After misinterpreting @themostoverrated ’s heavyweight thread, I thought I’d start the thread I was writing about. Just to be clear, this is any champion in any weight division who held a single belt rather than either being partially or fully unified in their division, so that criteria means we have to exclude undisputed champions like Michael Spinks at light heavyweight, Marvin Hagler at middleweight, Sugar Ray Leonard and Donald Curry at welterweight. But I’m including titlists like Larry Holmes and Aaron Pryor, even though they held two belts at the same weight, because they didn’t hold the titles simultaneously (I don’t think…). It’s tough to pick just one, but gun to head who would you choose?
Here’s a list of 10 of the obvious contenders, just including their 1980s output: Larry Holmes - WBC heavyweight (1980-83; 12 defenses); IBF heavyweight (1983-1985; 3 defenses) Thomas Hearns - WBC super welterweight (1982-1986; 4 defenses) Mike McCallum - WBA junior middleweight (1994-1987; 6 defenses) Aaron Pryor - WBA junior welterweight (1980-1983; 6 defenses); IBF junior welterweight (1984-1985; 2 defenses) Julio Cesar Chavez - WBC super featherweight (1984-1987; 8 defenses) Eusebio Pedroza - WBA featherweight (1980-1985; 13 defenses) Salvador Sanchez - WBC Featherweight (1980-82; 9 defenses) Azumah Nelson - WBC Featherweight (1984-1987; 6 defenses) Wilfredo Gomez - WBC super bantamweight (1980-83; 6 defenses) Jung Koo Chang (1983-1988; 15 defenses)
Just the reigns in the weight divisions where they were most dominant in the ‘80s and just their ‘80s output, even if their reign began before the 1980s or continued into the ‘90s e.g. Azumah Nelson at featherweight could be one or Azumah Nelson at super featherweight could be another but only factoring in his 80s title fights… and not both combined. Hope that makes sense!
It does, thank you. It's Sanchez for me, closely followed by his fellow FW Pedroza, Chang, Hearns (asuming the fight to begin the reign counts, what he lacks in quantity, relative to the others, he makes up for in quality) and Holmes.
Now I've got a little bit more time, I'd like to add some rationale for picking Salvador Sanchez, who was 10-0 in WBC title fights during the 1980's. His wins included: Danny Lopez x 2 - A top 20 all time FW, not just beaten twice, but dominated & stopped twice in one-sided fights Wilfredo Gomez - A stoppage win over the GOAT all time at SBW, just 4lbs south of FW Azumah Nelson - A stoppage win over arguably the GOAT African boxer and arguably a top 60 p4p boxer of all time Supplementary wins over ranked contenders Juan LaPorte, Pat Ford, Ruben Castillo and Pat Cowdell, would ordinarily deserve a better description than "supplementary". All these 10 x fights were lineal FW world title fights and are the cornerstone of Salvador's resume, a resume that sees me rank him as the 5th greatest FW of all time.
