4 belt era.. most impressive first .. we've had Taylor, Bhop, Taylor, Crawford , Usyk, Juicenelo so far .. best to worst?
B-Hop beat Keith Holmes, Tito and Oscar to become 4 belt unified Crawford beat Postol and Indongo Usyk beat Breidis and Gassiev Taylor beat Prograis and Ramirez Canelo beat Smith, BJS, and Plant 1. B-Hop 2. Usyk 3. Taylor 4. Canelo 5. Crawford Taylor and Usyk could switch if Ramirez and Prograis continue to win and become champions again like Breidis.
Yeah although he was undisputed he didn’t make a run to undisputed if that makes sense. He beat B-Hop who already had all the belt whereas everyone I listed actually had to unify the belts.
^ Crawford also beat Ricky Burns in Scotland to lift the WBO title before unifying against the other two.
1. B-Hop 2. Canelo 3. Usyk 4. Crawford 5. Taylor My thoughts on how I ranked them: B-Hop - Tito and Oscar were multi-weight champions Canelo - Smith was Ring Champion and Ali Trophy winner Usyk - Breidis and Gassiev were pretty impressive and very technically skilled, but wouldn't have been names if they weren't fighting for the Ali trophy Crawford - Postol was impressive, but no one else of note Taylor- Prograis and Ramirez are young champions and not particularly impressive to me
Gotta correct you. Smith was not a unified champion they fought for his WBA belt and the vacant WBC belt. IMO Taylor gets the edge over Crawford because his best win was Postol and Taylor and Ramirez beat Postol. Prograis and Ramirez is much better than Indongo who also was KO’d faster by Prograis in his very next fight after Bud. It’s hard for me to put Canelo over Usyk or Taylor because Plant and BJS didn’t have a signature elite level win and Smith arguably lost to Ryder in his previous fight. Those guys played it safe and waited for the Canelo fight while feasting on C level fights.
Smith. He wasn't unified. He was also fairly inactive and coming off of a debatable decision over B level Ryder. Looked dead at the weight too. Smiths a decent fighter when he's on form but his career has turned out to be a huge letdown. I don't expect much from him from now on to be honest. Saunders has zero legacy at 168 & Plant has done very little too. Again not a fighter I think will do much henceforth… the division is a wasteland.
There fixed it. Ring champ and Ali trophy champ. People may not thing much of Smith or 168, but I think it's better than cruiserweight and 140. I consider Smith's accomplishments much higher than the other guys Usyk, Taylor or Crawford had to face.
I don’t know man I’m actually struggling to put Canelo’s run over Bud and it’s not his fault at all. Since he’s been at 160 and 168 all the other fighters take soft touches in hopes of keeping their 0 and getting their name picked as his next opponent. So they all have pretty weak resumes to begin with. Smith did defeat Groves but let’s not act like Groves was a world beater when his best win was Eubank Jr. He proceeds to fight N’Jikam and gets a highly controversial decision over Ryder. BJS looked horrible against Isufu and Coceres(Who?) then beat a clearly shot Murray before getting Canelo. Plant beat Uzcategai, then go on a bum of the month spree vs Mike Lee, Feigenbutz and old shots Truax who actually rocked him. Canelo did no wrong but those guys had absolutely no legacies at 168 whatsoever.. At least Indongo as bad as he was unified with Ricky Burns before getting KO’d in 3 of his next 4 fights. It really should rank like this tbh B-Hop Usyk/Taylor Canelo/Bud
Those are trinkets mate, what is the substance? Groves. Who was coming off of shoulder surgery and then retired. Do you honestly think somebody like George Groves posed more of a threat than someone like Gassiev or Breidis? How many times had Groves lost again? 3? Groves was decent I rated him , but he was also at the end of his career and not the fighter he was. That tournament was the worst too .. Cox, Skoglund, Eubank, Yildrim etc .. Come on .. CW shat all over it LOL Also the condition of Smith going into the Canelo fight had to be noted .. his career had stalled and many people thought he'd already lost to Ryder.. Smith had also had a couple of lacklustre performances in the super series too.. he's not consistent. Not buying it. Canelos unification was weak.
One the state of boxing is in a weak state overall. Two I think it's easy to down any fighter because of it, so most of this is just posturing. Three let's look at this at a few angles. Lineal championships 1. Last lineal champion at 168 was Andre Ward, which he left behind when he went up to 175 back in 2015. Smith established a new lineage when he won the Ring championships against Groves in 2018. Canelo beat the Ring champ and the new lineal champ at 168. So his lineage goes back a generation. 2. All the lineal champs at cruiserweight and 140 moved on so Usyk, Taylor and Crawford had to establish new lineages. So there is no question that BHOP has the best reign, but out of the 4 champs in question Canelo is the only one to beat a lineal and Ring champ. Second level their competition However going off the list of their best wins we have Smith, Postol, Prograis, Ramirez, Gassiev and Briedis. 140 - third level the competitions competition Taylor's and Crawfords most impressive win was against Postol. Postol is 1-3 in world title fights. Taylor's next best win is Prograis who is 1-1 in world championship fights. Ramirez best wins are against Maurice Hooker and Postol who were not very experienced themselves. So yeah Smith is definitely better than them. Cruiserweight - third level the competitions competition Gassiev's and Briedis also have somewhat thin resume's themselves. Gassiev's best wins are against Lebedev and Dorticos who also have thing resume's and Briedis best wins are Charr, Huck, and Dorticos. So Briedis won the Ring belt against Dorticos who is 2-1 in world championship fights himself. Basically the further down we go down their resume's the competition isn't all that experienced or accomplished either. At the end of the day we have to rely on a bit of record and eye test. Yeah Smith is better than Postol, Prograis, Ramirez, Gassiev. Smith is about equal to Briedis in terms of accomplishments, both ring champs who beat lesser inexperienced titlists, however Smith was lineal and Ring champ when Canelo beat him, while Briedis won his RIng championship after Usyk moved on.
Hasn't Canelo just begun a new lineage by beating Plant? i.e. Calum Smith was not the lineal champion. The #1 DeGale and #2 Ramirez didn't enter the tournament. When the fight happened George Groves had climbed to #1, but Smith was #3 or lower. Maybe that is enough for The Ring Magazine belt. I'm not disputing that Smith was #1 after the win, btw.
