Is Anthony Joshua the worst of the best?

[Kovalev's "Man Bag"]

my pfp lists are my personal opinion created for fun. you don't see me citing pfp listings from this or that source to "prove" how good a particular boxer is.

It doesn't prove how good a particular boxer is it merely reflects the opinions of the list's publisher (collective or independent). The Ring & TBRB rate fighters for a living. It's what they do. They each have an actual ratings panel consisting of qualified individuals, many of which are historians, and well-known journalists in the industry. Hence why fans and fighters themselves discuss their lists and not yours.

 

[brundlefly]

You're really reaching with that first bit. Joshua won an Olympic gold medal. Remember? He was a quick study. Not that it matters considering he's a professional now. BTW those 350 amateur fights also amount to much more wear & tear on Usyk. There was no controversy in any of those fights you just listed. Unless you don't know the rules of boxing and thought that shot by Dubois should've been ruled as a fair blow. There've been lots of similar shots in boxing history that were called low and yet nobody ever had an issue with it. It's at the ref's discretion. Period.

yes, for a guy who started boxing far too late, joshua acomplished some truly amazing things. wilder also won a medal in the olympics and the world HW title despite having started boxing years AFTER joshua. Neither of those guys had any business being anywhere near as successful as they were considering what they had to overcome.

but that's not my point, and you know it. they were still very incomplete fighters BECAUSE of their late start and lacked the foundation to sustain championship level performances because of it.

and as for usyk and his 350 amateur fights, since when does fighting 3 rounds with headgear protection and all kinds of safety precautions cause wear and tear on fighters? in fact what it did was it gave him a safe way to accumlate hundreds and hundreds of rounds of technical skills and experience, while, at the same time, being largerly protected from physical damage. that was a huge advantage he enjoyed over guys, especially older guys, who turned pro after much shorter amateur careers.

 

[brundlefly]

LOL you think that's how this works with the alphabet titles? It doesn't. The reason becoming undisputed is so challenging is because you may have to collect them all one-by-one and then defend against each of your respective mandatories in the process. It's easy to end up getting stripped especially with the IBF. Sorry, Holmes has never been undisputed champion. Take a look at this exhaustive list and read the criteria.

dude, you're a tough nut to get through to. OK, let's do this...forget the sanctioning bodies. so, let's just you and me talk as boxing fans. Consider the scenario i described with holmes and witherspoon. do YOU as a boxing fan consider holmes to be the undisputed champ in that scenario, even informally speaking? after all, like i said, he did beat witherspoon who, a few months later became wbc champ. so, would YOU in your opinion consider holmes to be the undisputed champ in that situation, yes or no?

 

[brundlefly]

It doesn't prove how good a particular boxer is it merely reflects the opinions of the list's publisher (collective or independent). The Ring & TBRB rate fighters for a living. It's what they do. They each have an actual ratings panel consisting of qualified individuals, many of which are historians, and well-known journalists in the industry. Hence why fans and fighters themselves discuss their lists and not yours.

it's a tool used to promote certain fighters, particularly the fighters of a particular network or the fan favorites. a marketing ploy and a political tool. it doesn't reflect the actual abilities of the fighters stacked up against each other. it's simply a way to pander to particular fanbases and validate their biases.

 

[Kovalev's "Man Bag"]

and as for usyk and his 350 amateur fights, since when does fighting 3 rounds with headgear protection and all kinds of safety precautions cause wear and tear on fighters? in fact what it did was it gave him a safe way to accumlate hundreds and hundreds of rounds of technical skills and experience, while, at the same time, being largerly protected from physical damage. that was a huge advantage he enjoyed over guys, especially older guys, who turned pro after much shorter amateur careers.

Seriously? Fighting always causes wear & tear if you do enough of it and Usyk has. That's over 1,000 rounds of high-paced competition in amateur boxing plus the countless hours of sparring a boxer uses to prepare for each tournament they enter locally, nationally, and/or internationally. But yes, Usyk is at such a distinct advantage at heavyweight nowadays that he's the smallest guy in the division, considerably, and older than all of the other Top 3 - Top 5 fighters.

