Do we underate Micheal Spinks?

[Cardinal Buck]

underrated at heavyweight

[StarshipTrooper]

I think Roy Jones would have something to say about that!

Spinks' resume reminds me of Felix Trinidad's - Hall of Fame worthy, but not good enough to be ranked as one of the all-time greats of the sport.

Jones' Light-Heavy resume was hardly stacked.

Poet

[StarshipTrooper]

He was undefeated as a lhw.
Beat Larry Holmes although somewhat with some controversy
Your thoughts please

People who know their stuff don't underrate him: They know he's a top-10 ATG at Light-Heavy, maybe even top-5. The only people I've ever come across who underrate him are casuals who only think of him as "that dude who got flattened by Tyson".

Poet

[Scott9945]

I think Roy Jones would have something to say about that!

Spinks' resume reminds me of Felix Trinidad's - Hall of Fame worthy, but not good enough to be ranked as one of the all-time greats of the sport.

I believe that Spinks fought better opposition than Jones and (especially) Trinidad did.

[Bolo Punch]

Jones' Light-Heavy resume was hardly stacked.

Poet

Whilst I see where you're coming from - the names in which he faced at 175 aren't exactly elite - you can't become undisputed champion of a division and defend all of those titles 8 times unless you've had a truly great run at the weight.

[Bolo Punch]

Just to clarify, I'm not saying I don't think Spinks was great - I said in my original post that he was very talented - I just don't think he's worthy of being classed as an all-time great, that's all.

[crold1]

People who know their stuff don't underrate him: They know he's a top-10 ATG at Light-Heavy, maybe even top-5. The only people I've ever come across who underrate him are casuals who only think of him as "that dude who got flattened by Tyson".

Poet

This is what I was thinking. Who underrates him among serious boxing folks? Almost all have him top 5-10 all time at 175.

[StarshipTrooper]

Whilst I see where you're coming from - the names in which he faced at 175 aren't exactly elite - you can't become undisputed champion of a division and defend all of those titles 8 times unless you've had a truly great run at the weight.

Resume is all about who you beat and when you beat them, not about collecting belts and "defenses". You can defend against 20 tomato cans and it doesn't equal 1 real win over a high quality opponent. Quality of opposition is everything when speaking of resumes.

Poet

[billeau2]

Great fighter. Tough weight class to distinguish oneself in because if you are realy good you challenge for the heavyweight crown...Yet Spinks fought some great fighters at light heavy. The Tyson fight did show how good Tyson could be. The first Holmes fight was really close.

[Bolo Punch]

Resume is all about who you beat and when you beat them, not about collecting belts and "defenses". You can defend against 20 tomato cans and it doesn't equal 1 real win over a high quality opponent. Quality of opposition is everything when speaking of resumes.

Poet

A bit disrespectful to Jones to suggest that more or less all he done in his prime was fight bums for meaningless titles.

As far as fantasy matchups go, Jones beats Spinks, IMO.