Today’s Best Fighters at Any Weight” (p.22) October 1981 Ring: In case anyone is interested. This list comes from a Ring poll of 50 voters. I believe this may have been the Ring's first ever "pound for pound" ranking. It was published in the "October 1981" issue, which means that the poll probably went out in early 1981 (there is a note explaining that it was compiled before the Sanchez-Gomez fight). Side note: Gomez got the second most first place votes (10) after Leonard (20), besting Holmes (6), Hearns (4), Arguello (4), and Hagler (4). 1. Sugar Ray Leonard 2. Larry Holmes 3. Tommy Hearns 4. Wilfredo Gomez 5. Arguello & Hagler (tied) 7. Wilfred Benitez 8. Gerry Cooney 9. Salvador Sanchez 10. Roberto Duran 11. Matthew Saad Muhammad 12. Michael Spinks 13. Aaron Pryor 14. Jeff Chandler & Mike Weaver (tied) 16. Saoul Mamby 17. Eusebio Pedroza 18. Pipino Cuevas 19. Cornelius Boza-Edwards 20. Greg Page 21. Ray Mancini 22. Sean O’Grady & Lupe Pintor (tied) 24. Michael Dokes 25. Mustafa Hamsho 26. Ayub Kalule
Wow. Just look at the strength in depth of that p4p list! Of all the fighters listed, well over half of them went on to become ATGs. And even the ones who didn't were still damn fine fighters! I'm guessing that if it was the October 81 edition then it would have been reporting on events up to about July/August 81? Judging from the rankings, Sanchez-Gomez was probably about to happen, hence Gomez was 4th and Sanchez was down in 9th. Would be interesting to see the rankings from the following couple of months too as Leonard-Hearns took place in September 81.
Gerry cooney top 10 p4p? What a ****ing joke. Shows you how clueless many of these Larry Merchant type experts are
Interesting that Cooney, Page, and Dokes are on that list. Good fighters, but the hype was stronger than the reality. Surprised Milton McCrory, or Tony Ayala jr wasn't on the list.
For the most part, a great list. However, Gerry Cooney #8 and 4 places ahead of an atg lightheavy in Mike Spinks? It's so ironic that Michael beat the **** out of Cooney when they were at heavy, although Cooney was shot at that point. Pedroza is too low as well.
Too low ?? He's only one place behind the immortal Gerry Cooney, basking in the divine glow of his greatness.
You would have had to have been around back then to realize just how hyped Cooney was After he stopped the shopworn Norton, Sports Illustrated put him on the cover with the headline: "Gerry Cooney. Lethal. Awesome. Ready." I bought into the hype. Of course, I was a 12 yr old casual boxing fan at the time. LOL
McCrory had about 14-15 fights at the time and wouldn't have been a top 10 welter for another fight or two. Ayala would have had 12-13 fights and wasn't yet rated either.
If it's the Oct. 81 issue it's for the period ended around June 81. The date of the issue was usually four months ahead of the results
