Langford is overrated

You can make a good case for Langford being 1 all time p4p.

 

Langford's resume speaks for itself. When you have a long career and face many of the best fighters you're going to have some losses. No sacred lamb here. I honestly think Harry Greb is the only fighter who ranks higher all time p4p.

 

Why not Roy Jones for one? Doesn't Roy Jones comnsistency counter Langfords resume edge?

 

An ATG LW, an ATG MW, & 3 of the best HWs to never win the title, all HoFers... what's wrong w/ that?

 

No, they didn't.

Langford started around LW & eventually beat HWs who weighed far into the 200s, often conceding double-digit weight disadvantages.

Duran started around jr.LW & ended up fighting SMW or LHW @most.

Canelo started @ jrWW & has yet to surpass 175.

DLH competed from 130 thru 160.

Walker's jump is the only one that's comparable to Langford's, but he was generally less successful, i.e.: he was never a consensus #1 HW contender for several consecutive years, as Langford was. (& incidentally, I rate Walker only 3 spots behind Langford in ATG rankings anyway.)

 

Such as?

 

Other than Langford participating in an amateur tournament in 135-lb division in January 1902, I don't know a single time any primary source reported his weight at or below that figure. I don't care Boston newspapers calling him lightweight without exact figures on his weight. Even prior to Joe Gans bout they wrote that Langford was to meet a lightweight (Jimmy Kelly) at catch weights, he was unable to make lightweight limit and he and his manager knew it.

 

he was a WW cum MW cum L-HW, finishing at HW...

quite normal in the past to move up and cruise between a few weight classes, especially with only 6 or 8 Weight Divisions.

plus Langford was thick built like Braxton/Qawi, closer to either side of 175 when levelled out, fighting Catchweight fights in those MW - HW Divisions.

Langford vs Qawi is a great Different Era's fantasy fight!

 

The thing with Langford is people have chosen to ignore his acheivements in the name of elevating Jack Johnson and/or simplicity. How can one be overrated if ones titles aren't recognized(boxing rec WBA dispute doesn't count)?

The reason Langford has so many more blemishes than his peers is he spent his career fighting at HW during the segregation era. Langford ditched MW at 21 or 22. While Langford fought white guys 40+ times and was not prevented from fighting white fighters he still partcipated in "colored" boxing his whole career and the way "colored" boxing worked is the top black fighters(and a few white guys who seemed to prefer fighting black fighters like Jim Barry) fought each other at a frequency their white counterparts did not. In combat sports if a champ beats a top opponent once or twice thats usually it. In black boxing of this period the champ would fight the same guys over and over with little record padding. You know the saying "if they fought 10 times he'd win 9 times". Langford, Jeanette, McVea and co was actually doing this hypothetical in real life. You can't view the resume of someone who fought in early 20th century black boxing the same way as a typical resume.

You can say multiple rematches were much more common then than later eras across the whole sport. And this is true especially because of the lack of a real judging system. Not in those quantities they weren't and not for champions. Competitive series were more common because a decisive outcome was less common. Langford fought a handful of guys double digit times and many guys a handful of times. This sort of thing is why having no "unavenged losses" was such a bigger deal in the past whereas now no one cares. Outside of the 1920s how many unavenged losses does Langford have? Fulton? Another thing that made losses more likely it was the NSW eras where most fights were short newspaper decisions many of which were debatable. This is how he lost to Flynn in a close decision. Langford usually got the stop.


Another thing with the P4Ps is how many of them were power hitters? Langford got a 71% finish rate fighting at HW fighting top guys over and over and over little to no resume padding. Fitz was champ at MW and HW but he was a HW(in later eras he'd be a LHW)cutting down to terrorize MWs, Langford is the opposite. He bulked up sacrificed mobility gained power and won. Someone like Qawis KO rate was 10 points lower fighting at LHW and CW with a quarter of Langfords career length. Whos else do we got? Ironically Jim Flynn who doesn't really impress you is one of the closer fighters to that.

Jim Flynn is not an ATG HW. But look at his run in 1911 after the Langford fights. Beat undefeated Morris and KOd Kaufman. If Langford had beaten Morris he'd get a lot of credit for that. Flynn was fighting at the highest level of his career at that time and might have been the number 1 contender for a bit whenever you look through rankings from that time he is ranked very high. He was not a great number 1 contneder if he was one and a smaller man(hence why Jack Johnson fought him instead of Langford) but he was a very good HW who was competitive for nearly a decade and had multiple title shots. Another small guy with power though not nearly as good as Langford. Langford losing a competitive 10 round decision to Flynn some scored for him then KOing him in the rematch is not a real mark of shame. You call Flynn flukey and inconsistant but at this time he was winning like 12 fights in a row against other opponents. Whatever you say about Flynn the one that fought Langford was the best he had to offer.

My main talking point about Langford is he is the smallest HW champ but the one with the longest career. Its hard to get around that.

 

There are many reasons Langford was less consistant than RJJ, theres the structure of "colored boxing", his career being 4 times longer than RJJ, being 4.5 inches shorter than RJJ and most important at all the fact he fought most of his career at HW while RJJ was there 1 fight.


Langford was considered the best HW for a period of 5 years and won at least 2 alphabet belts. RJJ won an alphabelt belt over John Ruiz then ran. The WBA was going to make RJJ rematch Ruiz and I don't blame RJJ for not staying longer but the reality is whatever RJJ accomplished at the weight class he'd have done via outboxing HWs by the skin of his teeth despite having more room to bulk up without compromising his speed. HWs were bigger in RJJs day but Langford still has the 4 KOs of 210+ HWs 6 ft 2-6 ft 6.

Don't get me wrong RJJ should rank high P4P hes likely the last LHW/HW champ one of the only ones from the late 20th century. But even there do I really think its impossible a Beterbiev or Tarver could have done better than RJJ at HW in the 2000s? Not really. LHWs ain't going to try again because LHWs division 3 and 4 now not division 2 and guys that size who aspire at HW probably won't be at LHW.

Theres also the issue that LHW literally didn't exist during the years Langford would have otherwise been compling feats at the weight class. LHW stopped existing during the 1906-1912 period. Exactly the years Langford would have been fighting there.