Do you consider Sugar Ray Robisnon to be PFP #1..

Bow to your scholarship, D. Have tunnel vision: Only know about fighters I've seen train and fight live since the early '40s.

 

i never get into lists, SQ. All I can tell ya is, Willie's the most beautiful BOXER I've ever seen -- a religious experience watchin' him in the ring.

 

Sorry i just have to say again that i really like this post JG

 

john Pep is the most buetiful boxer you have seen (same as me but just on film) what do you think is best about him

 

I find it astonishing how he gets so low underneath punches sometimes. Not that it's an amazing feat athletically, but to do i effectively in the ring and make it look so easy is something.

Sorry i know the question wasn't mine!1

 

still good to hear answer

yeh i do like his head movement but his footwork is enchanting it is the best i have ever seen

 

Yeah it's great and it just never stops working overtime!

 

his footwork is truly astonishing there will never be better footwork

 

The good fortune to be blessed with a once-in-a-lifetime talent for boxing, GP.

If it doesn't digress too much, here are two incidents you might enjoy:

In the waning days of Pep’s career, he took the bouts for walkin’ around money.

All he had left was a twinkle in his eye and a wisecrack. Most boxers looked bigger in trunks; he looked smaller.

He was trainin’ at the 5th Street Gym in Miami. Heavyweight Cleveland “Big Cat” Williams was there as well. But, though faded, Pep was the star with gym rats, which grated on Williams, who was always sullen, while Willie kibitzed and clowned.

Williams was the closest thing to Superman -- a walkin’ anatomy chart…at his peak, before he got shot in the stomach.. His left-hook cannonades on the heavy bag shook the gym.

Fifth Street was compact -- always jammed, so Pep and Williams had to do floor exercises almost side by side. Pep’s fans constantly stoked his ego:

" Willie, you could kill that big bum! He'd never touch you."

"You'd make him look like a jerk, Willie.”

It went on like that for weeks.

No way Williams didn't hear it.... He was nine feet tall – proud, a knockout puncher, and BRISTLING.

While Pep joked, Williams seethed. You could’ve cut the tension with a knife.

One day when Pep’s faithful were eggin’ him on:

"You could kick his ass, Willie"

"You'd make him look like fool, Willie!"

Pep turned to ‘em: "All I can tell you is: I'd hate to have him hang his HAMMER on me!"

Williams exploded with laughter.

Once more the “Will o’ the Wisp” avoided haymaker.

---------------------------------------------------

Willie was a floorshow every place he went.

All he wanted to do is laugh and stopped at nothing to break-up everybody in the gym -- had us in stitches. He'd rib us -- make us feel like he was just one of the boys. With his Graziano slouch and pork-pie hat, he was better able to carry that off goofin’ on a street corner… NEVER in the ring.

When he was at Stillman's, you could count on practical jokes and a florid Lou Stillman. But, he could get away with that because he was a dream in the ring.

He took nothing serious. NOTHING. Came to the gym mostly, I’m convinced, to have a good time. It was an extension of being at the track or playing cards.

Pep never learned ANYTHING; it was all God given. His feet didn't touch the ground. He was here. There. Behind you, popping from every angle -- laughing while he did it.

That 's the Pep I'd always seen at the height of his career.

After he hung’em up, briefly, he tried his hand at training.

I was at the 5th St. Gym. Willie was in the corner of a big, beefy heavyweight.

He was screaming at the heavy from the ring apron, getting redder and redder in the face. This wasn't stand-up comic Willie: This was more Vince Lombardi-Bobby Knight.

When the round ended, Pep went berserk -- attacked his fighter, screamed at him, punched him, whipped him with his pork-pie hat, kicked him in the shins; he had to be dragged off by three cornermen.

Pep just couldn't get through his head that what he did as natural as breathing, nobody else could.

 

I'm sure you've told that last part in a slightly different way before John G

 

If you look at it this way:

- Robinson does not have the best resume ever

- He does not have the greatest weight-jumping achievements ever

- He was by all accounts the best welterweight ever, but there is not a wealth of great footage of this greatness, and his welterweight resume is not the greatest resume of any fighter at a single weight

- Judging by his inconsistency (one fight brilliant, the next beatable), it can be stated with some certainty that he was not the greatest middleweight ever in an all-time greatness/pound-for-pound sense


There is clearly a legitimate argument that he is not the greatest boxer in history.


I myself am unsure of who the greatest is between Robinson, Langford, Greb and Armstrong, but I am aware of the argument that exists against the assumption that Robinson is the definitive number 1.

 

For me he is though. Don't really want to go through my regular explanation as its late, but i do understand the arguments for the other candidates so often mentioned.

 

SRR is my P4P best.

 

A good case can be made for 4 others - Langford, Greb, Armstrong, and Charles.

If you take everything we have to base the opinion on, combining resume with weight-jumping success, consistentcy (Robinson lost 2 of his first 135 fights, one where he was outweighed by 16lbs and the other being his 5th fight in 4 weeks, and both avenged as well), all-around ability on film/H2H ranking, longevity, and some other intangibles, I personally think Robinson comes out with the best argument. It is close though.

 

Langford number one ...

Greb Number 2

Ray possibly number 3