Is Canelo the Greatest Super Middleweight of all time?

I'll adjust my statement — it's hard to make a substantive case. The accomplishment (Undisputed) looks great on paper, but, when you look at who he beat to earn it, it falls into perspective. Same goes for the general dominance over the opposition. Best guy was Billy Joe Saunders, a darn good scalp, even if hardly in a rich vein of active form.

It's a creditable 168 body of work, just not creditable enough to take him past Joe or Andre, even Froch.


I realise you're here to bat hard for Canelo, though, and that's fine. Threads need different views for the sake of argument.

 

None of Canelos wins at SMW are that noteworthy. 168 is so weak compared to the days of yore and I don't think that's nostalgia talking. I rate old inactive BJS as his best SMW win. People are talking about an untested Benavides when Canelo hasn't even fought him. And like someone said earlier, how can Benavides even become "tested" when 168 is so damn weak?

Calzaghe and Ward would embarrass him.
Kessler would manhandle him.
Froch would decapitate him.
I reckon prime Groves would give him a schooling.
I would pay to see Lacy vs Canelo and I imagine it would be extremely competitive.

The 168'ers of then we're too strong, too big, and the division was so stacked, I think current 168 and Canelo's resume at 168 is a far far cry from then. No fault of his own. I would've liked to see a prime BJS vs Canelo , but at MW.

 

I just don't see it personally, there are other more worthy contenders. He has a solid resume of that there isn't much doubt however someone like Calzaghe for me is simply the better fighter of the two.

 

Anyone arguing FOR Canelo as the greatest SprMW of all time is very likely an idiot troll...

 

I'm not saying Canelo is better than a Prime SMW RJJ. There's "better" then there's "Greater". Greater puts more of an empharsis on accomplishments, Better puts more of an emphasis on the eye test, and perhaps level of competition. But it's not just level of competition. Who was the better SMW win, Toney or GGG? Who was more dangerous in their prime? GGG. Who was slicker and more skilled, and harder to outbox? Toney. But Toney as we know wasn't at his best when he fought RJJ, GGG was 40 when he fought Canelo at SMW. So it's not just who you fought if we're talking about better, then it's also what version of them were they were you fought them. Floyd claims he's the GOAT for being 50-0, but was he better in his prme than RJJ in his prime. Of course not. Roy in his prime was on a whole nother level. But is Floyd generally seen as "Greater" as an all around fighter than RJJ considering he was never stopped, retired undefeated, etc.

So in terms of accomplishments, Canelo is the GOAT SMW, due to being Undisputed and the level of dominance in his fights at the weight. But was he the best SMW of All-Time, no I don't think so. There's RJJ, Calzaghe, Ward. That's debatable, but at the same time Canelo isn't done yet. Depends on how long he reigns as Undisputed, who he beats in his defenses, etc. SMW Prime RJJ vs SMW Canelo would not be a one-sided fight. As great as he was, I don't see RJJ stopping Canelo. Canelo's too tough, Canelo's also good at cutting off the ring when he's in seek and destroy mode. He could present problems for RJJ if he can connect on a big shot.

 

Very fair points. Undisputed is only a part of it, a big part of it, but still only one part of it. Longevity is also important. How dominant you were is important too. If Canelo loses at some point, then you could say but Calzaghe, Ward or RJJ never lost at SMW. But then again, they never become Undisputed either. If Canelo reigns as Undisputed for many years, and beats some good up and coming fighters, he'll have a great argument, but it'll always be debatable. We just gotta see how his career plays out.

 

Not really batting hard for Canelo, just saying there's an easy argument to make for him given that he's Undisputed and given how dominant he's been at the weight. But of course there's also good arguments for Joe, Andre, RJJ, or Froch. Everyone brings something different to the table to make their case that they're the Greatest SMW. And Canelo isn't done, so even if he's not there yet in your mind, he still has an opportunity to add to his legacy. It will be interesting to see how long he can reign as Undisputed. It's one thing to become Undisputed, which is a rare feat, but to reign as Undisputed for a long time that would be even rarer and more impressive.

 

Mundine.

 

Pretty easy question clearly Toney is the better win, how many fights has Golovkin at Super Middleweight ? and what has he achieved at the weight ? to my knowledge the 3rd Canelo fight is his only fight at Super Middleweight.

