Seems that the best fighters right now are Inoue, Crawford and Usyk. I think we can agree on that. Dont understand why Usyk gets left out here in terms of who is the most skilled fighter in the world. Last time I checked it was Usyk who cleaned out the sports toughest weight class. Granted that was going on 4 or 5 years ago, so maybe recency bias is at play. But he is now the Unified HW champ. It's way harder to move up to HW than it is to move up to Welterweight or Bantamweight. Taking nothing away from Inoue and Crawford, but I do not see what they have done to separate themselves from Usyk in the skill department and especially the resume department. He is at least their equal in terms of skill. Fighters dont move up to HW and succeed very often.
Usyk & Inoue > Crawford Usyk and Inoue are fighting guys bigger than them. Crawford, is not. Everyone's choking on Crawford's balls for fighting a guy who has looked vulnerable in his past few fights and considered past peak
It is pretty clear that Usyk is left behind the other two for now in the eyes of most. I will say though that part of this might be activity. Usyk hasn't fought in almost a year. It might be that seeing him again, against an ideal opponent to demonstrate his skills against, will turn heads, and it is only four weeks away. He's clearly facing the weakest opponent out of the three of them though, by distance. That matters too.
Inoue and Crawford are moving up weight classes and knocking folks out Usyk has nice skills but i doubt he even knocks out Dubois
I don't think it's just going the distance, the second Joshua fight was very competitive. Usyk clearly won no doubt, but Joshua was the one who made the adjustments in the second fight and made it closer.
Yeah, that was a good, close fight. He was also in a good, close fight against Chisora, also. This isn't p4p form - but being at HW from CW is tough. Then again, historically, travelling to BW from fly has been even harder.
The order of the p4p top 3 is redundant right now. Their are 3 possible p4p kings right now, people can take their pick and I wont disagree.
Usyk isn't fighting guys who are killing themselves to make a weight they've made for 10+ years like Spence & Brook. and every HW is much naturally bigger than Usyk. Crawford is the same size as Spence....
inoue beat Fulton, who most believed lost his last high profile fight to Figueroa usyk beat the bigger but wildly flawed AJ who was already brutally knocked out and gets hurt almost every fight. Terrible post to try to discredit American greatness
Chisora fight was close af and could have arguably been a draw, it was closer than the 2nd Joshua fight imo.
The P4P list is mostly about recency bias. Usyk beat AJ as an underdog and boxing fans think he's #1. Inoue dominates Fulton and boxing fans think he's #1. Crawford dominates Spence and boxing fans think he's #1. When Inoue beats Tapales and become undisputed at 122, boxing fans will think he's #1 again. They're all good fighters with good skills, but Inoue & Crawford does have a better case because of their power. Usyk have less options and less room for P4P growth because he is at heavyweight. If Usky beats Fury, who is going to deny that Usyk is #1? Then again, he is getting up there in age.
Usyk has fought 1 top 10 opponent in the past 5 years. p4p isn't simply about the most skilled otherwise Shakur Stevenson would be rated higher, it's about who you beat and what you accomplished. Inoue nor Usyk beat a top 10 p4p fighter while Crawford has while also being more accomplished winning 2 undisputed belts, that's why he's rated above them.
Usyk does indeed have the strongest resume. Mairis Briedis is without doubt the most skilled prime fighter on either of the 3 men's resume. That said, he has been less dominant against his opposition than the other 3 have. Although, it should be noted that Usyk does not have the luxury of entering the ring at approximately the same weight as his opponents like Inoue and Crawford have. Wont begrudge anybody for calling Inoue or Crawford the most skilled fighter in boxing, but neither has done anything to separate themselves from Usyk in my opinion.