What would be considered he golden era of boxing, if any? Is there a different said "Golden Era" for each weight class? ..Randomly though of this while brushing my teeth this morning, haha.
Yes. I don't think there is one Golden era for the entire sport. Each weight division has had its day in the sun. Just as one example that comes to mind, I happen to think that the 1980's was pretty close to being a golden era for the welter weight division. At the down of the decade you had : -Ray Leonard -Thomas Hearns -Roberto Duran -Wilfred Benitez Then later you had: Donald Curry Marlon Starling Simon Brown Mark Breland Lloyd Honeyghan. I don't know what anyone else thinks, but in my honest opinion that was one talent packed division.
We have recently just came to an end of a golden era for the Featherweight division. Juan Manuel Marquez Marco Antonio Barrera Erik Morales Manny Pacquiao Naseem Hamed One hell of a list of 126lb fighters there.
Overall I'd say the decade after WWII. There you had Robinson, Louis, Marciano, Charles, Pep, Moore, Walcott, Gavilan, Zale, Graziano, LaMotta, Saddler, Cerdan etc making the headlines and excellent fighters like Burley, C. Kid and Williams never making it into the spotlight. For HWs it's 1965-1975. WW to MW of course had a very good era in the 80's, with The Fab Four as main protagonists. For MWs and WWs it possible even eclipses the immediate post-war era, since all the most talented fighters got their shot.
Pretty obvious: -For the Heavyweights it is late 60s-early 70s -For the Welters it is the 80s In fact, I have the impression that those are the only two cases of "Golden Era" where everybody agrees. Other examples are not as clear, for different reasons (faded in time, lack of good referential sources, not enough good contenders, tainted by scandals, etc.)
light middle = 90's cruiserweight = 2000's super middle.....90's/2000's...hard to decipher which decade.
I always said the '40s, but I'm sort of leaning towards the '70s: Roberto Duran Carlos Monzon Jose Napoles Muhammad Ali Carlos Zarate Alexis Arguello Ruben Olivares Bob Foster Those are the kind of fighters who were on television at the time. Nice. Plus a stack of other soon-to-be greats who were just touching on the latter stages of the decade, such as the rest of the Fab Four, Larry Holmes, Wilfredo Gomez, Michael Spinks and Salvador Sanchez. I especially like the fact there was a larger intake of Latin fighters than in the '40s, made for more variety.
The 1920s has a good shot: You have legends in every weight class and arguably the strongest ever eras at middleweight, lightweight, bantemweight and flyweight. It also saw the largest number of active profesional fighters in North America of any era.
Yeah, that's a lot of good fighters. Then you also have Frazier, Foreman and Holmes, of course. Perhaps it was the strongest era.
Heavyweight- 70's Light Heavyweight- 40's and late 70's-80's Middleweight- 60's Welterweight- 40's and 80's Lightweight- 40's Featherweight- 40's and 60's Bantamweight- 60's and 70's Flyweight- 60's and 70's
40s cant be beat overall Pep FW Robinson LW-MW - who beats him? Burley/Holman Williams (LW) WW-LHW Charles/Moore MW-HW Marciano/Louis/Walcott-HW In terms of individual divisions 70s/90s - HWs 40s-50s-LHWs 40s/90s - MWs 40s/80s - WWs 80s - LW 40s/70s/00s - FW
It has to be 45-55 really. In which other era did you have three guys who all have good shouts for top 5 p4p (Robinson, Charles and Pep) in their prime? Moore, Marciano, Burley, Gavilan etc is a pretty good second tier as well.
The 70s for me. When boxing's world champs were from all-around the world, rather than most of them from the USA. I Don't see what's so 'golden' about that.
Certainly in contention,the 70's was a strong era ,particularly for heavyweights, but often overlooked ,it was a very competitive time for the Light heavies too.
the 20s/late 40s early 50s/ 70s for me thats where all the legends come from really. for weight class Heavyweight- 70's ali, Frazier, Foreman, Norton etc... Light Heavyweight- late 70's-80's MSM, Conteh, DWQ etc... Middleweight- 60's Fullmer, Tiger, Giardello, etc... Welterweight- 50's Basilio, DeMarco, Saxton, Gavilan etc.. Lightweight- late 60s early 70s Ortiz, Laguna, Buchanan, Duran, Ramos etc... Featherweight- 40s Pep, Saddler, Wright etc... Bantamweight- late 60s early 70s Harada, Rose, Jofre, Olivares etc... Flyweight- 70s Canto, Gonzalez etc... (i know the other guys just cant remember names im not too hot on my Flyweights)
