we are...it's called "an analogy"..and it's a perfect one.
both are judged and are subjective.
both are known to have BULLSHIT decisions ( Cutler beating Cormier at the 03 Arnold...this board almost crashed with people saying how fucked up it was )
both have guys who were great in their prime, and then fall off and get beat by lesser opponents.
No, it's not a perfect analogy, for the reason I posted (which you may have missed, since I edited my post.
Those men didn't win the big one. Cutler and Jackson did.
and level of competition isn't a recordable stat, but those of us who look at it objectively recognize that it is a huge factor.
Larry Holmes beat Muhammad ali. Ali went on to win a few other fights, and Holmes was a great Champion. But no one in their right mind would say Holmes was better than Ali. he fought tomato cans, while Ali fought in the most competitive era in heavyweight history.
lots of parallels.
And yes, they never held THE title becuase the "ALIS" of their sport were in the way. Yates and Coleman.
However, Cutler surpassed those guys, supplanting Levrone as the #2 bodybuilder in the world. Eventually, he got to Ronnie and became Mr. O.
In other words, Jay not only beat them. But, he did what they couldn't.
If Yates and Coleman's careers were shifted ten years forward NONE of those guys would have won a damn thing, just like Flex, Chris and Shawn didn't . They had to deal with the two greatest Bodybuilders of all Time....today's top guys face bloated abominations.
This is the part where you say "but X beat Y so he's better"
Listen to what you just said about subjective decisions. You complain about Cutler's win over Cormier over the Arnold Classic. Yet, there are crickets, when it comes to some of Yates' wins, most notably 1994.
If their careers where shifted 10 years forward, Yates' Sandow count would be cut in half. And that of Ronnie by 25%.
WHY? The whole incumbency "knock-the-champ-out" mess is gone.
BTW - there were plenty of "bloated abominations" during the Yates and Coleman era (including Yates and Coleman, themselves). Do the names, Jean-Pierre Fux, Aaron Baker, Paul Dillett, Orville Burke, Markus Ruhl, (just to name a few) ring a bell?