Home Boxing News 10 Hardest Punchers In Boxing

10 Hardest Punchers In Boxing

Gennady Golovkin
Photo Credit: Anthony Saldana

Artur Beterbiev

ike some of his contemporaries on the list it remains to be
seen just how quickly the foes will fold once Beterbiev steps up to the highest level but ‘Beter-beast’ has certainly been passing the eye test. The Canadian-based Russian holds an amateur win over Sergey Kovalev so a professional clash between the two would
be an intriguing collision of bangers, with a back story to match. Beterbiev is 11-0 with 11 knockouts and has dispatched the likes of Gabriel Campillo, Jeff Page and Tavoris Cloud with the minimum of fuss. It’s the manner of the wins that has stood out. His
come-forward, walk-you-down approach, throwing every shot with vicious intent, has excited fight fans. Artur, however, has had promotional disputes with the PBC and needs to be extremely more active if he is to test his power against the chins of the light-heavyweight
elite.

Sergey Kovalev

Kovalev has won 30 of his 33 bouts (one draw) to date, with
26 opponents falling early The Russian hits every bit as hard as his 79% knockout ratio suggests. In 2013 he travelled to Wales to forcibly remove Nathan Cleverly’s WBO light-heavyweight crown. Ringside observers still speak of the thudding sound that emanated
from the gloves of Kovalev that night as he smacked the hometown hero around the ring, hurting him with shot after shot from the first bell. Kovalev later laid two sickening beatings on Canada-based Jean Pascal, even taunting Pascal’s daughter at ringside
as her father lay stricken on the ropes. “Kovalev is a magnificent bastard,” joked Boxing Asylum contributor Andy Paterson after the second beating. In 2013, top former amateur Ismayl Sillah led Kovalev a merry dance in the early rounds of their encounter
before Kovalev nearly folded him in half. A brutal, uncompromising puncher at his best.

Naoya Inoue

This baby-faced destroyer has blitzed 11 of his 13 victims.
18-1-1Ryoichi Taguchi was being dispatched in only Inoue’s fourth bout. Faded veterans Omar Narvaez and Kohei Kono have been felled, while savvy Mexican David Carmona lasted the 12 rounds in 2016. Naoya, 24, showed in that bout that he can box and move a bit too. Will the Japanese
boxer’s lauded power carry up in levels when he inevitably mixes with the likes of Roman Gonzalez, Carlos Cuadras or Juan Francisco Estrada? Time will tell.

Keith Thurman

Once branding himself with the moniker ‘One Time’, Thurman
has been taking a little longer to dispatch the opposition of late. Four of his last five opponents have heard the final bell, barring Luis Collazo who retired on his stool, but that probably has more to do with the fact that 28-year-old Thurman has stepped
up the levels. Carlos Quintana and Diego Chaves are probably his most notable knockout victims and the power is always there if needed.

David Lemieux

A criticism that often gets thrown at the Canadian is his inability
to mix up the boxing skills with ferocious power, but when you can hit as hard as Lemieux can, why would you need to? His limitations have been exposed at times during a successful career, most notably when he was dissected off the back of a Gennady Golovkin jab. No shame there though. Marco Antonio Rubio, who can dig himself, caught Lemieux cold in 2011 before Joachim Alcine miraculously avoided his power enough to outbox him in the same year. David bounced back with a string of wins, including knockouts of decent Fernando Guerrero and the ubiquitous Gabe Rosado. Most recently Glen Tapia and, particularly, Curtis Stevens felt the burn of Lemieux’s punches. The latter was knocked cold and exited the ring on a stretcher, in a clash of huge bangers.

Gennady Golovkin

Any boxing fan will know that this entrant goes without saying.
Golovkin mixes excellent fundamental boxing skills with thudding power in both hands. The Kazakh beast has a way of stalking his opponents, hunting them down with subtle footwork and traps, before pinning them in a favourable position and letting the shots
go. This exemplifies the benefits of being a skilled technician in the ring. What is the point of being a hard puncher if you are unable to manoeuvre your opponents into range to let the shots? This, for me, is the most impressive thing about Golovkin, who
has knocked out 33 opponents in 37 fights and has a career-defining night on September 16 in Las Vegas against Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez. Will the Mexican be the next man to fall?

Anthony Joshua

Boasting 19 wins on his record, Joshua has starched all 19
foes inside the distance. Kevin Johnson, who doesn’t get stopped easily, was belted early and Joshua finally got rid of Dillian Whyte after being buzzed himself in the London grudge match. Hapless Charles Martin -one of the worst heavyweight “champions” of
all time- handed his belt over for a wad of cash in 2016 and tough Dominic Breazeale even folded after a sustained beating. Joshua’s biggest win to date came earlier this year when legendary heavyweight Wladimir Klitschko brought a war to the O2 in a fantastic
contest that many, including myself, have as a front runner for Fight of the Year.

Adonis Stevenson

It’s a shame Stevenson doesn’t fight more often and against
better opposition because the fast-handed Haitian can crack. Just ask Chad Dawson, whom he wrestled the WBC light-heavyweight title from in June, 2013. It was Stevenson’s huge signature left hand that landed in the opening round, splaying ‘Bad’ Chad’s senses
and announcing a new star on the circuit. Unfortunately, a lacklustre string of title defences has left fight fans frustrated as Adonis ploughed his way through mandatory and voluntary contenders of a lesser quality rather than face off with the likes of Sergey
Kovalev, Andre Ward, Jean Pascal or Lucian Bute. Not all of the blame can be placed at his door of course, but now competing in his 40th year, ‘Superman’ needs to step out of the comfort zone and test his chilling one-punch power against his contemporaries.

Deontay Wilder

There’s no doubting the punching power of boxing beanpole Wilder,
who has made a habit of removing his victims early. The one cloud that hovers over Deontay’s knockout streak is the fact that many of the earlier opponents were of a dubious quality, to put it mildly. That said, there’s no doubt he can crack hard. Just ask
Artur Spilka who was viciously removed from his senses in early 2016. The ‘Bronze Bomber’ is pretty unorthodox and extremely excitable whenever he gets his foes going. He can often be seen jumping in with huge looping, windmill punches to finish the job. Audley
Harrison was seen off in this manner. This is what makes the Alabama finisher so unpredictable and dangerous. It was a shame that his biggest test to date was cancelled due to the fact that Russia’s Alexander Povetkin can’t seemingly stop himself from using
PEDs. Wilder badly needs a test to see if his power legitimately deals with the division’s elite.

Dmitry Kudryashov

Here’s an intimidating character if ever you saw one. ‘The
Russian Hammer’ looks every bit the ferocious puncher that he is. Despite his technical limitations, if Kudryashov hits your clean then you will know about, or, more to the point, you don’t know about it until you wake up. The 31-year-old has knocked out opponents
in all 21 of his wins, with only one loss scouring the record, when he was stopped by Olanrewaju Duradola in 2015. That’s the thing about Kudryashov, if you can take his shots and wait for him to gas out, as the African did, then you have a chance of exposing
his flaws and lack of defence. The pair had a rematch and, rather unsurprisingly, the Russian gained revenge via stoppage, but has the blueprint been laid out to beat him? Yunier Dorticos will certainly hope so when he tackles Kudryashov on September 23 as
part of the World Boxing Super Series cruiserweight tournament. The problem is, of course, what happens if the ‘Hammer’ lands a big shot first?