I don't have a huge issue with anyone who calls Floyd Mayweather Jr. the GOAT..

Hard to say, but I imagine that he would suffer losses and couldn't ride his '0' all the way to the bank. I think he'd be great in any era, however.

 

Hard to say. How would he react if he were ever to get knocked out?

I really don't view him as a warrior, but rather a damn good boxer. But I don't think he'd deal well getting KO'd.

 

Of course you would. You also said that you'd put Duran's achievements at lightweight above Floyd's entire career!

 

Excellent ****ogy. I hold Cotto's loss to Mayweather in a similar light.

 

Good then l guess we'll be seeing Floyd against GGG then. Or maybe he's too much of a chicken **** to get in the ring with him.

BTW who has Floyd fought where he came into the fight as the underdog? Honest question.

 

This coming from a guy who caller Leonard a liar for saying Duran forced him to fight his fight which the announcer also said the same even though it's on YouTube.

 

Btw, l can think of numerous fighters whose best performances were on the loosing end of a fight. Jirov - Toney was one of the best fights l've ever watched. Jirov - Mesi was another war that Jirov lost. The problem now a days, and it's wrecking boxing as far as l'm concerned, is that some fighters want perfect records and therefore won't take fights in which they're the underdog and any loss no matter how gallant is discarded.

 

Deleted.

 

This is my main gripe. Boxing has always been a business but it's also a sport that requires a warrior's mentality, courage, blood and guts 'n' n u t s. Dig deep. Use your smarts. Hurt your opponent more than he hurts you.

I remember Holyfield gained more respect for his gallant effort against Bowe in '92 than he did in his previous 25 victories combined. You show what you're made of. Fans want to see that, and if you're good they'll even pay to see that.

 

Or how would Floyd's brittle hands hold up in an era of small horsehair gloves and no xylocaine whilst having to fight every few weeks?

 

Most people who rate him GOAT haven't studied history. Under certain criteria he has an argument though, namely longevity and dominance.

I don't see how anyone can rate Ross, Pep, Chavez above him now.

It depends on criteria, he easily has better longevity and dominance, if top 5 wins are the be all then Duran rates above him.

Armstrong tends to get overrated. People talk about 20 WW defenses. Well after winning the WW title against a blown up LW he barely fought any ranked WW opposition bar Garcia and Zivic. He beat many of the best LWs and FWs so it's a good achievement given his relative size but it gets overblown.

He beat many prime champions. 'Great' is subjective though. I don't consider Lamotta a great when you look at the number of gift decisions he got alongside his losses. I'm not sure I consider Loughran to be greater than Maske either if you watch footage of them both. But because historic fighters have red tinted glasses things get overrated.

Yes their opponents would have many more belts most likely. It's not something I factor in so much. Augustus was better than some of the 'champions' Mayweather beat.

The Sugar's and Hearns would be too big for him, not sure that's a P4P argument. Whitaker is a toss up where you'd favour Pea. Napoles I'd give Floyd the edge but no issue with you picking him. Armstrong would lose, he's too small apart from anything else.

 

I agree with this.
There's really no argument for Floyd being the #1 of all-time.
The OP seemed like a parody, to be fair to magoo. But I'm not sure.
By the same "logic" being offered there, I'd imagine people would accept Joe Calzaghe among the top 15 ... ???

 

At a 147 same day weigh in no one is too big for anyone.

They might be taller, rangier, harder hitting etc but they won't be bigger in boxing terms so that would lead me to believe skill is the defining factor and if Hearns is skilled enough to control range whilst weighing 147 it is a p4p argument imo.

 

Great post with a lot of great points. :thumbsup But are there any other endeavors in life where longevity and consistency would be the primary measures of greatness (especially in an era where the former and probably the latter is probably easier to accomplish than it had been in the past)?

I'm not big on "GOAT" debates, in large part because it is so difficult to compare different fighters (especially from different eras) and because we each have our own set of criteria. If I were making an argument for Mayweather though, I would probably focus just as much on his skills and his talent as on his win #s.