Tony Doyle, a 1960s heavyweight, is a good illustration of the differences between the career/cumulative ratings that are represented as prime in the default data pool and a rating that's actually based upon a fighter's best years---his prime.
Doyle began his professional career in 1963 at the age of nineteen. Although young in years, he had decent boxing skills due to several years as a successful amateur. Throughout the 60s, he was somewhat active, fighting almost every two months.
Following a TKO loss to Joe Bugner in 1972, it would seem that his interest and abilities as the relate to boxing declined. After almost a year off, he returned to the ring to fight just five times until he retired just before he turned thirty-one.
In that closing period, his record was 1-4. He was stopped by Jerry Quarry and Mike Weaver, kayoed by Howard Smith, and dropped a decision to Johnny Boudreux. His lone win was a tuneup ten round decision
over Dick Gosha.
Dolye's rating was revised in the default pool this past April and in most categories is pretty much the same as the one that I've posted below. Yet if you were to sim Doyle separately with the two ratings, you'd wind up with markedly different results.
The key difference here deal with the chin ratings. The default rating has Doyle at 3 for knockdowns and 4 for knockouts. I rate him during his prime at a 2 for each category.
During his twelve year career, Doyle was stopped six times. Four of those stoppages took place in his final six fights when he was past his prime. During his peak years he was kayoed in the last round by Jimmy Ellis in their 1971 meeting and was beaten into a second round TKO loss to Joe Frazier four years earlier.
In his prime he was in the ring with Quarry, Joey Orbillo, and Manual Ramos, sluggers of some means. Doyle lost those fights but went the distance. Which brings up the second difference between the default pool's cumulative rating and the prime rating I've put together---the CF.
Doyle's defalut CF is 8 versus a boxer and 7 against a slugger. For his prime, I levelled the rating out to 7 against both. As I indicated above, Dolyle could go the distance with a slugger in a losing effort, but he also had his problems with boxers as well.
Ellis knocked him out, Joe Bugner stopped him, James J. Woody decisioned him in all three of their meetings, and he dropped a unanimous nod to Larry Middleton.
Just to give you the opposite side of the coin, besides the losses to sluggers already mentioned, he held Quarry to a draw and stopped Amos Lincoln. I should also mention that his 1966 loss to Orbillo was a ten round split-decision. Among the lesser sluggers of the day he halted Vic Brown and decisioned Jack O'Halloran.
Once more, I'm not saying that the default rating is wrong. I'm just pointing out that it really is wrongly labeled. It's a career/cumulative rating which is indeed accurate as an overall assessment of Doyle's twelve year career.
If you were to do an historical recreation of Jerry Quarry's career, for example, and used the default rating, the results would be markedly different from what actually took place. Given the career chin ratings, Doyle would have a very slim chance of going the distance with Quarry, let alone hold him to a draw. The typical result would usually be what happened in their final meeting, when Doyle was past his prime---Quarry by a TKO in four.
As a point of interest, the site below is from the February 21, 1966 issue of
Sports Illustated and provides a nice set of thumbnail sketches of the young heavyweights of the day. Besides Doyle, James J. Woody, Frazier, Ron Marsh, Orbillo, and Buster Mathis are all profiled.
Jerry Quarry will have plenty of company on the way up. - 02.21.66 - SI Vault