 

[Blastbeat]

the primary difference between the Ring, ESPN etc., and me, is that they are going concerrns driven by a profit motive and therefore forced to capitulate to the demands and preferences of consumers, whereas I am a boxing fan who has NOTHING to lose or gain by being honest in my assessments and rankings. Therefore I can afford to be objective whereas they cannot.

"objective"
right, sure. I dont think you know what that word means. TBRB has the best p4p list right now, and thats about the most objective list i can think of.

you are one person, and no one person is free from bias. you are biased, whether or not you think you are. in fact, id argue youre even more biased by attempting to refer to yourself as being objective. thats just flexing your ego and humblebragging.

 

[Blastbeat]

Seriously? Fighting always causes wear & tear if you do enough of it and Usyk has. That's over 1,000 rounds of high-paced competition in amateur boxing plus the countless hours of sparring a boxer uses to prepare for each tournament they enter locally, nationally, and/or internationally. But yes, Usyk is at such a distinct advantage at heavyweight nowadays that he's the smallest guy in the division, considerably, and older than all of the other Top 3 - Top 5 fighters.

headgear may actually cause a fighter to absorb more blows to the head too. because the perception of it being safer means fighters throw more shots.

Study – Fighters Take “Statistically Significant” More Head Shots When Wearing Headgear

Headgear does not prevent concussions or other brain injuries. Nor does it stop the progressive disease CTE which is linked to repeated concussive and sub concussive impacts. Despite this many athl…

combatsportslaw.com

check out that study abstract. it really takes an unabashed troll to argue that just because a fighter has headgear on, they dont experience wear and tear to their bodies. and thats pretty much who you're dealing with.

 

[treelo]

those three years make a big difference in learning and development. the age difference also contributed Usyk being able to build an record with 350 amateur fights compared to less than 50 for AJ.

my point is, AJ might have been a HW titlist but that was DESPITE dealing with serious handicaps in his ability to grow as a fighter.

whether you want to acknowledge it or not, there was controversy over usyk-joshua II, usyk-fury I and usyk-dubois I.

no there wasnt, only in certain peoples minds who love to make stuff up to suit their own narrative

what, Dubois promotor objected, well i am fucking shocked and amazed at that, who would think such a thing

 

[Kovalev's "Man Bag"]

headgear may actually cause a fighter to absorb more blows to the head too. because the perception of it being safer means fighters throw more shots.

Study – Fighters Take “Statistically Significant” More Head Shots When Wearing Headgear

Headgear does not prevent concussions or other brain injuries. Nor does it stop the progressive disease CTE which is linked to repeated concussive and sub concussive impacts. Despite this many athl…

combatsportslaw.com

check out that study abstract. it really takes an unabashed troll to argue that just because a fighter has headgear on, they dont experience wear and tear to their bodies. and thats pretty much who you're dealing with.

That's one of the reasons why they did away with it at the elite level. It gives a false sense of security/protection. Not to mention it can make it harder to see shots coming. Heavy blows can shift the headgear and cause the boxer to have to keep readjusting it.

 

[Kovalev's "Man Bag"]

dude, you're a tough nut to get through to. OK, let's do this...forget the sanctioning bodies. so, let's just you and me talk as boxing fans. Consider the scenario i described with holmes and witherspoon. do YOU as a boxing fan consider holmes to be the undisputed champ in that scenario, even informally speaking? after all, like i said, he did beat witherspoon who, a few months later became wbc champ. so, would YOU in your opinion consider holmes to be the undisputed champ in that situation, yes or no?

No, and I'm going to explain why in detail. Not to mention that your timeline is off. Holmes won a contested SD against Witherspoon in May of 1983 as the defending WBC & lineal champion. Holmes vacated his WBC title not long after. Witherspoon then beat Greg Page for the vacant WBC title 10 months later (which is closer to a year than "a few months") which would take us into March of 1984.

