Greatest Contenders - Lightweights

NoNeck, thanks for the submissions. I had to disallow Davis as he has actually held a portion of the lightweight title. I also didn't feel Azumah Nelson or Erik Morales actually contended at the weight. They both fought for the title, but that's all. No real substance there. It was just a shot at a big payday rather than calling them great contenders and then they just went on back to their normal weight. However, I added Gamboa, Guzman, Mitchell and Raheem.

 

Ron, I heard that story too. Some argument where the wife nailed Davey upside the head with a skillet sometime before the fight. Of course, the whiplash effect off of that bottom rope as he fell in the 10th didn't help matters any. Great little featherweight.

 

Actually we've already done jr. light (super-feather). A division unto itself. I omitted Straw, jr. fly, super fly, super bantam, super-middle and cruiser. They all came around during the multi-multi title era. They have no real history of good contenders because every half-decent fighter or average fighter became a champ. Trying to make a list of contenders in those divisions would be almost akin to naming club-fighters. I allowed jr. light, jr. welter and jr. middle because the history does stretch back a bit and gave us more elbow room. It may not be perfect, but I think its the most fair and keeps real world class fighters on our minds. My only issue with Nelson and Morales is the fact that they simply didn't do anything at 135 other than move up, fight for the title and then move back down. They just didn't contend. I struggled with my own inclusion of Kid Chocolate at lightweight. I ended up including him because - despite his lack of weight - he did fight Tony Canzoneri (twice), Kid Berg (twice), Al Singer, and Lew Feldman and Johnny Farr several times apiece. So he was really there. Sorry for any confusion, just trying to keep everything within the lines.