- Muhammad Ali would be the last man standing in a tournament featuring boxing's best big men.
- That's according to the former heavyweight world champ's official biographer Thomas Hauser.
- He'd have been unfazed by today's super heavyweights, Hauser claimed.
CANASTOTA, NEW YORK — Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, when the world of sports had shut down, there was little for fans to do aside from watching clips of marbles rolling downhill.
Remember those days?
Back then, fight fans — who had no live combat to watch — were gripped by a computer simulation involving eight of boxing's best-known heavyweight athletes through history, organized in a last-man-standing competition.
Mike Tyson defeated Muhammad Ali in a fantasy final watched by 200,000 people.
This couldn't have been farther from the truth for Ali's biographer Thomas Hauser, who was inducted into the sport's Hall of Fame in Canastota earlier this month.
The reality, according to Hauser, is that Ali would have beaten his rivals from whichever era he could compete.
"If you were able to match all the great heavyweights in history against each other in a round-robin tournament, then Ali would have won when it was all over," Hauser told Insider.
Ali would have beaten today's top fighters, too, Hauser said
Much is made about the modern era of prizefighting in which the heavyweight scene has numerous athletes who tower above other fighters.
The 6-foot-3 Oleksandr Usyk is an anomaly as Tyson Fury, Deontay Wilder, and Anthony Joshua are 6-foot-9, 6-foot-7, and 6-foot-6 and have dominated the division since Fury finished Wladimir Klitschko's reign as king in 2015.
Those physical advantages alone would have put them in great stead against the sluggers from yesteryear, who were typically far shorter, and competed at the 185-pound to 190-pound mark.
"Today's heavyweights would be problematic for many people — like Rocky Marciano, who fought at 186-pounds, and Jack Dempsey, who fought at 188-pounds," Hauser said.
"They could not have been competitive with today's heavyweights," he added.
Ali, though, is different, according to Hauser.
Ali was 6-foot-3 in his peak, much like Usyk, who holds an extraordinary win over the bruising Joshua last year.
But Ali moved like a middleweight, and his boxing skill was exceptional.
"Ali was obviously much bigger, and he was so fast that I would have picked him over any heavyweight fighting today," Hauser said.