Secondly, the three-belt era had already begun in 1983 with the arrival of the newly formed IBF organization. In December of 1983 the IBF awarded Holmes their inaugural title. He didn't even have to fight for it.

Lastly, Holmes never won the WBA world title even though he did challenge for it a couple times, once in the late 80s, and again in the 90s. From the late 70s into the early 80s it was guys like Tate, Weaver, Dokes & Coetzee etc that all held it at some point. Holmes beat Weaver but that was a year before he won the WBA title. As mentioned previously Holmes also scraped by Witherspoon who went on to win the WBA title himself against Tubbs in 1986. But, that's neither here nor there. The fact of the matter is that there were several others, like the aforementioned fighters that briefly held the WBA strap, that could also call themselves a "champion" while Holmes was still the reigning WBC & lineal king.

 

[Kovalev's "Man Bag"]

@brundlefly

Let's take a closer look at the heavyweight title picture back then. Holmes held the WBC title from 1978–1983. During his initial title reign the following fighters also had a claim to being heavyweight champ since they had the WBA version of the world title.

1978 – Leon Spinks
1979 – Muhammad Ali
1980 – John Tate
1981 – Mike Weaver
1982 – Michael Dokes
1983 – Gerrie Coetzee

Holmes later was awarded the IBF title at the tail end of 1983 and kept it until 1985. During his secondary title reign the following fighters also had a claim to being heavyweight champ since they held the WBC and/or WBA versions of the world title.

1984 – Tim Witherspoon (WBC) | Gerrie Coetzee (WBA)
1985 – Pinklon Thomas (WBC) | Greg Page (WBA) | Tony Tubbs (WBA)

The whole idea behind becoming undisputed is so that no ‘claimants’ exist to even bring forth a dispute as to who is the actual world champion. Hence the need to collect all of the alphabet world titles within that particular era (two-belt, three-belt, or four-belt). Of course this assumes that you're also the lineal champ otherwise it could leave the backdoor open. The latter though wasn't an issue since Holmes was indeed the lineal king from 1980–1985.

 

[SandisLL]

yes, for a guy who started boxing far too late, joshua acomplished some truly amazing things. wilder also won a medal in the olympics and the world HW title despite having started boxing years AFTER joshua. Neither of those guys had any business being anywhere near as successful as they were considering what they had to overcome.

but that's not my point, and you know it. they were still very incomplete fighters BECAUSE of their late start and lacked the foundation to sustain championship level performances because of it.

and as for usyk and his 350 amateur fights, since when does fighting 3 rounds with headgear protection and all kinds of safety precautions cause wear and tear on fighters? in fact what it did was it gave him a safe way to accumlate hundreds and hundreds of rounds of technical skills and experience, while, at the same time, being largerly protected from physical damage. that was a huge advantage he enjoyed over guys, especially older guys, who turned pro after much shorter amateur careers.

You are just trolling.
At first if about risk to die am boxing during recent years had provided more coffins than pro boxing because according to you ammy doesn't hit hard. They does even with ammy AIBA cert etc gloves.

Next thing: I do know that you never had competed in am boxing in tournament format. It is so easy to see from your posts.
Not alone that you don't know nor a bit about prepararition process for tournaments.

I also do know that you most likely never had even sparred with boxer bacause your atritude about headgear.

Maybe instead to post internet posts, go to spar in gym.
Exactly with headgear and definitely vs boxers who does have decent and normal & legal hand wraps and better if they will have foam padded sparring gloves. I think after you will get some 10+ punches landed you will start to think something.

Maybe even you will tell boxer that he is POS and you will kill him before this.

Spacetime chatbot was better programmed.

 

[brundlefly]

No

Well, I can't say I'm surprised. I asked you for your personal viewpoint and you reply with some gobbledygook about timelines and bs.

It would have taken a certain amount of integrity and honesty as a person for you to admit the truth. You would also have had to be more of a boxing fan than a usyk fan, but that would have also gone against your whole stance

The thing about boxing is, it's a marginal sport for a reason. bottom-feeder, so-called "fans" such as yourself are what really degrades the sport as much as the corrupt officials and outdated structures.

