Arcel held Duran in the highest of esteems. By the time his lightweight run was over and he had even gone on to Welterweight glory Arcel didnt have anyone above Duran. It took years for his opinion to shift. With that Ray was probably guilty of a little bit of nostalgia just like anyone else.
Armstrong, he'd beat him at his own game. Benny Leonard and Whitaker could beat him via movement and trying to outbox him.
The thing with Leonard besides his boxing ability he had good power as well. It's very difficult though to pick anyone over the prime lightweight Duran though.
This is exactly what it was and we're all probably guilty of it. Arcel also picked Mike Gibbons over Marvin Hagler. So some things have to be taken with a grain of salt.
Manny Pacquiao beats up Duran at lightweight, Manny Pacquiao looks the best against tall pressure fighters because they’re not using their reach and Pacquiao has a big target to aim at, he doesn’t have to go go looking for them and he can tee off with his fast combinations and avoid the return with his fast feet and Duran always struggled with movers and Pacquiao would be moving and springing in with combinations and getting out of there with Duran failing to pin him down, it really isn’t a good thing to go at prime Pacquiao, he will pick you off and make you look foolish, I see it looking like the Cotto fight, but even easier for Pacquiao because Duran never beat a southpaw Mayweather beats him, Mayweather has the greatest ring IQ of all time IMO, he was able to adapt to any style and beat everyone he faced, he is 50-0 for a reason he beat every quality of opposition and I know we hate Mayweather I hate him, but I don’t let it blind me from seeing his amazing boxing ability, he was the master at getting you into a position where you could be hit but he couldn’t and he would abound their counter, he was the master of range, master of footwork, master of feints, master of timing, master of movement he could do everything, he could fight on the inside, he would use his height and reach advantage, he put everything together so well, just give him his deserved credit in terms of boxing, yeah he’s a dick in real life, but just give him his credit for his boxing
What I mean by that is - and again, we're probably all guilty of it - is we tend to romanticize about the heroes of our past or when we first got into the game. I mean, Nat Fleischer's picks of the greatest really reflected the era of his youth and simply couldn't/wouldn't get past that. We look at films of that era and are generally mortified. So are they really using their head or their heart? Again, a grain of salt.
Duran won nearly every round v Buchanan even though the rounds were somewhat competitive and he sent Bizarro to another dimension so he hardly 'struggled' with those guys
Arcel is to be respected 100%. He was a Supreme trainer. But its all just an opinion. He also said the Dempsey that beat Willard beats any heavy in history. I don't know too many people that would agree with that.