The p4p ranking system has been taken out of context in recent years that the term has lost nearly all its value. Real p4p status should be reseverd for Sugar Ray Robinson/Lenard who were the greatest p4p fighters ever, who fought in 5 different weight divisions. Mayweather , Hoya and Roy Jones Jr also. Current rankings has Wlad Klitschko in the top ten who has fought his enitre career in one division. But wosrt of all is Andre Ward who who never had a Pro fight outside of 168 and is ranked number 3 in the world and is soon mooted to be number 1. Sergio Martinez is anothe example. He might of been a welter early in his life but his notable wins are at 160 and thats where he should be ranked. I understand the concept of it quite well , I just dont value it that much.
i kinda get what your saying but i feel its just like a ranking system to see who the best fighters in the world are in all of boxing Wlad and Ward are at least top 10 boxers on the planet well its tough to make a top 10 now a days with so many weights and titles and guys floating around with accomplishments
Tyson in his prime was P4P king, Hagler was a top P4P fighter as well, they both fought in one division their whole career.
I think it gets a bit ridiculous when people forget that it is a subjective means to compare fighters across weight divisions, and treat it as an actual "title" that can be won and lost. P4P is a good debate over a few beers, arguing about whether X would beat Y in a hypothetical match-up that is impossible due to difference in size. When it starts to take precedence over actual fights that should happen in the ring (eg Mayweather-Pacquiao), things are seriously ****ed up. As an example, before he fought Mayweather, Hatton was talking about how he would be fighting for the p4p championship of the world. What does that even mean? When Tarver beat Jones, he didn't suddenly become the best fighter in the world p4p, as there were clearly better fighters in over weight divisions. Ongoing P4P rankings are pretty pointless, as they become a hopeless mish-mash of subjective/objective criteria, when it should purely a subjective measure of how good a fighter is. A P4P snapshot (such as an end of year poll) makes more sense, as you don't have the continuity issues of moving fighters up and down because a fighter has a below par performance or one of their previous victims turns out to be better than first thought.
P4P rankings evolved into a more "current ranking" of today's fighters, it's more of a "What have you done for me lately" rankings list that is made up of the best fighters skills, how much they maximize their skills, their competition, and how they fair against their competition in comparison to others. - This is from an old RING mag before GBP bought it up.
P4P means different things to everybody, your best bet is to draw up your own rankings. I personally judge on talent, weights people are preforming well at in comparison to where they started doing well and victories over other P4P ranked fighters. Hence why I have Ward 5th, whereas others have him 3rd as the people I rank above him have done more in regards to going up weight, I also rate fighters like Haye and Adamek whereas others don't.
OK, so you DON'T understand. It is a method of rating how fighters from different weight classes compare. If anything you don't need it for guys that jump weight classes because they could simply make the fights. Ward has always been at 168. By your reasoning he is totally ineligible for p4p rankings. Think of it as a one caret diamond vs a one pound lump of coal. Both are the same mineral, carbon. In a direct fight the lump of coal would win based on size. Going on quality, you would prefer the diamond.
