How highly ranked in the all time lists for their division does a fighter need to be, to be considered an ATG in your eyes?
World Rankings, especially now with 20 Fight Champions just don't say enough, and even in better times they still weren't perfect. Ratings have been Corrupted, Court cases can Attest to that. They ARE Good and a great Guide. the Next step is to look at the TOP Countries Top 10 too, so with World Ratings and approx 5 Leading Nation's Own Ratings, you will get a Wider and More Accurate Panaramic Veiw of the Worlds Best Fighters. the Ring Used to Do this with the Top 10 followed by the Next Groups of World Classed Fighters. IF you've Got 3000 Top Fighters competing, you know 10 in each Division, is well short of the mark... I say Top 1-50 and in Strong, Strong Era's maybe even a few more.
Sounds about right. There are a little over 300 boxers in the IBHOF, but I wouldn't call all of them ATGs. Far from it! If we say an average of 20 men from 8 (original) divisions, that gives us 160 names. Even that seems a bit high to me! Of course it all depends, on what people think it takes to be called an ATG.
Logic... If all time greats existed: A: We know them all already B: Mentions of them would have been found from thousands of years ago!
I think it depends on the division. Deeper divisions like lightweight could conceivably have 25+ names that are legitimate greats of the division but that's balanced out by some of the other original weight classes not being as deep historically and the newer divisions being obviously thinner in most cases.