This. Too many that he dodged the primes of and NOT a good ambassador of the sport. I mean can anybody really see Floyd stepping in the ring with prime Hearns???? Lol NO
SRL for me. When SRL fought Benitez, Hearns, Hagler Kalule & Duran they had a combined record of 240 wins 3 losses and 3 draws
A lot of people think SRL was naturally bigger than FMJ, probably wrong. SRL turned pro at 20 years old weighing 141, FMJ turned pro at 19 years old weighing 131...but FMJ turned pro in the early weigh in period in which people cut more weight by drying out, and then gained it back by fight time. SRL and FMJ probably entered the ring at about the same weight for their first fight. In addition, FMJ is listed with a reach advantage on SRL. I don't think size would determine a fight between them but SRL is not bigger than FMJ. Both fighters were excellent, a good argument can be made for either in a H2H fight at their best, but FMJ was consistently in shape and stayed at the top of his game for a long time. FMJ always found a way to win and from 1998-2015 he was fighting top level opponents.
"Mayweather, unsurprisingly, consistently "selected" opponents he knew he'd beat."--> baseless accusation. He took the biggest money fights available. Leonard can be accused of the exact same behavior and/or tilting conditions in his favor in multiple instances. "Given how great he was, he still selected some excellent, world class boxers, but it was like each new fight was reinforcing the level of greatness he'd already hinted at, rather than enhancing it."--> word soup. He says he's "TBE" which is the highest level possible. Both Leonard and Mayweather fought a tall, undefeated champion with a ton of pop who was among the top fighters pfp (Corrales was 5 pfp and favored to win). Mayweather destroyed his opponent Leonard/Hagler discussion-->Mayweather's win over Canelo is already better than that, namely because he gave up age and more weight against a more prime great fighter and won wide instead of shoe shining to a disputed decision. He didnt need Martinez or GGG (idk who was lineal at 130 and 160) "he'd already moved through a few weight divisions,"--> Mayweather was a five weight champion, lineal in four and he knocked out Hatton who was lineal at 140 when they fought and had an in ring weight advantage over Mayweather. Leonard was lineal in three weight divisions not counting the farce with Lalonde (an example of Leonard "selecting" an opponent). 160 to Leonard was 140 to Mayweather or 147 if you're being generous.
They weren't the same size. Leonard fought at 140 in Pan Am and The Olympics and Mayweather fought ar 126 in the Olympics when they were 19 (+ or - the Olympics was near Leonard's 20th birthday). Furthermore, Mayweather never actually entered the ring much above 150. He maxed out around the size of current Devin Haney and was successful at higher weights despite not bulking. Leonard was bigger than that.
I have Leonard slightly ahead of Mayweather, and I'm definitely NOT a Floyd fan. But there aren't thirty, much less thirty five or forty ahead of Floyd. Unless you have a singularly iconoclastic set of judging criteria, I don't see how Floyd can be ranked lower than twenty-five. I have the dude at fourteen and I think ten to twenty is pretty arguable.
Well being objective, Floyd has an advantage in longevity and SRL has an advantage in quality of wins. IMHO beating all of his 4 Kings peers and Benitez in a shorter career at that is more impressive than anything Floyd has done.
Ray Leonard is greater. The level of opposition. Beating Duran in the rematch and Hearns the way he did. He fought the best and beat the best. Floyds career although good, was orchestrated.
Very weak post. Dissapontingly so. Berto was a bigger money fight than GGG? I agree money would have played a major part in who Mayweather selected as his next opponent, but I'm on safe ground saying he selected them, by the time he became boxing's biggest star. Of course he did, fighters would earn more against him than anyone else, everyone wanted to fight him, he selected who. He even posted a poll asking fans to vote for his next opponent, so, no, even if you dismiss that as a marketing stunt, by definition the "accusation" is not "baseless". For the 3rd time, I didnt say SRL didnt select his opponents, he clearly did by the time he was boxing's biggest star, too. Hearns and Hagler were clearly bigger risks than Mayweather took, though, to anyone who is both balanced and knowledgeable. Nothing you said even attempts to counter my point that began with Mayweather beating multiple excellent, world class boxers. You just make an unrelated and frankly bizarre comparison between Hearns and Corrales after quoting that. You think Mayweathers win over a weight drained, green Canelo was better than SRL's over the long standing champ and a top 3 of all time MW? You see, your nonsense comment has pushed you into a corner, and to justify it you're making comments that most people on here would agree are laughable. You're scrapping the barrel at the end. So, you're defending calling my describing Mayweather as having "moved through a few weight divisions", as nonsense, because he moved through 5? Few doesn't = 5? Really weak. I appreciate you didnt have much to work with and so were up against it, but I'm genuinely disappointed, I thought you'd make a better effort than that.
You sound scrambled again. Mayweather fought Berto at 38 as a farewell fight. It wasn't representative of his career nor did he ever use a poll to select an opponent, although you somehow think that's worthy of mentioning. If you think Mayweather should've fought GGG, I'll say Leonard should've fought Michael Moorer at 175 or Holyfield at 190 since it's similarly baseless and makes me question your level of academic achievement. Hearns and Corrales were similar fights without hindsight. Hearns is thought of a better win because his career played out better after the fight, not before, and because Corrales got washed. But Corrales beat every other fighter he fought other than a 154 pound farce against Clottey. You're showing your bias again with the Hagler fight. Hagler was known to be faded prior to the Leonard fight and Leonard got the big ring with the 12 round distance and arguably deserved to lose. Canelo had over 40 wins and was a unified champion who wouldn't lose for another decade. That is a prime fighter, full stop, unless you can find examples of other unified champs with 40+ wins who you think were green. The weigh in limit was a compromise between what Maywether wanted and what Canelo wanted, and was more than Canelo's weight for Matthew Hatton shortly in the past. You'll never find a Canelo comment complaining about being weight drained. Mayweather beating the best of the next generation in a 5th weightclass while 36 and giving away almost 20 pounds in ring is a singular achievement, whereas a lot of guys have won a title in a third weightclass like Leonard. An error you're making is that you're discrediting Mayweather for winning fights widely and giving credit to Leonard for struggling in fights. Mayweather simply had a higher ceiling which is why he accomplished more and never lost.
