Its an interesting question, a lot of Journeymen start off as prospects full of hope optimism and ambition, and they become journeyman for a verity or reasons, not having the stamina of determination and Mindset to sacrifice comforts to succeed, becoming disillusioned with the 'Slog' when other less demanding opportunities exist outside the sport (Business !!) Bad Management who do not seek to nuture the Prospect and steer a proper course through the choppy waters of the apprenticship years, but seek to throw then into the Lions Den at any given opportunity, and at Short Notice... thus turning them into a 'Have Bag will travel ' Opponent. a lot of good Journeymen could of achieved more with their Talent but one or more of these obstacles contrived to turn them into ' Parties of the second part..' - so simply transplanting a good 'Old Pro' from the past to the present may not work... if the desire disipline.. and Management are not in place. he may still end up as an Honest Trier.. who's never going to set the world on Fire... i remember in the early 70's when looking at the Ring Magazine's Rings around the world section, quite a few Regular Faces kept popping up giving spirited efforts, Carlos Marks, was one Tom Bethea another and indeed Old Tom pulled off a few upsets on his Travels, but i still do not think they would be forefront stars today. they were what they were part of the sports Backbone, and the stars couldnt exist without them. A name i will offer is Love Allotey, a real Globetrotter always fit and talented, perhaps today with a little luck...? his Brother Bob was not bad either. ill
Maybe some of the best journeyman who fought under the Cruiserweight limit ( 200 pounds ) could be in the top 5 today at Cruiserweight.
The circumstances that made a fighter a career journeyman was not a matter of too much talent in others but the lack of talent and management of the journeyman
the balance beween talent and management is different between different journeymen, though. Also, some fightes that have journeyman talent, have good management and start out really well because of good matchmaking. Eventually, the good management cannot compensate for lack ot talent and the fighter becomes a journeyman or retires. Jesse Burnett is an example of a guy who was thrown in with good fighters early and often. He also fought in the 175 lb. division when it was at a high period in terms of quality fighters. Once the cruiserweight division was established, he made a mark with a win of Galindez. Burnett had the combination of offense and defense to contend in weaker era's of the 175 division.
Perhaps with all the titles around today possibly Clinton Mckenzie , lloyd christie , pat Barrett , Roy gumbs , James cook
Burnett should have got the win over Spinks, but didn't. I could not believe they robbed him of that one. Moreover, I could not believe they did not give him the decision over Conteh. Just a draw was ludicrous. Burnett was a hard luck fighter. Still, he held some nice wins in his career over Yaqui Lopez (twice), Tony Mundine (twice), Bossman Jones, Windmill White and Lonnie Bennett. He also had Miguel Cuello down in his only title fight - which he was a last minute sub - but was so jet-lagged getting to Europe on short notice that he was exhausted and got stopped in 9. Again, total hard-luck fighter.