Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs the 1980s Welterweight champs.

Faith in Duran? We are talking prime Duran , the one that fought Leonard I.

Winning any fight. He would have been better advised to take fight as an Underdog like the true greats did.Then he woudl perhaps has been ranked as a Top10-Top15 ATG today.

Benitez is better than anybody Floyd fought at 147 pounds.

 

Floyd is top 15 in quite a few rankings.

Benitez, at his best, would probably be a little better than anyone Floyd fought at 147. On the other hand, Floyd would be head and shoulders better than anyone Benitez beat at 147. A draw with Harold Weston and getting stopped by Leonard in a fight he was losing do not suggest he could beat Mayweather. Mayweather would be an obvious favorite and Benitez "could" win just like in a lot of other match ups.

Yeah, it's putting faith in Duran to assume "Montreal" would show up. Duran demonstrated problems with boxers throughout his career. He lost to De Jesus, quit against Leonard when he chose to move, and lost to Benitez when Duran was a little past his best. It's also putting faith in Duran to believe that he forced Leonard into the trenches during the first fight. I see Leonard as having thought he could win while fighting aggressively and planting his feet bc he was the bigger man, foolish in hindsight. His adjustments showed in the rematch. Mayweather fits the mold of Benitez and rematch Leonard a lot better than Montreal Leonard. I think Mayweather would win. He has a whole lot of moves to slow his opponent's pace and break their rhythm which Leonard did not employ in Montreal. I'm not saying it would be easy. Sue me.

 

When you put it like that, the first four or five lines/paragraphs of what you've written make Floyd Mayweather Jr. sound really great.

But who and when and in what context are we talking about?

I would take just about all of the OP's list to have varying levels of potential success against the 2015 version of Pacquiao - ranging from a "puncher's chance" to an "unquestionable early wipe out".

If I apply the same exercise to a 2007, semi-retired version of Oscar De La Hoya, I might have similar but slightly varied predictions. And again with Mosley etc. etc.

Floyd's Welterweight wins, no matter how they are portrayed, are not his greatest asset, when remarking on fantasy match-ups with Welterweight practitioners of the past. When you put each of those listed in Mayweather's place, they might well have had the same success as he and, in multiple cases, more emphatically so.

Point being, it's not unreasonable to suggest that - at the very least, these match-ups are closely ran affairs - enough to give rise to a pick for Cuevas or McCrory - and, at most, Floyd gets badly beaten by several of those listed.

 

I have not seen any credible journalist or sportsmagazine rank Floyd in the TOP 15 ATG. He had a chance to be up there but chose not to fight Prime Pac or GGG. In my opinion he rather ranks in the Top 40th-60th ATGs.

Look at what Floyd did against Castillo? He is not gonna hold up well against the pace of Montreal Duran
Both are pressure fighters but Duran is a lot better than Castillo. A lot.

In my view, Floyd beats Breland, Simon and Lloyd. That is already not bad for a guy from super featherweight.

 

And none of those guys would've been able to do it for that long without a hick-up. By default, Floyd is the easy favorite over all except the big three. Someone else "could" win, particularly if he had to fight everyone.

I don't see it with Cuevas though. The guy was an easy to hit midget. I'd think Pacquiao, the best fighters on the planet other than Floyd in 2015, would've had more success against the guy in his late 30s. Or Hatton wouldn't have run headfirst into a ringpost.

 

He beat Castillo easily in the rematch. He won the first half of the first fight easily and coasted with an injury in the second half. It's not like he didn't beat several other come forward fighters who were better/bigger than Castillo. I don't know why the closest fight of his career is used as the benchmark for his potential.

Floyd is consensus 10-30 right now and rankings often improve over time. Guys like Oscar De la Hoya are 40-60. Your opinion is a huge outlier. Floyd was an old man when he beat Pacquiao, who was the pfp best other than him. It was a big win but not competitive. ESPN ranked Floyd 48 after beating De La Hoya in a decent enough list.

 

What consensus? That is your view. Who ranks Floyd in the TOP 30?

Floyd - Castillo II: scores were 115- 113. That is a very close fight. In the first fight, Floyd went life and death with Castillo.

He had a good victory over Pac, one of his career best wins. However, had he beaten Prime Pac he would be ranked much higher. Floyd was never a risk taker. You see guys like Leonard fighting Hagler, Duran fighting Barkley or Hearns fighting Hill.

 

Who did Hearns or Leonard beat at age 37 or 38 who was the best pfp fighter in the sport not counting themselves?

I'm not gonna do a research project for you. Nor do lists from before 2015 or from guys like Mknte Cox and Bert Sugar count. Looking back at threads after May-Pac on this forum is a good starting point.

Here's something recent to think about: http://www.espn.com/boxing/story/_/id/14970037/ranking-top-25-pound-pound-boxers-25-years

 

That's not a given by any stretch of the imagination - You're talking about 12 welterweight bouts. Even if you include the bouts at 154, where his better wins sit, it's a total of 15 fights - and you don't think any of those natural Welterweights listed could manage that? Against the opposition Floyd fought against; when he fought them?

I can't agree with you there.

 

So by your logic it is better to have beaten Pac at age 38 than in his prime.You can not be serious. the Leonards and Hearns fought each other in their primes.


You were making a claim about Floyd being a TOP 15 ATG but you can not back it up.

 

Destroy him? Lol, no fighter is 'destroying' Floyd.

Beat him, perhaps yes. But nobody is walking straight through him. The man was a genius in the ring, always one step ahead.

 

I'd have to agree with Flash 24, Floyd doesn't have the firepower to beat Duran Leonard or Hearns. Great defense? Yes, But Leonard was bigger, hit harder, and was probably faster at 147. Duran was so quick in Montreal it gave Sugar fits and if Leonard couldn't get Duran off him Floyd has no chance, and Hearns? Floyd couldn't get near him. and didn't have the pop of a Leonard to hurt him if he did. At best Floyd would lose lopsided decisions, at worst he'd get Ko'ed. I couldn't see Floyd hearing a decision against any of them in a 15 rounder.

 

Hearns, in particular, would have ended Floyd, at either 147 or 154.

 

None of their careers suggest that they could've. There was a decade long gap between his first and last 147 fights. That would include his 154 fights because he intermittently fought at that weight while undersized. And that's just part of his career.

 

It might just be part of his career but, in this thread, it's the only part that's of relevance.

With that in mind, I think it's safe to say that professional, world class welterweight boxers, operating at the level of those listed, could have managed to string twelve Welterweight wins together. The fact Mayweather chose to drag out his wins at 147, over a ten year period, really has no bearing on the point of this thread - other than perhaps the impact on the timing of the bouts.

The two big named Welters on Mayweather's resume are Mosley and Pacquiao - neither of whom were anywhere near prime at the point Mayweather fought them. And, I would favor any of the prime Welters on the OP's list to have beaten them, at that point in their careers, as well - along with the rest of Mayweather's Welterweight resume.