Miguel Cotto: Has the lineal champ ever had any less of a claim to being No.1?

Yeah, there is one currently that goes by the name of Adonis Stevenson.

 

I was just thinking about how weak the light heavyweight champions Battling Siki and Mike McTigue were from 1922-1925. Ring starts doing ratings in 1924 and lists McTigue the champ at number 4 in his division after Gene Tunney, Young Stribling, and Kid Norfolk. Future champions Paul Berlenbach, and Tommy Loughran are also mentioned in the top 10 that year, which could mean that the champ was maybe the 6th best fighter in his division.

In the 40s Gus Lesnevich was champ at light heavyweight instead of Ezzard Charles or Archie Moore. Then the awful Freddie Mills took over from 48-50 with guys like Archie Moore, Joey Maxim, Lloyd Marshal, and Harold Johnson under him.

Someone already mentioned Freddie Cochrain was welterweight champ from 41-46 even though Ray Robinson and Charlie Burley were in the division. It looks like Fritzie Zivic, Holman Williams, and Cocoa Kid were in the division too.

 

I believe it's Cotto. He's not even prepared to let opponents fight as fully fledged middleweights.
I don't know how he's allowed to get away with it.

 

This is one of those instances where "lineage" means squat..

 

Lewis was still the residing lineal champion.

 

I don't think most people did. Foreman went years without a legit defense, had no belts from any sanctioning bodies, was approaching the age of 50 and arguably got robbed anyway. Calling Briggs " the champ" was a fraudulent ploy to try to sell the guy.

 

I was just thinking ,wouldn't it be funny if Cotto took the fight and sparked GGG out? I wonder what those so anxious to anoint GGG as a combination of SRR/Monzon?Hagler ,would say about that?

 

shannon
briggs

 

Briggs is just a good example of how silly and synthetic the whole lineage idea is.

 

There are times and instances when mention of it is valid.. But it needs to be taken on a case by case basis and not used as a blanket concept which takes precedence over all other factors

 

But you either accept the lineal idea or you don't. If you do, then for a period of time Shannon Briggs was the lineal heavyweight champion. Picking and choosing which lineal champions to accept rather defeats the object of it all. That's why I don't take it very seriously.

 

Is kinda like chess, ya know. The best player in the world and the world champion are not the same thing, not always at least. To win the title you have to win the world championship, that's it. Euwe wasn't better than Alekhine or Capablanca (maybe not even Fine or Reshevsky); Fischer was the best player in the world for a few years before he won the title; Carlsen was ranked number 1 by a wide margin going into his challenge (and Anand was not even number 2 if I'm not mistaken).

Bottom line is the champion is simply the champion with no other literal meaning.

 

Cotto would have more cred if he actually fought at middleweight not some stupid catchweight all the time..