How many fighters were truly seen as "best of their generation" in history?

Year-by-year shows more than a short peak if a fighter is P4P the best in several of them. We know that Floyd has had a legitimate reign, but it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to force it into some arbitrary 15-year bracket that happens to start from Y2K, which then has each periodic demarcation at its mercy, as you aren't allowing for displacement/overlapping. I appreciate your idea though and enjoy discussing about which fighters truly had a reign over even their greatest contemporaries.

 

I think that's a pretty bad distortion of history. Manny Pacquiao was the better fighter in the early part of their careers but Floyd was the better in the later stages. It's the same as how Roy Jones Jr was better than Hopkins when they were young and now BHop is clearly better. No number of one sided beatings in their old age takes away what Roy Jones was in his prime, and a victory now over a faded Pacman doesn't make Floyd the best fighter of his generation. It makes him the better fighter of the two for the last few years.

Also, imagining that Floyd's supremacy stretches back to 2000 is wishful thinking. That would ignore all the stuff Jones, Mosley, and De La Hoya were doing in the first five years of the century.

It's probably not even safe to pick a fighter of the decade some times because fighters primes don't often fall exactly between 0-9. You got guys like Whitaker eclipsing Chavez Sr in the 90s and Leonard in the 80s. But there were two or three years when he deserved the accolade of greatest.

I like the way Lufcrazy did it in an earlier thread that might still be on the front page here. He broke things down more than year by year. He broke them down month to month, since fighters fight all year round.

 

Yes I "honestly " think that Jack Johnson from 1910 to 1915 was the best heavyweight in the world,but even before he was kod by Jess Willard in 1915 he was a faded heavyweight. So sir, the thread is "the best of 1910-1925" , not meaning because Johnson was a heavyweight who could beat every other fighter, but implies "who was the best fighter,who was so highly regarded by his peers from 1910 to 1925 ? Well give me Benny Leonard, who was considered every bit as great a lightweight champion as the great Ray Robinson,was deemed a great welterweight. And for Harry Greb, from 1915 to 1925 his
phenomenal accomplishments speaks for itself...

 

So Floyd went from being the best fighter over the last 15 years to the best over 25. What's next, hey I know, he must be the best ever.

This whole topic is stupid and basically amounts to PP proclaiming his love for Floyd.

Of all the threads I've read recently this one is probably the most pathetic, and believe me that's saying something.

 

Just because one doesn't think a particular fighter is the best ever, doesn't mean they hate him.

Why do fighter fanatics have to see it as one or the other?

Hell there's still people on this forum that are so deranged that they can't let go of the Lewis - Vtiali decision 12 years ago.

 

It's called extrapolation, look it up. He was the best over the last 15 years, no wait make that 25 years no wait ....

And I also think it's somewhat debateable that he's been the best over the last generation. You seem to think it's not even close, and said in other era's there are 3-4 fighters who could be the best of a generation. I think Pac even though he's faded, has a case, considering he started out at light flyweight which is 105. he never took two years off to avoid certain fighters, and he won more weight divisions than Floyd.

One could make an argument that over the first 7 years of Floyd's career Pac achieved a lot more than Floyd did.

At least it's a contest, despite what you think.

Hopkins winning a title at 49 and breaking Foreman's record is impressive and he's had a great career. Same can be said about Wlad.

That doesn't mean I hate Floyd, it means I think some people highly over rate him.

 

This too is somewhat bogus. In case you've never noticed Floyd has a pretty significant size advantage over both Pac and JMM. Pac started out at what? 105,

Floyd at what? 130

There's a 25lb gap right from the start. What Pac is doing fighting at 147 would be the equivalent of Floyd doing at 168. Now I'm not trying to dump on Floyd, rather I'm trying to help you put things in perspective.

So in terms of eras who don't have a definitive best, add this era to it as well.

 

Don't we already have that? It's call the P4P list

 

If I understand his argument though, Greb wouldnt really be relevant here. (not doubting his greatness of course), but there was a time where he was not really the best, looking at losses to Gibbons brothers and Tunney and only really being considered a world champion for about 4 of those 15 years.

Also, with Greb's prime paralleling that of Benny Leonard for one, (despite the fact that he may very well be one of the greatest if not the greatest ever) you would have to think that he was not really considered by most people of the time to be the greatest fighter of the generation. Dempsey and Tunney would be two others who would have arguable claims. Oh and no way do you get any Australians of that era to rank him anywhere near Les Darcy either. I think that Benny Leonard might just shade the era and qualify.

I think Bob Fitzsimmons is the obvious example who has been missed on this thread. Although at times he was rated behind Corbett, he ultimately beat him. Perhaps you could say he was rated behind Jackson as well, but I am not sure you could say with hindsight, Jackson was the better pound for pound fighter, just at a more advanced stage of his career. Even when he lost to Jeffries, Pound for pound you could still have had him at number one because of the huge weight difference. From about 1885 to to 1900 (perhaps a little longer) he could be considered to be without pier.

Without confirming dates i would think that the following guys would have to be close to consideration:
Fitzsimmons - as stated
John L Sullivan - Without pier his whole career until just before he lost to Corbett.
Sam Langford - Has to be a pretty close call. Probably considered the best for most of his career, although i am not sure how you reconcile the struggles with Blackburn and the thrashing by JOhnson. I think he does qualify, although technically Johnson himself has a pretty arguable case.
Joe Louis - Pretty much his whole career, despite the Schmelling loss.
Ray Robinson - goes without saying until age and weight ultimately caught him.
Muhammed Ali - Tough one, because you have to consider the parallel with several other great champions like Monzon, but i think Ali does s****e in, just.
Roy jones - I think that up until the Tarver fights, he probably qualifies comfortably here.
Floyd Mayweather - I do agree he probably does qualify.

There are others who had dominance for most of their career. but who were not necessarily considered the number one fighter because of other better pound for pound fighters around. Spinks, Moore, Foster, Ryan, McAuliffe, Armstrong, Pep, Chavez, Leonard, Monzon are a few who spring to mind and some of these could easily expand the above list.

There are also some other guys who have a shorter but more explosive and dominant career. Thinking of guys like: McGovern, Ketchell, Dempsey, Tyson and co.