Boxrec all time heavyweight ratings?

Question

I've just looked at this and guess what? They have Floyd Patterson as No. 3 behind Muhammed Ali and Joe Louis!!! Now all due respect to Floyd, but they have him above Rocky Marciano, Jack Dempsey, Jack Johnson, Sonny Liston (who is rated no. 7 depite destroying Floyd twice in 1 round). They then have Tyson at 20 and Jack Dempsey at 24. Take a look. Have they gone mad ??!!

Answer 1

Who compiled these rankings? Patterson wasn't that good, where is Larry Holmes ranked?

Sounds like a popularity contest to me, Floyd was a popular non controversial black guy and Larry was the opposite. Guess who they liked better?

Either way those guys are still better than the current crop of so called Heavyweight Champions we have today. They're all bums.

Answer 2

A total farce.  I respected Patterson as a person much more than I do against any of the top ten heavyweights.  He just would not be able to stay in there against them.  Dempsey at 24 is wrong also.  He is higher.

Answer 3

No one (that I know of) is a bigger Floyd Patterson fan than I am. . . .but come on!  Part of honoring a man is honoring him AS HE WAS . . . .not how WE WISH HE WAS!!!  Floyd in front of Dempsey?  In front of Marciano?  No way.  Now, I DO think he should be ahead of Liston, since Liston has gutless, and even though he had success against Patterson, Liston did nothing with his title reign, never won it back, and never was more than a footnote in boxing records after Ali dispatched of him.  Patterson made history TWICE, both being the youngest man to win the title, and the first man to regain his title after losing it.  He belongs ahead of Liston and Tyson, but not Marciano, Dempsey, Johnson, Ali, Louis, or Holmes.  

Maybe boxrec, despite being the most trusted RECORDS website around, needs to stop giving it's OPINIONS on serious lists like this.  Just stick to the facts, ma'am.

Answer 4

Well at least they got the first two right.  Ali and Louis stand head and shoulders above the rest of the division.  Floyd Patterson is SO godaweful overrated.  He's not even in the top 12.  So he's the first to regain the title and youngest to win it (I'll give him that over Tyson because the title wasnt broken when Floyd won it).  

Patterson beat ancient Archie for the title that Marciano left.  He lost to Johansson and regained it.  Then, against Cus' wishes, he fought Liston and got crushed twice,  206 sec. and 210 in the rematch.  HOW ON EARTH does he rank above Liston or Dempsey or Marciano,  who would certainly have KO'd Patterson had he come back like he planned.

I cant think of one reason to put Patterson in the top 10.  First of all there is no solid top 10 and I'll tell you why.

BEHIND Ali and Louis you have your TOP 10.  In no certain order here they are.

Johnson, Dempsey, Marciano, Liston, Frazier, Forman, Holmes, Tyson, Holyfield, Lewis.

NO ONE on this list would go undefeated in a series of battles against all the others.  Each would suffer at least one loss.  

Holmes and Lewis would be near the top because they would suffer fewer losses.   Dempsey and Frazier would be near the bottom because they would suffer more losses.  

Some examples.

Lewis could lose to Holmes and Forman and maybe a young conditioned Tyson.  

Holyfield would lose to Holmes and Lewis.

Johnson might be stopped by Marciano.  He could lose a decision to Dempsey and to Holmes.  Johnson is a little overrated because he's the first black champion.

Tyson could stop Frazier or Marciano early.  However, both would beat him if they made it past round 5.  Marciano would beat Frazier.

Liston is powerful but slow.  Tyson could catch him early.  He could outlast Holyfield.  Lewis would be too busy and stop Liston in the middle rounds.  

The point is that NONE of these champions would go undefeated.  Ali and Louis would beat them all.  And Patterson is NOWHERE to be found.  He's not even close.

Here are some others who dont make the Top 10 but would beat Patterson

Ezzard Charles,  Joe Walcott,  Jim Jeffries, Ken Norton,  Riddick Bowe.  Even some of the B-rated fighters of the 80s would beat him.  Floyd COULDNT TAKE A PUNCH.

Answer 5

A lot of the boxrec ratings are completely different to what most of us boxing fans think. It seems they have some kind of point scoring system that provides the basis for their ratings. Check out some of the others and you will be even more shocked. At Welter Sugar Ray Leonard and Henry Armstrong are ranked behind two fighters i havent hardly heard of, and at Middle they have Hagler ranked 5 when virtually every fan i have ever spoken too has him easily in their top three. I think they should revise their system as it obviously does have some problems but then again these lists are always open to debate anyway, whos to say that we are right and they are wrong, opinions seem to differ so often on these lists.

Answer 6

Their rankings are way out of wack.  They use a point system to determine who is number one and so forth and it obviously has flaws if Patterson is number 3 of all time.  Floyd Patterson was a good fighter but theres no way he is the third best of all time.  The true boxing fans such as yourself and I know that their rankings are not right and that the other fighters you mentioned deserve to be higher than they are

Answer 7

Floyd is not even a top ten on my list. Larry Holmes, Evander Holyfield, Rocky Marciano, Jack Dempsey, Jack Johnson, Mike Tyson, George Foreman, Sonny Liston will all KO Floyd.

Answer 8

Thumbs up to Frank D, I have never even visited the site, and as a result of this, I won't waste my time.  Yep, I think they made a mistake.  Dempsey is clearly a top ten all time heavyweight who rates higher than Floyd, as does Jack Johnson, Rocky Marciano, and Liston.  I will catch the usual flak from the Tyson fans but I think they were generous rating Mike so high, but Dempsey at 24 is insane.

Answer 9

Frank D is pretty much right about the site's scoring systems. Don't look too much into the scoring system on the site. Even myself wouldn't put Floyd Patterson over an unbeaten Rocky Marciano in all-time ranking.