All-Time P-4-P Top Ten

Clay, thank you very much for that, and with what you've written about the fight I asked about, that "low blow and injury" explanation that you allude to does seem to make quite a bit of sense and could be visualized considering the style Jackson was said to have fought with against Langford (crouching style with hands up, look to get inside and work the body while clinching...not much from any range besides the inside work).

Like you stated, it does seem like a very "odd" result between the two considering how the two were reported to have fought against each other, and how much success Langford was said to have had in other fights against Jackson, so thanks again for shedding some light to a question I've had for some time.

I'm looking forward to reading your book on Langford in hopefully the very near future.

 

Well, I think people make too much of Toney being weight drained. He always had trouble making that weight and I don't know why he would be less well prepared against Roy Jones than any of his other challengers, rather the opposite should be true. Fact is he was champ and considered one of the top p4p going into this fight, the rest is hindsight. Personally, I don't like these kind of excuses that much.

Roy was also green when he faced Hopkins and also old when he faced Trinidad. So I give him more or less full due for those fights. McCallum is a different story, though. He was clearly past his prime, while Roy was in his.

Ok. Thanks. I agree with you, he should have made most of these fights happen. But one must remember that even SRR is said not to have faced some of the most dangerous fighters around in his era. I do see your point, though.

 

It comes about merely because I have read from a few accounts that the p4p term was meant to showcase fighters from other weight categories. The HW champion is the best fighter on the planet. He is a cut above.

The HW's will always get the lion share of acclaim and attention. I can come up with a HW top 20 pretty quickly, without too much effort, and it'll be plausible. Other divisions take more time.

And I don't have a problem with other people's p4p lists with HWs. i just find it easier...

p4p has become a widespread term in boxing but believe that it originally came from a wish to promote smaller boxers.

 

Just watch RJJ-Toney, it´s so obvious Toney is far from his best even before the fight begins. It is still a good win but Toney beeing weight-drained diminishes it´s worth quite a bit.
I never said Hopkins was green when he met Jones. But he wasn´t what he later would be. Again watch their fight it is evident that Jones already was what he would be during his whole career and Hopkins just wasn´t. Jones was just entering his prime while Hopkins prime started about 3 years later. Still a good win but not what some people make out of it.
And Trinidad ... come on. He was fighting at least 2 weight classes above his best weight class, only fought 3 times in seven years before the fight and was even more past it than Jones. That win isn´t worth anything. For me that was a show fight and nothing more.

 

Well, it's a long time ago since I saw the Toney fight, and I've only seen parts of the Hopkins fight and nothing of that against Trinidad (don't like to watch past-it-greats fight), so I won't get into an argument abut this. I concede. Cheers.