From Ring mag website: 10 greatest British fighters of all time

Hatton's wins............

Tszyu - obviously
Castillo - the manner of it
Phillips
Collazo
Tackie
Malignaggi
Lazcano
Urango - the true worth will be revealed
Oliveira
Rios
Maussa
Stewart
Magee
Thaxton
Hutchinson

et al!

 

I would have to say Lennox handled Vitali much worse than Calzaghe handled Kessler.....and I couldnt seperate the difference between RJJ and Tyson....both of who were punching bags by the time of the fight

The rest I agree with though in terms of Lewis and his depth....it went under appreciated at the time

 

I think Tyson probably ranks above Jones

They were both punch bags, but at leasy Tyson tried to fight back against a guy who was a stylistic nightmare (even in their respective primes). Roy was content to go the distance with Joe.

Don't forget Lennox was more past peak than Joe was.

 

I actually rate the Lazcano win in his top 5....took a lot for Hatton to win that fight in terms of the illness, the heavy defeat beforehand as well as the fact that Lazcano was a more than decent opponent

Top 6 for Hatton......in my opinion

Tszyu
Collazo
Malignaggi
Castillo
Lazcano
Tackie

The others in terms of Phillips and Oliveira were a little too shop worn, although are good names to have on his record,and yep, that Castillo body shot was one of the best he's ever thrown if not the best

 

Thats true wasnt he 37 at the time of that fight??

I like all 3 guys and when you dissect their records they are actually impressive....not bad at all

 

Castillo may be a little high, but Phillips has to go in the top 5, given that he nearly KO'd Ricky in the 4th.

Paulie is way overrated, as a Hatton fan I was jumping up and down when the fight was made, because Malignaggi was made for him. A one-dimensional jab artist with no power and hittable = meat and drink for Ricky.

 

I wouldn't say Tua is that much better than Lacy. He is a limited fighter too. They are essentially the same type of fighter. Tua has a few better wins.

Why is Vitali better than Kessler? Vitali's resume was horrible before he beat Sam Peter. Samuel...Peter. A terrible TKO loss to Byrd against his name too, whatever the circumstances. They are even at worst.

Tyson was that much better than Jones? He was really in much better condition then when Danny Williams and ****ing McBride beat him just a couple of years later? Miles miles past peak.

Holyfield was noway near that far ahead of this current Hopkins either. He was widely considered past prime, except his form would then be to struggle with John Ruiz and get KO'd by a fat Toney. Whereas Hopkins beat Pavlik.

Basically all of them were widely inaccurate and overstated.

 

I do laugh when people say he has no punch resistance anymore because lazcano wobbled him and Mayweather stopped him.......Lazcano fought a mentally all over the place Hatton and did catch him but not to the extent where he was out of it like some people like to say....and as for the mayweather KO.....Mayweather is a cracking world class fighter and caught Hatton cos ricky was still going for it pushing forward like we know he thrives on

That said....my point was kinda gonna be that Phillips did nearly stop ricky, tszyu caught him with some massive shots and Magge dropped him.....yet people were very quick to write him off everytime he's wobbled since the US fights

 

That means you have to dig even deeper into the 3 of their records to rank them???? Woodhall/Thaxton/Bruno kinda tier???

Or does everyone instincively have a favourite fighter??

 

And how did you work that out? Simply because he was stupid enough not to train for Rahman (too busy on the set of Ocean 11) and thus got sparked?

If anything Calzaghe has shown a more pronounced physical decline that Lewis had up until that point....Lewis looked as good as he ever did going into Tyson, Rahman aberration aside...which he of course atoned for big time in the rematch where he actually trained properly.

And the way you attacked Joes wins over Hopkins and Jones....you could rather easily say the same for Holyfield and Tyson for Lewis, who wasn't fortunate in that the best heavies of his day never took him on in their primes...Bowe avoiding him blatantly, Tyson imprisoned(and later step aside money) and Holy with his erratic form in the mid 90s.

The resume can be, and has been attacked many, many times. I could put forward a convincing case to tear him apart rather easily. Not that I would as I regard him as a top 10 all time HW, but it would certainly be possible.

 

I think you make a good point - Hatton has never been good at all defensively, even guys at journeyman level have had him in trouble either through carelessness or cuts..........

 

I'm not really arguing most of those wins are better. Except Vitali, considering the circumstances. Kessler is a better win. The number of ">" they seemed to get were well over the top with no real basis in reality. I mean is there really much difference between that Tyson and Jones? I don't see it at all. If anything Tyson's best years were well past in comparison to RJJ.

Lewis has a much better depth of win beyond that. His B grade of competition is outstanding.

Of course he's way ahead of Calzaghe overall.

 

You're not allowed to do that!!

 

Yep, the way people go on about Lewis as some sort of untouchable British Demi-God amuses me: I remember people would say that he couldn't rank among the panehon of greats simply because he has been sparked twice by two average-good fighters....

People seem to gloss over that. I can only imagine what they would say if the same thing had happened to Calzaghe, even if he did avenge the losses ala Lewis.

Again, I rate Lewis higly but lets not pretend his resume can't be picked at.

 

Lacy's a horrible fighter. Tua has better wins and genuine KO power. I don't think any Tua opponent ever said 'he can't punch ****' like Joe did about Lacy after 2 rounds.

Vitali and Kessler have similar resumes in that neither shines and they both lost to the best they fought. I prefer Lewis's win, because of the stage he was at in his career and the fact that Vitali has dominated/Ko'd every fighter he's fought.

Jones is awful now, everything that made him great has gone. At least Tyson still had a punchers chance and went for it, Jones couldn't even get punches off.

Lewis beat Holyfield comfortably. Calzaghe barely landed a clean punch on Hopkins.