Why do people rate Donald curry so highly?

Well Curry and McCrory were the best of their time and Leonard/Hearns were rare talents. You can only fight the best of your time and Curry did that in his almost four years as a WW champion.

 

I thought in his relatively short prime he was sensational.
He was like a coiled spring right there in front of his opponents in the pocket.
Excellent fundamentals, a sharp hitter with good power who didn’t waste much, a real intimidating presence.
I loved watching him at this time.

 

People can brag Curry was a unified champ. But if they are going to claim he unified the belts by beating the best welterweights to unify, that's not true.

He beat Jun Suk Hwang, Milton McCrory and NOBODY to win three welterweight belts.

 

I agree. Curry beat most of the best welterweights of his day. He clearly didn't beat Honeyghan. I just don't think Curry and the best welterweights of his day were any better than the best welterweights today.

In fact, you can make an argument the best welterweights today are better. They certainly aren't worse.

 

It's all about context. It's easy enough now to read some ledger on Boxrec this many years on and see no names you recognize in your few years following the sport and immediately dismiss his accomplishments as nothing much but was absolutely terrific for however brief a time he was on top. And as mentioned, he was considered at the time (late 85 until the Honeyghan loss) to be the very best P4P fighter in the world. In THAT era, that's saying something.

If one chooses to so readily dismiss that out of hand then perhaps it says more about that person's lack of historical perspective than anything it suggests about Curry.

 

It didn't make sense then, and it doesn't now. (LOL)

How do you become the #1 pound-for-pound by knocking out freaking Milton McCrory? Like I said earlier, writers and boxing people at the time heaped all this value on them really early on that they never earned.

When Leonard retired and Hearns, Benitez and Duran moved up, it was like they decided Curry was the new Leonard, McCrory as the new Hearns, Starling was the new Benitez and Colin Jones was ... who knows what. (A poor man's Dave "Boy" Green LOL).

Curry had no business being rated #1 pound for pound. A number of fighters have held that designation who had no business holding it. He's one. Curry, McCrory and Starling were just good welterweights. Nothing really more than that. By the time Curry and McCrory were 25, they started losing and it should've been clear to people they weren't what people thought they were going to be.

But they just kept giving them passes. To this day, they do.

Danny Garcia, Keith Thurman, Shawn Porter, Errol Spence ALL have better wins than those guys. None of the current guys have loses as bad as those guys.

And people, 35 years later are still giving Curry a pass for his loss to Honeyghan because he struggled losing weight. Freaking Errol Spence had a high speed car crash that launched him out of the car and knocked all his teeth out. And he's fighting Garcia next. That's a little more to overcome than Curry had to endure before a fight.

But, 35 years from now, if Spence loses to Garcia, are people going to say "Well, he was in a car wreck." Or will they say Spence just wasn't as good as we thought? Or that era just wasn't as good?

I'm not trying to bash Curry and his era. They were all good. Just like today's guys are overall solid. I just don't hold Curry's era up to some lofty height. I didn't then. I don't now.

 

Please, Garcia's win over who is better than Starling?

 

Garcia is a two-division champ. Has two wins over Erik Morales (first ballot Hall of Famer). Win over Zab Judah. Win over Lucas Matthysse. Win over Peterson. Stopped Amir Khan. Stopped Malignaggi. Win over Holt. Lost to razor-close fights to Thurman in a unification and Porter for a belt (I thought he beat Porter). Fighting Spence next.

Starling beat Honeyghan, Breland, Brown and lost to Blocker, lost to Vilella, lost to Bumphus, was starched by Molinares ... it's all comparable. Starling didn't beat any Hall of Famers. Neither did Curry. Neither did McCrory.

 

I concur, for the most part, with @Dubblechin. I don’t know that today’s welters are on par with or any better — that’s a different kettle of fish — but Curry was anointed ‘next big thing’ and ultimately didn’t deliver.

He was, for certain, the best welter of his day for a period of time. If he didn’t clean out the division, he certainly cleaned it up pretty well.

But here’s the thing, ultimately: he was very good (maybe exceptional) at welter but he couldn’t make 147 comfortably even for most of his title run there. And when he moved up, he couldn’t compete at the top level above 147. Thus it seems pretty obvious if he had been vaulted into a ‘created’ super-showdown with Marvin Hagler he would have had been most likely destroyed.

He was a very good offensive fighter. Exceptional reflexes. I think he had legit power. But he also squared up too much (shoulders more than feet), he didn’t present much of a puzzle (footwork-wise or in changing his level by bending his knees much) or work well off the back foot as I recall and boy how he left that chin up in the air and just dangling to be hit (especially when he punched). I always thought he was very stiff and never really relaxed. Robotic.

I thought Simon Brown, who didn’t quite overlap with him at welter, was a much more dangerous fighter and better at his peak.

Curry did have those 400 amateur fights (what the hell were his handlers thinking?) and maybe he left his best in the three-round ranks.

Good fighter. At his very best maybe great. But nowhere near ATG.

 

So, his wins over a completely shot Morales is the wins that are better than Curry's over Starling? Are you sure this is the line of thinking you want to go down?

 

What are you talking about? I was comparing Danny Garcia and Marlon Starling.

Porter and Thurman defeating Garcia is certainly equal to Curry decisioning Starling.

Starling wasn't any better than Garcia, as I pointed out by who Starling and Garcia both beat and lost to. Garcia never lost to someone like Pedro Vilella or got obliterated by someone like Molinares.

 

No, in the first post I quoted you said:

"Danny Garcia, Keith Thurman, Shawn Porter, Errol Spence ALL have better wins than those guys."

So I asked, who did Garcia beat who was better than Starling (Curry's best win), and the first name you replied with was a shot Erik Morales. Garcia lost to Herrera, and he was never hit with such a horrendous punch after the bell.

So I ask again, is Garcia's win over a shot El Terriblé, better than Curry's win over Starling?

 

Zab Judah was a two-division champ and a former undisputed Welterweight champ. Lucas Matthyse was a multi-division champ and one of the hardest punchers of his era. Erik Morales was a first-ballot Hall of Famer and a three-division champ.

Neither of Curry's wins (the non-title fight or the title defense) over Starling is a better win than a win over any of those guys. Pedro Vilella beat Starling. Johnny Bumphus beat Starling. You know that, right? Starling finally won belts at welter when everybody freaking left. And then he lost belts to Molinares and Blocker.

I know you drank the Kool-Aid when it comes to Curry's era. Marlon Starling was a good veteran fighter who went on a brief run when the division kind of cleared out. Don't act like he was any better than he was. Or that Garcia didn't beat guys as good or better than Curry or Starling did.

The guys then all fought and lost to each other. Curry beat Starling and lost to Honeyghan. Honeyghan beat Curry but lost to Starling and Breland. Breland lost to Starling but beat Honeyghan. Same as Garcia and Thurman and Porter and Spence all fighting and winning and losing to each other.

That era was no better than this one.

 

He was the sharpest puncher you'll see.

 

Right on point here X. Thurman, Porter or Garcia may have been, with the emphasis on "may have " been top 8-15 welters in the world but for damn sure they haven't shown the skill level prime and focused Curry showed. Not even in the Ball Park. As for Crawford who seems to avoid the best competition, and Spence at 32 and 30 respectively how much better can they get? Especially with their lack of activity ( Understanble in Spence's case) Personally I don't believe anyone of them would've beaten Marlon Starling, and much Less Donald Curry.