Golovkin has also only had 4 fights since 2018 going into the 3rd Canelo fight, looking less than impressive and beatable vs Murata, Derevyanchenko, also at the ripe old age of 40 as you pointed out.

James Toney was the IBF World Champion had a record of 44-0, and had some of his most impressive performances at Super Middleweight like the destruction of Iran Barkley. And lastly Toney was 26 years old and considered in his prime.

So i think it's clear as day.

 

Yes but James Toney was severely weighed drained and unhealthy when he fought RJJ. Toney was outgrowing SMW, he was ballooning up in weight between fights and had to cut a lot of weight in a short amount of time to fight RJJ. After RJJ, he moved up to LHW because he couldn't make SMW anymore. When he beat Barkley that was years earlier when he had just moved up to SMW from Middle.

It's like when Danny Garcia struggled vs Herrera largely because could barely make the weight, and after that sub par performance he realized he had to move up a weight class. Toney was not the same fighter vs RJJ he was when he beat Barkley, he could no longer make the weight safely by the time he fought RJJ, and it showed in the ring.

Toney's prime was in his early to mid 20s. He was arguably past his prime at 26 due to his weight issues. GGG never had the kind of weight issues Toney did and was arguably closer to his prime at 40 than weight drained James Toney was at 26.

 

Whether he was weight drained or not is irrelevant, because Toney had no issue's in prior fights to Jones. That's Toney's fault if he let his weight get out of control.

The fact is Toney was P4P number 3 only behind Whitaker, Chavez. He was 44-0 had been at Super Middleweight for a few years, and was considered the number 1 man at that weightclass.

For me that's clearly a better win than Canelo's win over a 40 year old Golovkin, who had 4 fights in 4 years and who had never fought at Super Middleweight.

Were judging this clearly on Super Middleweight resume, and clearly RJJ's 12-0 win over Toney. Is far superior to Canelo's win over Golovkin at Super Middleweight.

 

Who says we're judging the win solely on Super Middleweight resume? We should be judging the win based on its merits, which includes what version of the fighter he fought was. Toney was clearly out of shape and weight drained. That was RJJ's first fight at SMW, so if Toney had won, would that win be meaningless because RJJ didn't have a SMW resume? Of course not. BTW it wasn't a 12-0 win for RJJ. The scores were 119-108, 118-109, 117-110. Now granted the scores were a lot wider than Canelo GGG 3, but both were seen by the public as one-sided. The difference was that GGG wasn't weight drained like Toney. A one-sided win over a weight drained fighter is not as good as a one-sided win over a healthy fighter. Now granted 26 is a lot younger than 40, but again James Toney had weight problems that took him out of his prime at a very young age, whereas GGG didn't have weight problems and even at 40 was still arguably closer to his prime than 26 year old Toney. To your point, James had as many fights at 26 than GGG had at 40, so there was more wear and tear on James at 26 than GGG at 40. GGG was well preserved, rested due to his inactivity, and healthy. James was run down from all the fights he had, and clearly wasn't at his best when he fought RJJ.

 

@Dynamicpuncher Ask yourself this : What would have happened if the 40 year old GGG who fought Canelo fought the 26 year old weight drained Toney who fought RJJ?

Then ask yourself this : who was a better fighter in their prime : GGG or Toney? "Prime" MW GGG vs "Prime" MW Toney.

I don't think there's a clear answer to either of these questions. If 40 year old SMW GGG had the weight drained Toney who fought RJJ in front of him, he wouldn't have to worry about getting hurt by James like he had to against Canelo. He wouldn't have fought that cautiously, frankly I think 40 yo GGG would have imposed his will on "that" version of James. Now Barkley version of Toney would have taken 40 yo GGG to slick school, but would that version of James take "Prime" 32-35 GGG to slick school? That's a different question.

Remember when there were rumors about GGG fighting Ward at 168, many people thought GGG would destroy Ward, so keep that in mind when we compare GGG to Toney.

 

This is a great post.

I agree with everything that you’ve said.

I only responded to you initially, as you’d previously said to another poster that it was easy to claim that Canelo was the GOAT. But like you’ve just said above, it’s actually very difficult to determine who the actual GOAT is. And that’s all I wanted to say really.

It’s not a straightforward choice, as there’s many factors to consider.

Regarding Roy-Canelo, I just feel that Roy’s hand and foot speed would have been too problematic for Canelo. But I think that Canelo would have given a good account of himself.