By Abbas Dadhiwala: Vitali Klitschko is a unified World Heavyweight Champion with only two defeats on his record and 41 knockout wins out of 45 fights. But will be remembered as a great?
Klitschko hasn’t fought since stopping Manuel Charr in the third round in 2012. Klitschko is 45-2 with 41 knockouts. He has been more dominant even than that record shows.
He has stopped boxers like WBO Champ Herbie Hide, WBC champ Corrie Sanders who stopped his brother Wladimir. In his four bouts that went to decision, Klitschko defeated Dereck Chisora, Shannon Briggs, Kevin Johnson and Timo Hoffman. In all those bouts, Klitschko came ahead on the cards in 137 of the 144 scored rounds. That means he won 95.1 percent of the scored rounds in those matches.
In the two bouts, he lost, to Lennox Lewis and Chris Byrd, he was ahead on both cards at the time of the stoppages. He needed shoulder reconstruction surgery following his loss to Byrd in 2000, when he quit on the stool after the ninth round. But the judges had given Klitschko seven, of the nine rounds to Klitschko.
In the Lewis fight in 2003, Klitschko was stopped by a horrendous cut. However, Klitschko had won four of the six rounds at the point the bout was stopped.
He was exceptionally dominant in his time. And while some critics attribute that solely to his size, there are plenty of fighters who are 6 feet 7, as Klitschko is, who weren’t remotely as successful. He was a magnificent fighter who had boxing skills as well as power. He had a dominant jab and was one of the game’s great finishers.
The fights that never happened were Tyson, Holyfield. It would have great to see Vitali going up against these greats. It does leave a little sour taste in the mouth that Vitali never fought these boxers.
Klitschko would have held up in any era and I have him just about sneaking in into the top ten of the best heavyweights ever.
My top ten list of the greatest heavyweights who ever lived is Muhammad Ali, Tyson, Joe Louis, Joe Frazier, Larry Holmes, Marciano, Foreman, Holyfield, Lewis, and Klitschko comes in at 10.
Vitali’s size and power likely would have been a problem for all the boxers in that list. Imagine Klitschko versus George Foreman or Joe Frazier. These bouts would have been epic. I think he would have even given the greatest Muhammad Ali problems.
Though he doesn’t get this kind of respect, he belongs in the all-time top 10 of heavyweights.
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