Marciano was a great HW and a boxing legend, but IMO is one of the most overrated boxers of all time, due in large part to the fact that he had a pretty, undefeated record. Well, Sven Ottke also retired undefeated but how many times do you hear his name come up when talking about modern greats? Like mentioned above, there are a LOT of HWs of past and present who would have retired 49-0 had they fought the same opposition.

When I hear people call him the greatest HW of all time, or say that he would have whipped Muhammad Ali (often citing that computer fight, ugh), I feel physically ill. Marciano would have been BRUTALIZED by the bigger HWs after him (Liston, Foreman, Frazier, Tyson, Lewis, Bowe, ect ect) and IMO would have been beat by a few of the HWs before him (including prime Joe Louis and Jack Johnson). He sure as hell would have been outpointed by the bigger, faster, slicker, more skilled guys of the late 60s/70s like Ali, Holmes, probably even guys like JImmy Young.

Even his power is overrated. We've all heard the tales of how he had a heavy bag specially made for him, how he threw punches like he threw fastballs, ect ect. Don't get me wrong, Rocky could hit with the best of them, but he had a "break you down" power, not the huge one-punch bombs that guys like Foreman or Tyson had. Disagree? Watch Rocky's fights against guys like Don Cockell and tell me that you could invision Foreman, shavers, Tyson, Liston, ect hitting Cockell with as many flush punches and Rocky did without him going down.