Greats Who Wouldn't Been Seen As Great If Not For Extra Divisions

I'm kind of a traditionalist in that I kind of would like to see boxing go back to the "original 8" plus Cruiserweight to 200. But if boxing had never established more weight divisions, what greats wouldn't have been able to prove their greatness, or not had the career they actually ended up having?

 

Duran

 

I think Duran would be pretty safe still being "great" given besides his great lightweight reign of terror he also beat SRL at Welterweight and won the Middleweight title to boot.

As a matter of fact the only non traditional title he won was at 154 over Davey Moore.

 

Hate to admit it, but Wilfredo Gomez.

 

Oh I thought the question was if fighters didn’t fight through other divisions

 

Duran was already held in very, very high esteem before ever moving up in weight. He was the most dominant champion of the 70s. The most dominant Lightweight since Benny Leonard 50 years prior.

 

Yes but beating Leonard and Barkley really bumps him up in terms of greatness

 

It does but he still would have been very great - ATG great.

 

I'm with Bujia, Gomez was my first thought.

I suppose the question marks hang around the blokes who were longstanding bad motherfeckers in the between classes. Whether or not they'd be diminished as a result or - on the flipside - gain extra tenure and cred for competing in a deeper classic division (should they spring enough good results) is anyone's guess.

You'd imagine that longstanding divisional physical titans like Cervantes, Khaosai, Moon, Lopez, Tszyu etc who made significant use of size and strength are fairly likely to lose effectiveness if forced to step up in event of not being able to boil down. Or kill themselves making the lower weight. Especially the likes of Galaxy feeding on undersized cannon fodder as he often did without facing the best his own niche division had to offer. Or Lopez competing at flyweight etc.

 

Kostya Tszyu and Pryor take away junior welterweight and there in shark water, it may amplify there greatness if they succeed as legitimate welterweights

 

I kind of left the question vague enough so people could interpret it in their own way.

 

Yes but If he never moved up do you really think anyone would pick him to beat prime Leonard, Barkley, or give a tough fight to hagler? He would be considered the greatest at light weight but what he did outside of that division ranks him at a legendary status

 

Yeah I thought Duran was a bizarre pick for this thread myself given that he’s arguably the best lightweight of all time and a pretty damn good welter. Hell he even did ok at middle - all three were traditional weight classes

 

I’ve contemplated before how Joe Calzaghe would do if not for super middle. In the absence of that weight class he’d have to settle at either middle or light heavy. Hard to discern how he’d fair. Guess a lot would depend on which era he was dropped off in and which champions were presiding at the time.

 

Calzaghe and Wilfredo Gomez were who came to mind when I created the thread.