I have him ranked somewhere between 14 and 20: A near-great rather than an ATG. His lack of recorded fights makes it difficult to my mind to justify ranking him higher.....It's just too difficult to get a handle on how good he really was given his lack of a track record.
He probably was a hell of a fighter. It's just that the brevity of his career and lack of any quality video footage make it difficult to rate him over more proven heavyweights.
top 15. The Man was a legend. Years out of retirement, pounds and pounds out of shape, he lasted 15 rounds in a 1 fight comeback to my No.3 Heavyweight. If that doesnt scream talent, what does?
Despite his lack of fights they are againts some excellent oppostition.
Where do you rank him?
not much video on him though vs sailor tom you can see a glint of ali vs fraizer in the way he controls the fight. id put him some where from 8-13 as far as heavies maybe like 60 something P4P.
Jeffries legacy unfairly suffers from the come back against Johnson. We pretty much ignore Ali's display against Holmes but I do think that the Johnson fight does stick in peoples mind a little
Despite his lack of fights they are againts some excellent oppostition.
Where do you rank him?
Just what I think of when Jeffries is raised --- too few fights, but he fought great competition in countenance to that.
There seems to be a consensus here that Jeffries is top-15 material, & with that, I concur. #11-15 sounds about right. Some feel unconvinced or unsure Jeffries could compete with more modern greats, but I've never been of that take.
Most interesting of all, to me, is how Jeffries would have fared with the legendary ****ers of the division --- your Foreman's, & Liston's. Those fellas would've been a test like no other for Jeffries' fabled chin & grit, & it would be just amazing to see. Jeffries' opponents hadn't the size, strength or slug-power of those men, but then again, his rivals were hitting him with knuckle-bare gloves, which enhanced the brutality of their punches over what was won by Foreman or Liston in later decades, & Jeffries was from an era where punishment was tolerated virtually without end, hardening him (& his contemporaries) in a way future generations would not be.
If those qualities in Jeffries withstood those challenges, how would Foreman & Liston react? It's too open-ended to be sure about those fights, for mine, which makes them all the more interesting. However they might've gone, Jeffries would be a handful, I feel, for most of the best HW's of all-time.
I actually feel fairly confident he'd have defeated the stylistically-similar, but smaller, Marciano & Frazier, & had a damn good shot at a fight with Dempsey, too. I neither outright favour or dismiss him against Liston, Foreman & Tyson. I wouldn't be surprised if he beat Lewis, & he has my vote in a fifteen-rounder against the HW version of Holyfield.
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