Is Nigel Benn HOF or ATG worthy?

Is Nigel Benn HOF or ATG worthy?

Benn begin his career, with a string of 22 consecutive victories by knock out, and is regarded as one of the most exiting British fighters ever.


42-5-1 (35 ko)

His two greatest wins are probably...


Gerald McClellan ,perhaps the biggest win on Benn's resume. McClellan was no 1 at middle, prime, and Ring magazine p4p no 8 at the time. Behind names like RJJ, Pernell Whitaker, Lopez, and Trinidad.


Iran Barkley. A Stateside, early KO win over prime Iran Barkley (defeater of Hitman Hearns twice). Barkley picked up the WBC middleweight title, the IBF super-middleweight title, and the WBA light-heavyweight title during his time.

Barkley fought Hearns, Duran (1989 Fight of the Year - Ring), Nunn, and then Benn, right after one another (in a row). He lost three of them, but that's some punishing series of fights, against crack opposition.

Many also believe Benn beat Eubank in their draw as well.


http://www.boxrec.com/list_bouts.php?human_id=000739&cat=boxer

 

I'm a big fan of Benn (in retrospect, I actually prefered Eubank at the time), but I'm in two minds. On the one hand I say no he's not HOF worthy, but then I think of current HOF, and possible future ATG's, and there resumes are not necessary any better, perhaps worse.

Perhaps Eubank, and Benn could go in joined together. I read somewhere that Benn was offered half a million to fight Eubank for a third time, just 3 years ago. He turned it down

 

Yea, it was part of a large interview in the times a couple of years ago. A fight at their ages wouldn't have been right.

"THE PHONE rings. The interview is over so he picks it up. It is his agent, Kevin Lueshing. Ambrose Mendy, who was once Benn’s manager, has just called. He has offered Benn £500,000 to come out of retirement and engage Eubank for the third time. Benn laughs and puts down the phone. He walks into the kitchen, picks up a large envelope off the table and strides back into the living room.

“This here is an apartment that my wife has just bought for me. Today. Here are the keys,” he says with an air of utter satisfaction, removing them from the envelope along with pictures of the apartment and its panoramic view of Palma’s coastline. “Why would I get back in the ring to fight for half a million when I’m a millionaire?

“I’ve just come back from doing a celebrity SAS-style reality show and it was hard, horribly hard. I was with Steve Collins (the Irishman who beat Benn in each of his last two fights) and we were being ambushed by these SAS men, who then kept us up all night, interrogating us. They put us in ice water, everything. Now, I keep myself in shape but when all the filming was done and they announced a big party to celebrate I headed straight for my bed. I was exhausted.

“Does Ambrose Mendy really think I’m that hard up that I have to fight Chris Eubank? Does he not consider that at 41 I might just have better things to do? What is it that Matthew wrote? ‘The harvest is plentiful but the labourers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send labourers into his harvest.’ I think I know what I have to do."

This content is protected