If you are an RJJ fan or an RJJ critic, have a look...

Nunn, if you're going by lineage. Toney if you're going by HBO bull**** nuthuggery.

.....Jones pretended that the guy who was his main rival for years & the division's champion didn't even exist. I don't know if HBO even mentioned DM during telecasts of Jones' fights. Lame.

 

& what does Nunn-Toney at 160 have to do with the lineage at 168?

 

Me to but when he moved up to light heavy he got hurt worse than Pavlik did:hey

 

It has nothing to do with lineage.

Just as lineage has NOTHING to do with who is the best in the division. Shannon Briggs, anyone?

 

Great logic, I mean forget Hoyfield, Bowe, Moorer, Foreman, Lewis. Clearly they don't count. You haven't a clue really. What percentage of Linear Champions in history were not the best in their division?

 

None of those were considered the best because they were linear. They were the best because they were unified, undisputed, or simply clearly the best. The linear title is not something anyone chases or tries to be.

To answer your question, of the last 5 linear HW champions 3 or 4 of them were not the best in the division - Moorer, Foreman and Briggs (Rahman is debatable).

In the other divisions, there would also be a whole bunch of linear champions who were/are not the best in the division. It's difficult to give you names because, well, who really bothers keeping a list of linear champions? And that's kinda my point.

 

You seem confused. The Linear title is the title traced back to the unified undisputed champion, who the majority of the time retains at least one sanctioning body's title until he retires or loses. Any paper champions crowned during that time don't come into it.

 

Prior to the win over Leonard, he had beaten top WW Palomino, and at his LW best he'd beaten the likes of Dejesus, Buchanan, Ishimatsu, Kobayashi, Thompson, Mamby, Bizarro, Lampkin, Fernandez, Viruet, Villa, etc along with a win over underrated great Ernseto Marcel at just 18 years of age.

The majority of his work was done in these prime years, and he'd fought professionally for over 12 years before losing to Leonard in the rematch. The fact that a LW was able to continue to fight up to MW at a world class level when past his prime for the vast majority of those years says a lot about not only his heart and desire, but his immense skills. He was a passion fighter, and a lot of his lackluster performances and losses came as a result of a lack of effort, motivation, conditioning, etc. Without his passion, he just wasn't the same fighter. Even so, it was a rare occurence in his prime and only began to happen often toward the latter half of his career at higher weights.

Duran at his best was one of the best fighters we've ever seen on film, to call him overrated more or less just shows a severe lack of boxing knowledge and understanding on your part.

 

No.

 

I'm not confused at all. I know exactly what linear means.

YOU seem confused, because in it's original sense it actually had nothing to do with who has unified the belts. It originally simply meant "the man who beat the man" and is traced back to before there were multiple belts to unify! The boxing media / public added a clause where, if the line is broken (due to a retirement), then we can start a new line if someone unifies the "big-3" belts. But that is pretty arbitrary because, for example, why is the IBF more significant than the WBO?

The point is, a fighter can become a linear champion with a one-off fluke win. It doesn't tell you who is the best in the division. It starts off being meaningful, but as time goes on and the belts get splintered, it becomes less and less significant to the point that Shannon Briggs can be the linear champion of the world.

 

Although I dont think RJJ could whip Ali and probably not Ray Robinson his record is better than Duran's and Ali's and he was just as dominant as Robinson and more so when moving up in weight. Ali had way to many gift decisions. Duran was to brave for his own good and I wish he would have fought more smaller sized legends like Pryor

 

His record is better than neither Duran nor Ali's, not by a long shot. You don't really have much to back up your ill-advised points with.

 

As I said before Leonard there wasnt much..Buchanan was good, he was pretty even with DeJesus..Cuevas?? 35-15 lost to every good fighter he ever faced...Moore was a hype job much like Lacy of today, he had 12 ****ing fights when he fought Duran. So all in all Duran only had a handful of good wins...Leonard one which was kinda a fluke and people forget that alot of people actaully thought that Ray won that fight...Plus its bull**** that people say that Duran was a natual lightweight because he wasnt, he was no more natural as a light as Oscar was a jr light, they killed themselves to make that weight...Go back and actually find out how many of Durans fights were actaully as a lightweight, not many most were above the weight and even as high as welter as early as 1977. Roberto couldnt make the weight which is why he only defended the title 12 times in 41 fights, thats right Duran was the lightweight champ for 41 fights and only 12 were title fights...BECAUSE HE COULDNT MAKE THE WEIGHT...Duran moving up in weight and losing to every elite fighter isnt that impressive, not impressive enough to put him in the top 15 p4p in my mind...Dont get me wrong I was a duran fan as a young fighter and fan, but now looking back on his career he was/is very over rated.

 

Ali ......................................Jones

Doug Jones robbed L..............Castro W
Cooper robbed L....................Hopkins W
Liston fixed...........................Toney W
Young L robbed..................... Mccallum W
Bonavena W...........................Griffin W
Frazier W ..............................Grant W
Quarry W ...............................Hill W
Norton L Robbed.......................Gonzalez W
Foreman W .............................Kelly W
Shavers W ............................. Woods W
Lyle W.....................................Ruiz W
..............................................Tarver L
..............................................Johnson L
...............................................Tito W

6 (with robberies 10)....................... 12

I know you will say What about Patterson but Patterson was KO'd to many times prior and I could have added Harding, Hamond etc... to RJJ but i didnt put possible hype jobs

Now I am interested in your argument that Duran's record is better than RJJ's