Greatest Heavyweight Boxing Champion

Who was boxing's greatest heavyweight? Depends on how we judge. If we ask who had the best record then Rocky Marciano, who won all 49 of his professional fights, tops all the rest. If we ask who held the title the longest, Joe Louis held it for 11 years. If we ask who dominated the division for the longest, Mohammed Ali won the title in A.D. 1964 and lost decisively to Larry Holmes in A.D. 1980--16 years--though Ali held the title for fewer years than Louis. (George Foreman was champion twice, 20 years apart, but hardly dominated the division except during his first reign.) It depends how we judge.

Getting into more arguable judgments, if we ask who, at his best, could have beaten each of the rest at their best, perhaps one of the Klitchko brothers--huge men who fight quite well--would be a good candidate, since better boxers might be too small to beat them. If we ask who was the most skillful boxer, with the best technique, or best pound-for-pound, quite a few names can get mentioned--Jim Corbett, Jack Johnson, Louis (sound in all the basics), Ali (though some say he used his speed to get away with poor technique), Gene Tunney (very disciplined), Tyson (well trained early)…

If we ask who dominated the most strongly, making his opponents look like chumps who did not belong in the ring with him, perhaps Louis at his best ("bum-of-the-month club," 7 title defenses in one year) or the mid-60s Ali (5 defenses in a year) or Johnson (though he ducked black contenders) would be top candidates, along with the Klitchkos lately, Foreman between clobbering Frazier and losing to Ali, and Tyson at his best. If we ask who beat the strongest opposition, Ali would lead contenders: two he beat, Liston and Foreman, were considered close to invincible when he beat them, and plenty of others were pretty good. If we ask who was the most devastating, watch Jack Dempsey as challenger floor reigning champion Jess Willard (58 pounds heavier) 7 times in the first round, or Iron Mike Tyson at his best, say against Mike Spinks, or Foreman against Frazier (first fight), or Louis against Schmeling (2nd fight).

If we ask who successfully overcame the most difficulty, Marciano might come up again: 31 of his 49 opponents outweighed him (Humphrey Jackson, who fell in round one, by 71 pounds; Joe Louis by just under 30, though 10 of those 30 pounds may have done Louis more harm than good). 35 of 49 had had more fights than he when they fought, more experience. (For these numbers I'm taking each fight as a separate opponent, though he fought some men twice.) And it might perhaps even be that everyone he fought had longer reach than he, since his reach was 67 inches, the shortest reach of any heavyweight champion, shorter than Sugar Ray Leonard who fought from lightweight (as an amateur) to lightheavy. (A glance through Boxrec gives reach for some but not all of Marciano's opponents; the few I looked at did have more reach than Marciano. More research, anyone?) The Klitchkos may perhaps never have fought anyone heavier or with more reach than themselves; certainly they rarely do (which is not their fault, of course--God made them big--but it does deprive them of one type of opportunity to show greatness.) One might also mention that Marciano took up boxing well into his 20s, older than most top boxers; imagine if Marciano had combined his own outstanding courage and work ethic with the training Mike Tyson got before Tyson was 21.

Strength is another question, or series of questions. Marciano's fans like to point out that his punching power was measured as harder than a rifle bullet hits (I think the Army let him hit a target they usually shoot bullets at to see how hard bullets hit), hard enough to lift a heavyweight a foot off the ground (and I think one of his opponents, hit perfectly, did go flying). But I've never seen reports of other top heavyweights doing the same test, so I don't know his hitting power compares to that of bigger, younger, black men (though I think those who fought both Marciano and Louis said Marciano hit harder; but had these common opponents fought Louis only after Louis's best years?) And strength isn't quite the same thing as hitting power; a long discussion between two or three experts on Amazon said Jim Jeffries was very strong (I've read he once shot a deer and carried it 9 miles to camp on his shoulders) but didn't hit outstandingly hard, and that George Foreman clenched his fists so tightly that he lost hitting power and wasted energy compared to how he could have hit.

So "the greatest heavyweight" depends what standard we judge by: different champions excel in different ways. I think Ali did the best for the longest at the top. I like Marciano, who had a shorter reign against lesser competition, but may have come closer than any other to using everything he had (and won every fight.) In an imaginary or computer tournament of each at his actual best against the rest, I think I'd pick Tyson or one of the Klitchkos. (Such tournaments have been held. Perhaps the first, in the '60s, came up with Marciano as winner, Dempsey 2nd, with courage the most important factor; but computer boxing has come a long way since the '60s.)

http://boxrec.com/list_bouts.php?human_id=009032&cat=boxer Marciano's record at boxrec

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvCHk_kKpVI Dempsey versus Williard Youtube video

My own website is www.lohr84.com. I rarely write about sports, but do have one piece on how to fix the BCS: http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1264913/how_to_fix_the_bcs.html?cat=14