In today's Sun newspaper it's long serving boxing scribe,Colin Hart gave us his top five 147 lb men - Sugar Ray Robinson Sugar Ray Leonard Jose Napoles Barney Ross Ted 'Kid' Lewis I definitely agree with numbers one and two. Good cases can be made for 3 - 5. What does everyone else think ?
Nothing really badly wrong there. Britton McLarnin Hearns Whittaker Armstrong Trinidad DelaHoya Pacquiao Mayweather Gavilan There's a lot of quality at147lbs!
Lewis a bit too high, for me. Borderline top 10 Welter but never top five for me. Given that he hammered a slightly worn but still top-down Ross, made more defences of the true 147 lb title than even any alphabet titlist has made of their belt I'm a little surprised that Hart hasn't got Armstrong in there. He's not quite the head-to-head monster at 147 that he is at 135, but I couldn't leave a guy with that record out of the top five. Could change any day but I'd probably go 1) Robinson 2) Leonard 3) Armstrong 4) Napoles 5) Gavilan
i'd assume he felt to, or was told to try and include a british fighter, but in fairness after the top 3/4 there are a bunch of names to pick from.
Yeah that's right, in an ND fight too so it was the only way for him to win that fight. Non-puncher knocking out a guy who doesn't get knocked out.
I think Ray Leonard's overrated there. I suppose it depends on how high you rate Benitez, Hearns and Duran as welters.
I think Colin Hart and the rest of you guys are being too hard on the great masters from the 19th century! Take a look at the all-time top 5 welterweights in the opinion of Tracy Callis... a historian who has spent a lifetime studying the old-timers, and someone who should know what he's talking about: 1 - Sugar Ray Robinson 2 - Nonpareil Jack Dempsey 3 - Kid McCoy 4 - Tommy Ryan 5 - Joe Walcott
I'm surprised you read the sun for a start.as for those five, the two rays must be in plus tommy hearns. The other two I don't know.
Yes, but I don't think he did enough to be placed #2 of all-time in that weight class. He won the title in '79, lost it in '80, won it back in '80, and made his last defence in '82 .. and never fought as a WW again. Only 32 fights as a welter, maybe 10 against contenders, total. Like I said, you'd have to rate Benitez, Duran and Hearns as truly elite ATG welters too, to make that case. With the competition for places in the WW all-time list being up against some champions who had 100, 200, 300+ fights sometimes mostly at that weight.