was the heavyweight renaissance a false dawn?

[Madison Boxing]

Lot of talk of the heavyweight division being on the cusp of being back in last couple of years. A new era now wladimir has gone. But watching some of the clips of the fight last night of the fury/parker fight, ive just been thinking about it and the division is still garbage.

Parkers arguably one of the top guys in the division and he just looked like a basic slugger. I saw a write up in the media saying 'the heavyweight division wont have sat up' in regards to the performance, but thats a performance thats as good as pretty much anyone in the division can put in bar joshua.

Who else is there? Luis ortiz looks old, really old and a lot of rumours hes approaching 50.

Its no secret i dont rate wilder, technically hes absolutely atrocious and the windmills are just cringeworthy. This is meant to be world level boxing ffs/

Pulev is the classic stiff european stereotype and got destroyed by wlad, theres lukewarm reception to him fighting joshua in the uk, but in heavyweight terms hes a world class fighter these days so it doesnt get much better than that.

Although in my opinion joshua looks like a more exciting fighter than wladimir generally was, the hallmark of a great division has surely got to be competition. I think the reason that the division lost all interest was because of just how dominant klitschko was.

Im not a joshua fanboy, but i think he is head and shoulders above the rest at the moment and it could be another uncompetitive era unless one of the prospects rises up the ranks quickly.

Unfortunately i dont think the heavyweight division is back at all... In my opinion its still one of the worst divisions in boxing.

[Jewish-Reptile]

Lot of talk of the heavyweight division being on the cusp of being back in last couple of years. A new era now wladimir has gone. But watching some of the clips of the fight last night of the fury/parker fight, ive just been thinking about it and the division is still garbage.

Parkers arguably one of the top guys in the division and he just looked like a basic slugger. I saw a write up in the media saying 'the heavyweight division wont have sat up' in regards to the performance, but thats a performance thats as good as pretty much anyone in the division can put in bar joshua.

Who else is there? Luis ortiz looks old, really old and a lot of rumours hes approaching 50.

Its no secret i dont rate wilder, technically hes absolutely atrocious and the windmills are just cringeworthy. This is meant to be world level boxing ffs/

Pulev is the classic stiff european stereotype and got destroyed by wlad, theres lukewarm reception to him fighting joshua in the uk, but in heavyweight terms hes a world class fighter these days so it doesnt get much better than that.

Although in my opinion joshua looks like a more exciting fighter than wladimir generally was, the hallmark of a great division has surely got to be competition. I think the reason that the division lost all interest was because of just how dominant klitschko was.

Im not a joshua fanboy, but i think he is head and shoulders above the rest at the moment and it could be another uncompetitive era unless one of the prospects rises up the ranks quickly.

Unfortunately i dont think the heavyweight division is back at all... In my opinion its still one of the worst divisions in boxing.

Parker was criticised for fading mid rounds versus Takam and Ruiz, last night he brought it from start to finish and the only guy trying to make a fight of it. Hughie's performance was on par if not worse than Malik Scott's versus Ortiz, he turned up to run for his life.

Give the guy at least some credit, he's clearly better than Wilder and has the second best resume in the division after Joshua, who it could be argued he was more accomplished than AJ until the Klitschko fight, a Klitschko who AJ went life and death with after poor performances against Fluff Furry and Jennings, seriously how much does that win even mean for AJ ? It wouldn't Surprise me if Pulev actually beat him.

[stiff_back]

Lot of talk of the heavyweight division being on the cusp of being back in last couple of years. A new era now wladimir has gone. But watching some of the clips of the fight last night of the fury/parker fight, ive just been thinking about it and the division is still garbage.

Parkers arguably one of the top guys in the division and he just looked like a basic slugger. I saw a write up in the media saying 'the heavyweight division wont have sat up' in regards to the performance, but thats a performance thats as good as pretty much anyone in the division can put in bar joshua.

Who else is there? Luis ortiz looks old, really old and a lot of rumours hes approaching 50.

Its no secret i dont rate wilder, technically hes absolutely atrocious and the windmills are just cringeworthy. This is meant to be world level boxing ffs/

Pulev is the classic stiff european stereotype and got destroyed by wlad, theres lukewarm reception to him fighting joshua in the uk, but in heavyweight terms hes a world class fighter these days so it doesnt get much better than that.

Although in my opinion joshua looks like a more exciting fighter than wladimir generally was, the hallmark of a great division has surely got to be competition. I think the reason that the division lost all interest was because of just how dominant klitschko was.

Im not a joshua fanboy, but i think he is head and shoulders above the rest at the moment and it could be another uncompetitive era unless one of the prospects rises up the ranks quickly.

Unfortunately i dont think the heavyweight division is back at all... In my opinion its still one of the worst divisions in boxing.

Parker didn't look great last night and I agree with you he's doesn't look like an elite fighter at the moment... but, I think you might be under valuing Hughie Fury's performance, he was very very awkward and *he* might be a talent to watch out for in the future (even if he's as boring as ****).

Imo none of the guys out there are really as good as the classic eras, including Joshua. But what makes it interesting to me is that there are a tonne of fighters who are close terms of ability. If an old Klitchko can almost beat Joshua, who's clearly got major stamina issues, and someone like Dillian Whyte can do well against him then I think fights against Wilder and Parker could be competitive/ interesting too, even if Joshua ends up as the no. 1 of this era.

[Redd Foxx]

The knowledgeable HW fans like Joe and Scott will tell you that it's been strong for years. And, I respect that.
But, I personally agree w/ DS and feel that we were on the cusp of a renaissance and it crumbled before our eyes.
-Fury imploded.
-Ortiz took only 1 relevant fight and threw away 2 critical years.
-Povetkin PED'd his way into irrelevancy.
-Wilder was affected by the Povetkin thing and also got no relevant fights.
-Joshua had 1 great fight, the only one in his entire career though.
-Wlad is done.
-H Fury never got off the ground.
-Haye is done (but will grab a few more $ for sure).
-Parker isn't what we thought he might be.
-You guys need to stop pretending Dillian Whyte is relevant.

I guess I could go on but I, like many, imagined the last 2 years was going to be an epic clash of the titans with talented heavies duking it out for supremacy. We got 1 good fight.

[Deus]

Kinda feel like this topic needs to be revisited after Wilder v Ortiz and Joshua v Pulev.

Hughie Fury v Joseph Parker isn't really a reasonable barometer, even if Parker is the WBO champ.