Mike Tyson was #1 p4p for a few years; who else would've been?

Well he beat 2 top P4P fighters in Moore and Charles and beat Walcott and was unbeaten. Not sure how his career overlapped with SRRs off the top of my head

 

Wasn't Sal Sanchez #1 p4p from 1980-82? He was in my book!

 

He wasn't actually. He sat at 2 at one time i think. SRL might have been 1 after the Duran rematch i think.

 

Both were joint Ring fighters of the year for 1981. The only other time this has happened over the last 35 years was Curry and Hagler, 1985.

Im pretty sure Leonard was widely considered #1 until he retired in 1982. If he wasn't #1 after the Duran rematch, he sure was after beating Hearns. Your initial call is more than likely correct.

 

Well SRR at that time was busy winning and loseing the middleweight title to the likes of Turpin and Fullmer at that time. I may give the edge to Marciano here.

 

Ali was a pretty big man who beat most fighters who very much smaller than himself, how can he be #1 p4p in the 60s when fighters like Griffith, Saldivar, Ortiz, etc. were around?

 

Because he was dominant, and impressive as hell in 1966-67. Really, his only competition in this regrad would have been Jofre, who, along with Ortiz would have been fighting for the #2 slot.

 

Robinson retired in 1952 and wasn't an active fighter for two years, and then stumbled a bit before rallying to ko Olson. Marciano was beating Charles and Moore. Saddler was erratic and Gavilan faded after 1954. I think one could make a very good case for Marciano from 1953 to 1955.

 

No love for Holyfield? I know he wasn't rated no.1 but after cleaning out the cruiserweight division completely and taking the heavyweight title I think you could make a case for it. But I guess with Chavez beating Taylor and Pernell victory over Azumah would of been hard to have either at number 1

 

Yes, I remember seeing the 1989 (I think) p4p list & the top 3 were Tyson, Chavez, Whitaker in that order.... as good as prime Mike was, I don`t think he was better than prime JCC or prime Pea, those 2 were the best & their position probably swapped around fight by fight depending on performance.... I believe the star power of Tyson at his peak was as much to do with him being no1 as his ability.... Chavez & Whitaker forced themselves onto the list thru sheer talent & ability alone.

Ps. Muhammad Ali of 1966/67 must surely have been in with a good shout for best p4p at the time.

 

It was his ability that contributed to his star power.

He seldom lost rounds, rarely got hit clean and he beat everybody he faced decisively and more impressively than anybody else competing for the top spot. He got there on merit.

 

I suppose but it's not like Whitaker lost a lot of rounds and his competition was far greater than Tysons.

 

Listen, just to clear things up... I`m a Tyson fan, I have him 3 or 4 on my all time HW list & at his best he was amazing, I give him more credit than most... I just don`t feel he was better than a peak Chavez or Whitaker... its not something I`ll debate too much tho because as I say, I think Tyson is very underrated on here & I kinda smiled when I first seen that p4p list.... shows you how easily people forget, Tyson was phenomenal in the 80s.

 

This could perfectly describe Whitaker & Chavez too tho, they were extremely dominant.