Let's be real here, people are putting this guy up there with the ATG's for beating a bunch of bummingtons at cruiserweight and two VERY average heavyweights.
Joshua was FINISHED as a world class heavyweight by Ruiz Jr, after that he done NOTHING until getting 8-4 x2 by Usyk before getting absoloutley battered by Dubois.
As far as Fury, he was physically finished by the third wilder fight and was so badly diminished he LITERALLY needed a robbery to scrape a decision vs a UFC fighter.
There's not a single historically significant win on Usyks resume, he's a good skilled fighter but nowhere near proven enough to be considered an ATG based on wins over middling opposition.
Usyk's resume is unimpeachable (secondary/interim belts ignored, TBRB rankings used)
W vs #2 Krzysztof Glowacki UD 12 (reigning and future WBO cruiserweight)
W vs #10 Marco Huck TKO 10 (fmr. WBO crusierweight)
W vs #6 Mairis Briedis MD 12 (reigning WBC cruiserweight; future WBO cruiserweight; IBF/Ring/TBRB/lineal cruiserweight)
W vs #2 Murat Gassiev UD 12 (reigning WBA/IBF cruiserweight)
W vs Tony Bellew KO 8 (fmr. WBC cruiserweight)
W vs #1 Anthony Joshua UD 12 (fmr. and reigning WBA/IBF/WBO heavyweight)
W vs #2 Anthony Joshua SD 12 (fmr. 2X WBA/IBF/WBO heavyweight)
W vs Daniel Dubois KO 9 (ftr. IBF heavyweight)
W vs #1 Tyson Fury SD 12 (fmr. WBA/IBF/WBO/2X Ring/2X TBRB, reigning WBC/lineal heavyweight)
W vs #1 Tyson Fury UD 12 (fmr 2X lineal/TBRB/Ring; WBC; WBO/WBA/IBF)
Other notable victories: Thabiso Mchunu, Michael Hunter, Derek Chisora
8-0 vs top 10
6-0 vs top 5
5-0 vs #1 (or #2 if Usyk was #1)
10-0 vs fighters that won a legitimate world title
5-0 vs reigning world titlists
3-0 in unification fights
12-0 in world title fights
4-0 in lineal world championship fights
23-0-0-0 overall record, 14 KOs
Cruiserweight: Lineal/TBRB, Ring, WBA, WBC, IBF, WBO undisputed
Heavyweight: Lineal/TBRB, Ring, WBA, WBC, IBF, WBO undisputed (plus IBO)
2 division lineal world champion
2 division undisputed world champion
2 division world titlist
Notable achievement:
-Usyk is 10-0 in his opponents' home countries and 5-0 on neutral ground, including 3-0 vs the A-side fighter in Saudi Arabia
-One of only four men in the 3/4 belt eras to be undisputed in two weight classes (Holyfield , Crawford, Inoue)
10-0 on the road and 5-0 on neutral ground against high level competition is absolutely nuts.
He isnt exactly fighting in a HW golden age, but hes still clearly an ATG when you take into account the combined achievements of his ammy career, cruiser run and late career HW run. Guy is a very special talent.
What makes an era great or one bad?
Is it multiple champions? Or is it a dominant champion? And which one is the good era? Since the 90s both situations suggest to have signaled a poor era to fans on here.
Usyk came up from Cruiserweight and beat two guys who will go into the HoF. How overrated can that be?
An era's greatness is defined usually by the perceived ability and capability of the top 5-10 fighters at the time, and their willingness to fight each other.
What makes an era great or one bad?
Is it multiple champions? Or is it a dominant champion? And which one is the good era? Since the 90s both situations suggest to have signaled a poor era to fans on here.
Usyk came up from Cruiserweight and beat two guys who will go into the HoF. How overrated can that be?
Nah strongly disagree, Usyk is a special fighter who is currently entering GOAT territory. The subtle things he does goes over a lot of peoples heads. Not only does he have sublime footwork and an intelligent rhythm of fighting, he also has a knack of being able to make fighters tired with his pressure and his movements. Not every fighter can do that and this is the reason he beat AJ & fury with consummate ease - he got them blowing out of their a$$es, unable to keep up!
Worst HW era in the history of the sport
Still, he is the goods.
He'd be a high ranked HW in most eras.
When over rated M Tyson won his title might actually be the worst era. Trash heavyweight division.
