost only 1 of 46 fights, the loss coming when he was 18-0. He never lost any title fights and destroyed ATG Wilfredo Gomez, who was undefeated in 33 previous fights, and he won all 10 of his World Featherweight Title Fights. He also beat number 1 ranked Ruben Castillo, 47-1, in one of the greatest fights ever fought.

Bernard Hopkins is well respected, but you don’t hear him mentioned as maybe the best Middleweight ever. He had 20 straight Middleweight Title Defenses which is the record. He won the Light Heavyweight Title at 41 – after which he went on to beat 5 more Light Heavyweight Champions – retiring at age 51 with 6 of his 8 losses coming after age 40.

Overrated were: Ali who got hit too much... Hearns who got hit too much... Robinson who got hit too much... Marciano who never fought any good prime Heavyweight, so his undefeated record is a joke... and Hagler who was fairly easy to hit and never faced any natural Middleweights with the boxing skills of a Monzon, Valdez, Nunn, McCallum, Toney, Jones, Hopkins, Golovkin, etc.

Trivia question:
What do Benitez, Duran, Hearns, and Hagler all have in common?

Ambling Alp II wrote: ↑09 Nov 2017, 11:40 Trivia question:
What do Benitez, Duran, Hearns, and Hagler all have in common?

Counter-puncher wrote: ↑09 Nov 2017, 12:16

Ambling Alp II wrote: ↑09 Nov 2017, 11:40 Trivia question:
What do Benitez, Duran, Hearns, and Hagler all have in common?

Ambling Alp II wrote: ↑09 Nov 2017, 11:40 Trivia question:
What do Benitez, Duran, Hearns, and Hagler all have in common?

They all ducked Mike McCallum?

Ambling Alp II wrote: ↑09 Nov 2017, 11:40 Trivia question:
What do Benitez, Duran, Hearns, and Hagler all have in common?

They've all lost to Sugar Ray Leonard

Ambling Alp II wrote: ↑09 Nov 2017, 11:40 Trivia question:
What do Benitez, Duran, Hearns, and Hagler all have in common?

They were all professional boxers, North Americans,World Champions, racial minorities, and had about 100 other items in common.. They didn't have in common beating Leonard...though some fans argue 3 of them beat Ray.. I don't agree with that, but 2 of them certainly beat him..

But I don't agree that Leonard is overrated. He was a tremendous boxer and puncher. I loved the Benitez fight cuz Benitez IS WAY overrated. Any real good boxer with a slick left jab and quick and accurate straight right was going to get him. Leonard lined him up for the jab especially well.

SaadOffTheDeck wrote: ↑09 Nov 2017, 16:54

Ambling Alp II wrote: ↑09 Nov 2017, 11:40 Trivia question:
What do Benitez, Duran, Hearns, and Hagler all have in common?

They all ducked Mike McCallum?

They all lost to Leonard

Underrated:

Frankie Genaro - Similar reason to Newsboy Brown, Genaro's record is a who's who of arguably the best/deepest flyweight era. Unlucky not to have won the title atleast once.

Tony DeMarco - Never really gets mentioned among the WW greats, but would give most of them hell on any given night. Finesse wasnt exactly in his repotoire but had the heart of an Ox, could punch like a mule kicks, not the kind of guy you would want to face if you were lacking in ticker.

Freddie Dawson - Fantastic boxer/puncher who was one of the best LWs of his era. Despite the record, he seems to have been on the receiving end of some dubious decisions in 3 of the 4 of his fights with Ike Williams. Finding it hard to land big fights, Dawson had a few stints in Australia where he cleaned up every top LW and WW.

Jimmy Leto - Forgotten fighter from a great era that amassed an impressive record. Was apparently well respected and a tough prospect for anyone he fought, probably deserved atleast one crack at the title.