 

[brundlefly]

You are just trolling.
At first if about risk to die am boxing during recent years had provided more coffins than pro boxing because according to you ammy doesn't hit hard. They does even with ammy AIBA cert etc gloves.

Next thing: I do know that you never had competed in am boxing in tournament format. It is so easy to see from your posts.
Not alone that you don't know nor a bit about prepararition process for tournaments.

I also do know that you most likely never had even sparred with boxer bacause your atritude about headgear.

Maybe instead to post internet posts, go to spar in gym.
Exactly with headgear and definitely vs boxers who does have decent and normal & legal hand wraps and better if they will have foam padded sparring gloves. I think after you will get some 10+ punches landed you will start to think something.

Maybe even you will tell boxer that he is POS and you will kill him before this.

Spacetime chatbot was better programmed.

Dude, run your posts through some kind of editing program first. I don't know wtf you're talking about.

 

[brundlefly]

Seriously? Fighting always causes wear & tear if you do enough of it and Usyk has. That's over 1,000 rounds of high-paced competition in amateur boxing plus the countless hours of sparring a boxer uses to prepare for each tournament they enter locally, nationally, and/or internationally. But yes, Usyk is at such a distinct advantage at heavyweight nowadays that he's the smallest guy in the division, considerably, and older than all of the other Top 3 - Top 5 fighters.

yeah, now we're supposed to be that the reason fighters prepare for a 12 round fight by sparring hundreds of rounds with headgear on is for a reason OTHER than the significantly decreased risk of getting about getting injured while sparring. ok, sparky. have a good one.

 

[SandisLL]

Dude, run your posts through some kind of editing program first. I don't know wtf you're talking about.

STFU.

 

[SandisLL]

yeah, now we're supposed to be that the reason fighters prepare for a 12 round fight by sparring hundreds of rounds with headgear on is for a reason OTHER than the significantly decreased risk of getting about getting injured while sparring. ok, sparky. have a good one.

Your brain shold get eddited. With punches.

Headgear does protect till some extent from cuts but not from concussions.
However you should remember that you are Spacetime's one from next reincarnations here, so I don't think that even punches might help.

 

[Kovalev's "Man Bag"]

yeah, now we're supposed to be that the reason fighters prepare for a 12 round fight by sparring hundreds of rounds with headgear on is for a reason OTHER than the significantly decreased risk of getting about getting injured while sparring. ok, sparky. have a good one.

Operative word here is 'sparring' which the headgear is mainly used for to prevent cuts (from head clashes, etc). Sparring gloves are not the same as competition gloves. In the amateurs they use 10 & 12 oz. In the pros is 8s & 10s. In sparring guys can use up to 20 oz. Secondly, sparring is practice. You're usually not going as hard as you would be in amateur or pro contests.

You've never wondered why you no longer see headgear worn at elite level international men's boxing events like the Olympics? Might want to read the studies on that. It doesn't protect against concussions (only cuts when used in sparring).

Why Olympic Boxers Aren’t Wearing Headgear Anymore

 

[Kovalev's "Man Bag"]

Well, I can't say I'm surprised. I asked you for your personal viewpoint and you reply with some gobbledygook about timelines and bs.

It would have taken a certain amount of integrity and honesty as a person for you to admit the truth. You would also have had to be more of a boxing fan than a usyk fan, but that would have also gone against your whole stance

The thing about boxing is, it's a marginal sport for a reason. bottom-feeder, so-called "fans" such as yourself are what really degrades the sport as much as the corrupt officials and outdated structures.

Yes, a comprehensive breakdown of precisely why Holmes could never be considered undisputed isn't good enough for you. Amazing. Your mind is already made up. Meanwhile I just named 10 different heavyweights that all had a claim to be the champ from 1978-1985 when Holmes held a title.

 

[treelo]

@Kovalev's "Man Bag" has been sucked in again, i swear they target you