earnie shavers: the hardest heavyweight puncher ever?

[Andre]

I don't think that question will ever be answered.

If we go by end result: No man has ever been injured the way Jess Willard was against Dempsey: broken orbital bone, fractures, teeth(several) knocked out...

Not saying Dempsey hits harder than Shavers or Tua or Tyson, or Wlad.. hell sounds like loaded gloves, but we dont know that either...so how else can a question be answered without it being subjective as opposed to objective?

Yeah and theres a lot more things to consider too, like more rounds and a lot less fucking around (less technique) the further back you go in history, thinner the gloves get too.Some modern guys wouldnt hold up, some of the leaders now would dominate.
With less training and evasive techniques back then you'd need a solid chin or a decent reserve to last.The championship rounds as once were, have been taken away over the years from no end of rounds, to 20 rounds ,down to 15, all for fighters safety no other reason. For that alone we need to stretch our thoughts out a bit more than just straight comparisons between then and now.
Dudes are getting bigger now too, even the Asians since eating more meat are shooting out some giants of their own.
Some modern fighters who are not top skill level can still do it the old way, look at Hatton probably not what you would call a natural, he used to train for 20 rounders that won him what it did got him as a far as it could.
Then you got some lazy fighters who rely on heavy hands and a good beard, same thing in all eras.
The lines all cross in many ways it isnt clean cut.

[Max Power]

Yeah and theres a lot more things to consider too, like more rounds and a lot less fucking around (less technique) the further back you go in history, thinner the gloves get too.Some modern guys wouldnt hold up, some of the leaders now would dominate.

Boxers have become more evasive and developed technique the closer to the present because of much harder punches in the HW's. The sport has also evolved more professionally, back then it was more of a "tough man contest" today they are elite athletes.

Thinner gloves presents a bit of a puzzle. You would THINK that the power of the punch is greater with thinner gloves but in fact, this exact thing was busted on that sports science show. Turned out that the amount of force transferred to the head was exactly the same (it is spread over wider portion of the head and leads to an identical concussive force. Thinner gloves obviously though leads to more structural damage to the skin, skull and sensory organs. For this reason however, fights were often stopped when the boxer had become disfigured (which would never be allowed today) but it is believed there are more cases of brain damage today than then because the boxer can receive more punches for longer.

It is unclear whether a modern boxer would want to BE a boxer under such conditions. But were they to accept I am quite certain they could dominate it. The reverse would be next to impossible I believe, but that's just an opinion.

You also mentioned rounds. More rounds generally equates to featherfists. As a rule, the more rounds fought, either the lighter the boxers, the more featherfisted the boxers in it, and/or the plans have failed or were compromised by the opponent.