Was Floyd Patterson an ATG?

In some contexts he is:

- Olympic gold medalist
- Youngest heavyweight champion ( until Tyson )
- First to regain heavyweight title
- was ranked for many years
- beat good fighters in Moore, Jackson, Machen, Johansson, Harris, Bonavena and chuvalo.
- was arguably robbed against quarry, Ellis and Maxim.

Negatives:

- was too heavily protected during title reign
- only had 7 title wins in 6 years
- was the only heavyweight champ to give a title shot to a debuting fighter ( who floored him. )
- was very shaky in the chin department
- would probably be an underdog against more than half of history’s heavyweight champions and many of its contenders.

overall his unique achievements get him into the hall of fame and perhaps even give him some shade of greatness. But I don’t place him in the upper echelon of the sport’s best.

 

An All Time Pretty Good

 

IMO Yes

 

Woah @cross_trainer you seeing this Boxed is talking boxing?

 

Just barely.

Though it does not matter in any way, it interesting that Boxrec has him #6 heavyweight of all time.

 

Going to rehash one of my old posts

 

nope

 

No not a ATG.
But an highly skilled, brave warrior.

 

He was one of the more popular heavyweights in history. He continued to draw big cheering crowds until his final bout with Ali. Whenever he fought at the Garden, tickets sold out and New York City buzzed with energy. He was not an all-time great champion but he was terrific for boxing and is remembered fondly by multitudes of fans until now.

 

People cite youngest HW champion… first to regain the title and a lot of things like that but boxing is who you beat ain’t it? That’s stuff is just “polish” You get points in my book for not losing the title… I also don’t rate guys higher for being ranked a long time and not really beating anybody good? He’s a guy who lost to Ingo and Liston… but he might’ve beat Ellis and Quarry? Then it’s just some semi decent (in the grand scheme of things) filler… his best win might be Ancient Archie Moore? Which is… Floyd Patterson is the sort of guy you can really admire as a man, very thoughtful, a serious champion fighter and overall he did his best whilst keeping his heart but an ATG? I personally reserve that distinction for very few fighters in general so I’d say no and even amongst HW’s.

 

I think he's undeniably great, but that's just my two cents.

 

I think he's better than many are willing to acknowledge, hard to say where he ranks all time . I think he was a great fighter, but not an all time great thou.

 

Of course, he is. Yes.

But the sport has changed a lot over the last half-century.

Head-to-head, he doesn't beat a lot of fighters who came after him.

To the point he fought, though, he could've beaten most who came before him.