Top This Resume... Duran, Haggler, Hearns, Benitez

Hagler would have beaten the "prime Leonard"

Back to the thread, Leonard's wins over Duran, Hearns, Benitez, and Hagler are right up there with the best ever. All 4 are All Time Greats, 3 are HOFers (1 is a future HOFer), and all of them rank somewhere in the top 100 ever with Hearns, Hagler, and Duran all being easily in the top 40-50.

 

It's your perspective. Some of us see it differently.

 

Leonard has the best resume, facts don't lie.

I don't think Hagler against Leonard in their primes is possible. Leonard's prime was during the early 80's, Benitez (79) to Finch (82). He never went higher than jr middleweight throughout that time span. You could offer an opinion how effective he would have been had a Hagler fight came off around 82 when the drum was banging briefly. But their primes were in different divisions.

I don't think any fighter in boxing history can possibly get his prime back after one fight in five years, and moving up further into another division he had previously never fought in. Leonard just fought as good as he possibly could for a fighter past his prime that night.

 

I agree...those 4 wins aren't matched by anyone in boxing history in my opinion. Greb, Armstrong, and Robinson among others have more quality wins, but their best 4 aren't quite as good.

 

One fighter who's probably the most underrated for fighting a high quality of oppostion. De La Hoya.

He probably fought even better fighters than Leonard, but came up short more times than Leonard did. When I mean better fighters, when you average them out across the board.

Whitaker, Chavez, Trinidad, Mosley, Quartey, Hopkins, Mayweather.

Benitez, Duran, Hearns, Hagler, Norris.

Whitaker was past his prime against De La Hoya, but he was much better than Hagler when he fought Leonard.

Very close, but De La Hoya edges it. Leonard beat better opposition, but never fought better than De La Hoya when averaging it out.

 

De La Hoya's quality of opposition is like nothing I've seen over the last 20 years. Holyfield is second probably.

 

Even as a huge RJJ fan, I have to admit that this is on the money. I blame this at least partially on the historic weakness of the Middle and Super Middle divisions when RJJ was at his prime. I just don't see that Toney, Hopkins, Griffin and Ruiz measure up to Hearns, Hagler, Duran and Benitez. Hell, even if you through DM, et al into the mix, I don't see that it matters.

 

You're wrong, but no apology needed.

 

sugar ray leonard is my fav fighter of all time. the best combination puncher i have ever seen - the skills, the slickness, the killer instinct, the heart, the chin, the charisma - SRL had it all.

 

thats four awesome wins against arguably the best Lightweight ever,the best Jr Midleweight ever,the best middleweight ever and a top 5 jr welter ever.

 

He has a great resume.

In part, he was lucky of being present in that era.

Tommy is my #1 or #2 Light Middleweight. Hagler my #2 Middleweight. Duran my #1 Lightweight and Benitez a Top10 Light Welterweight.

 

SRL was smart tough and skillfull and on top of that had a huge , huge heart...he proof that again and again......that said, MM H had a tough time handling a slightly past his prime and slower SRL, yet SRL was resortful on this fight and doing what he needed to do to win the tight decison...


In all honesty, both at their prime, I don;t see the outcome being any different....that said...I will agree that SRL would not have been as good of a MW champ like MMH was...the durability of SRL would have been at stake

 

Liston
Quarry
Shavers

 

Yeah I dont think that anyone since then has a resume to match SRL, that is part of the reason why SRL is so highly ranked in terms of ATG status.

DLH and Holyfield have an amazing resume, theyve fought damn near everyone in their divisions but they have many losses to show for it.

SRL has wins over all those top guys he was fighting.
There hasnt been anyone since then that can match his resume.

as far as Ali (i know he was before SRL)
Ali's resume was also incredible and not only had he fought everyone from Floyd Patterson all the way up to Larry Holmes, he has wins over almost all of those guys. That is why I have him at #1 heavyweight all time, it wasnt his **** talking or personality but his record speaks for itself. On top of that he was fighting in many different countries all over the world.