Best MW, SWM, and LHW ever.

In my lifetime ....

Hagler
Calzaghe
Jones Jnr

Calzaghe is there cos he stayed at the weight although Jones and Benn push him close and for LHW people go on about Spinks but my biggest memory of him is of him being beaten like a naughty schoolboy by Iron Mike

 

Monzon, Jones, Charles.

 

All things considered...

MW - Greb
SMW - Calzaghe
LHW - Charles or Langford

 

I am no expert on Charles. However, Since I lived in Cincinnati where there are streets named after him i have to ask this question?

How can charles be ranked at LHW when the VAST majority of his fights were at heavy!

 

Just take a look at what he did at light-heavyweight.

Numerous wins against Joey Maxim, Lloyd Marshall, Archie Moore (3-0!), Jimmy Bivins, Violent Ray (who had 16-20 lbs on Charles in their fights).

Quality over quantity.

 

Exactly..his non-title record is what you have to look at and its just about as good as you can get.

I mean he beat probably the 2nd best light heavy of alltime 3 times...that well and truly cements his spot as one of the greats of the weight.

 

1) Greb
2) Calzaghe
3) Charles

Good cases can be made for others, but that's just my 2 cents.

 

He fought about as many fights at 175 or below as he did at Heavy, and it was where he was at his best.

In most of his heavyweight fights, he was already past his prime. He started out at 160, and at the weight he beat the likes of Charley Burley twice, Teddy Yarosz, Anton Christoforidis, Jose Basora, and gradually moved up to LHW. He lost badly to fellow greats Lloyd Marshall and Jimmy Bivins while pretty much being a Supermiddleweight in today's terms, but after he came back from the war, Charles had reached his peak and was a LHW.

While at LHW, he beat Archie Moore all 3 times they met, avenged the losses to Bivins and Marshall multiple times each, beat Joey Maxim on several occassions, defeated "Oakland" Billy Smith a few times, while still weighing 175 he stopped one of the best heavyweight contenders of his era in Elmer Ray, and was never beaten at the weight after his service in the war.

Greatest Lightheavyweight of all-time, and one of the 10 greatest fighters ever.

 

MW: Monzon
SMW: Calzaghe
LHW: Moore

 

MW-Hagler
SM-RJJ
LH-Spinks

From what I've seen.

 

Best MW- Greb.... than monson, than Hagler... if your thinking of just career Middlewieghts i go with those three.... if youre also talking about guys with only a portion of their career at middleweight, than you have to go with SRR
SMW-it is Joe but, the division is still relativly young
LHW-Tunney, followed closley by Ezzard Charles... than Roy...thats on greatness alone, if you wanna go prime for prime it's RJJ for sure........

 

Best mw ever h2h: SUGAR RAY ROBINSON
Best smw ever h2h: ROY JONES JR
Best lhw ever h2h: EZZARD CHARLES

Best mw ever in terms of achievement: HARRY GREB
Best smw ever in terms of achievement: JOE CALZAGHE
Best lhw ever in terms of achievement: ARCHIE MOORE

 

Because most of those fights at HW came past his actual prime, and many were only a few pounds above the LHW limit anyway, thus were considered HW bouts.

He fought just as often at LHW, and was far better overall in terms of being at his physical peak, natural weight and in relation to his opposition, which was far more stacked than even his stellar HW opposition. The main difference would've also been Charles's consistency and performance over such an immensely stacked era of LHW's (the best era in the division's history easily, even ahead of the stacked 70's-80's) in comparison to his HW days, which is where he first won the world title. His lack of hardware at LHW is very misleading, as he beat everyone there was to beat outside of Harold Johnson (including Archie Moore 3 times!), and was simply never given a title shot.

Have a look through some of his top LHW wins:

Archie Moore X3
Lloyd Marshall X2
Jimmy Bivins X3
Joey Maxim X2
Teddy Yarosz
Gus Lesnevitch
Oakland Billy Smith X2
Fitzie Fitzpatrick X2
Elmer Ray
etc.

 

I'd still give it to Charles. Both had fantastic resumes at the weight, some of the most stacked ever, but Charles's triumvirate of wins over Moore gives him the clear edge IMO, unless you're just taking into account Moore's title reign, which is hard to compare when considering how Charles was never given the opportunity to compete for the title despite beating almost everyone there was to beat.