Not his fault it was split decisions, i thought he won both aj and fury fights , can't see a case for him losing 7 rounds in any of those fights.
there is usually at least one crazy ass judge with pre filled in cards
Let's be real here, people are putting this guy up there with the ATG's for beating a bunch of bummingtons at cruiserweight and two VERY average heavyweights.
Joshua was FINISHED as a world class heavyweight by Ruiz Jr, after that he done NOTHING until getting 8-4 x2 by Usyk before getting absoloutley battered by Dubois.
As far as Fury, he was physically finished by the third wilder fight and was so badly diminished he LITERALLY needed a robbery to sc**** a decision vs a UFC fighter.
There's not a single historically significant win on Usyks resume, he's a good skilled fighter but nowhere near proven enough to be considered an ATG based on wins over middling opposition.
Based on your perception of the era and available fighters, is there anything he could've done to be deemed an ATG?
I think it's pretty universal that AJ is grossly overrated. Overall, Usyk beat 2 of the most popular heavyweights of our era. But hardly the most skilled opponents.
IMO Usyk gets too much props for going to split dec vs both.
For that, I don't think he should be ranked so high.
It's merely a semantics thing, but a fun one.
If it were "pretty universal that AJ is grossly overrated"; beyond that universal grouping, who is left to do all that erroneous over-rating of him? Seems, literally, that if he were indeed overrated by those outside of universal concensus, he'd be rated precisely where he should be, and any over-raters would statistically be outliers, outside of the universal.
What?
On a more sober note; the 2015 - 2025 era has been one of the best. While the 1970's remains the consensus high water mark, going farther back prior to it, the players become a bit smallish. Important, depending on whether your judgement criteria contains a P4P component.
And since the 70s?
The era dominated by the Klitschko brothers was considerably worse than the current one. In fact, it isn't even close.
Feel lucky that you're not limited to following Mixed Martial Arts or Kickboxing, waiting around for new and talented heavyweights to churn out.
Holy hater alert. He won against top competition, at heavyweight against MUCH bigger guys, and he won the majority of his big fights on the road in enemy territory with hostile crowds and judges and haters like you, which meant to get the points wins he did, he actually had to win more rounds than he got credit for. If you can't acknowledge the man, that's just an indictment of you and proof that YDKSAB.
No way you can hate on Usyk. The dude went up from cleaning our cruiserweight division to heavyweight and becoming undisputed. You can't deny his skillset no matter what era he would have fought in. His southpaw edge coupled with excellent footwork would give any heavyweight problems from any era.
I don't care if this era is better or worse than any other era. The fact is he still did it. It's not his fault for the era he's born in. All you can do then is imagine how he would have fared in another era and for that matter, why does it mean another heavyweight would have done any better against Usyk? It's all just fantasy talk at this point. Give the man some credit.
I think it's pretty universal that AJ is grossly overrated.
Overall, Usyk beat 2 of the most popular heavyweights of our era. But hardly the most skilled opponents.
IMO Usyk gets too much props for going to split dec vs both.
For that, I don't think he should be ranked so high.
100%
AJ is fish food for any atg heavyweight, 8-4 vs him isn't all that impressive
I think it's pretty universal that AJ is grossly overrated.
Overall, Usyk beat 2 of the most popular heavyweights of our era. But hardly the most skilled opponents.
IMO Usyk gets too much props for going to split dec vs both.
For that, I don't think he should be ranked so high.
No the two don't correlate.
He's winning on points 116-112 vs opponents in the worst era ever, not good enough to be a top fighter in good eras.
On what objective grounds have we determined it's the worst heavyweight divison ever? When you fire up the time machine and begin to match fighters from different eras then we can have the conversation, until you get the DeLorean going though we can only meaningfully discuss how fighters have done in the context of their current era and relative to the contempraneous competiton.
Far as I can see the only serious argument you can have against Usyks inclusion in the rankings of Great Heavyweights is that he simply hasn't had many fights in the divison but then if quantity was the deciding metric no fighter will ever again reach the heights of historical eras when records in the hundreds of fights were commonplace.
Let's look at it this way, which heavyweights in the last 25 years would you rank above him? The history of modern boxing is approximately 100 years (from the establishment of the NBA and NYSAC), which you could - very loosely - divide into 4 eras. If you were to pick a top 20 you would expect roughly 5 fighters from each 25 year period unless you can make a convincing argument that fighters have objectively got worse over time and would not be competitive with their peers from yesteryear should they share a ring.
At his age when Usyk beat them in thier primes it should be considered a great victory. They were his #1 and #2 best opponets in terms of their resume with multiple title defenses.
They weren't in their primes.
You just want to ignore form?