So Mayweather is essentially retired...

That's bull**** reasoning. You can't discount Floyd for how good he is. It's his fault that he was only an underdog for Corrales, but that's not a negative. I remember people picking Marquez.

 

Mayweather fanboys = assume criticism of Mayweather is an agenda against Mayweather.
We are ranking Mayweather vs ATG's = the standard is thus very high.
Terms like 'Good win' = good according to the very highest standard.

All in all, I agree with Vanboxingfan's, Bogo's assessments on Mayweather, and opinions which are similar.


How to Rate Greatness:
1. Resume
a. H2H ability of his opponents (consequently, their condition during the fight)
b. Stylistic advantages or not?
c. Manner of the victories
d. The size of the opponents
2. H2H ability of the fighter
a. How good are they relative to the other greats?
3. Longevity
a. RING AGE.


My version of Mayweather = 47-1-1 (or 0-0-0-49 due to the IV scandal)
But for the sake of argument, let's say he's 49-0.

ATG's:
W semi-shot, psychologically shot, surgery level injured Pacquiao
W Past prime De La Hoya
W Ancient Mosley of 2010
W fat, slow, heavily outweighed on weigh in, Marquez

- That is very underwhelming.

Pacquiao = very good win, never to be considered a great win.
Past prime De La Hoya = Borderline but not a clear very good win
Ancient Mosley of 2010 = Ok win.
Fat, slow, heavily outweighed in weigh in, Marquez who is massively stylistically disadvantaged = Ok win.

Other wins:
W Castillo x 2
W Cotto
W Corrales
W Canelo
W Genaro
W Maidana x 2
W Judah
W Hatton
W Historically, C grade contenders that aren't mentioned in this post.

Range = a small number of very good wins, mostly good wins. No great wins. Only looked incredibly impressive in half of these wins.

His H2H ability (relative to greats in his weight class):
Griffith, Rodriguez, Chavez, Benitez, Pryor, Pacquiao tier

Loses to: Napoles, Duran, Leonard, Hearns, SRL, DLH, Whitaker

Mayweather's Longevity:
38 years old, 19 years as a professional, undefeated. That's an incredible feat. However, RING AGE is the most important, this is not the same as 'age'. This is the connection fanboys seem to miss.
People act as though Mayweather is on the highest echelon of longevity, like an Archie Moore. He's not on the highest echelon.


So, how great is a 49-0 Mayweather?
A few very good wins, mostly 'good' wins, and C grade wins.
No ATG victory on his resume (an incredibly important factor in ATG rankings)
He beat a just a couple of borderline HOF'ers in terms of H2H ability

In short, I see him as on the same TIER in greatness as Eder Jofre, Alexis Arguello, Carlos Monzon, Marvin Hagler, Michael Spinks, Evander Holyfield, Tommy Loughran, Jose Napoles, Fighting Harada.
This is a very lofty praise. Mayweather is probably around 38-39th.


People lose sight on what the '0' means. Old timers had careers like modern day amateurs in terms of records. Someone like Guillermo Rigondeaux is one of the GOAT amateurs who has a 245-12 record or something like that. That's a lot of losses, but conditions were different then. People would take fights with injuries, they fought to live, no access to hyper PED's until 50's, they'd fight every week, 4 ounce gloves, very war torn etc. etc.

 

Again ... how does he lose to Whitaker?

Based on what, exactly?

Whitaker didn't beat better fighters. Whitaker didn't punch harder. Whitaker wasn't a better boxer. Whitaker wasn't more successful against the lesser guys he fought.

What are all these major Pernell Whitaker wins that make him so much better than Floyd Mayweather?

Because Mayweather clearly seems better than Whitaker in every category.

I'm no Mayweather "fanboy" as you just dismissed everyone who is making a valid point here.

What did Whitaker do in his career that was better than Mayweather in any way at all?

I'm being completely serious here?

And, seriously, how the f*ck are Canelo and Cotto and Genaro Hernandez and Zab Judah and others you mentioned "historically C-Grade contenders."

Alvarez and Cotto were the last two lineal middleweight champions. How does that make them "C-Grade contenders?"

How many Lineal Middleweight champs did Whitaker beat?

Hell, Whitaker never beat ANY LINEAL champs in his whole career. Forget two LINEAL MIDDLEWEIGHT champs in a fairly straightforward manner. And the LINEAL JUNIOR MIDDLEWEIGHT champ. And the PREVIOUS TWO LINEAL WELTERWEIGHT CHAMPS in a straightforward manner. And Lineal LIGHTWEIGHT champ.

Genaro Hernandez beat Azumah Nelson (maybe the best guy Mayweather ever defeated) in a unification just before he lost to Mayweather. Hernandez is C-Grade?

And you're badmouthing Manny Pacqiauo because he claimed he was injured. Buddy McGirt had his rotator cuff torn loose and fought Whitaker. McGirt wasn't a fraction of the fighter Pacquiao was ... and McGirt was injured ... how does that weigh into your rating of Whitaker?

Beating the reigning lightweight champ Marquez doesn't count because the fight wasn't at LIGHTWEIGHT?

Seriously, some of you need to forget posting "grades" and get your heads out of your As$es first.

Hell, Roger Mayweather had Whitaker on the deck ... and Roger wasn't even close to the level of his nephew.

Yes, for the sake of "argument" ... let's use his actual record.

SERIOUSLY.:hi:

 

38-39 is more than fair. That's well within the top half. That's knocking on the door of the top 20, the creme de la creme, of all fighters that ever lived.

Lol @ acting like Mayweather beat Roach-Cotto at 159 and 2015 Canelo at 155 to beat two lineal Middleweight champions. That's now how it works. C grade sounds harsh for them but if A's are the top tier all time greats, then for HOF level fighters (which Canelo isn't even at yet) C makes sense. Judah isn't even C grade in that case, nor is Hernandez.

Whitaker's win over Chavez is better than anything Floyd has done. Stop acting like that isn't clear. So is beating Nelson, who KO'd Puerto Rico's GOAT in Wilfredo Gomez and reigned for years against accomplished contenders with impressive records. After he lost to Whitaker he beat Laporte, a solid contender of the era, and continued to reign for years after. Whitaker had just one inch in height and reach on him.

Unlike Oscar, who didn't get his remathch, and got stopped by little Pac soon after and retired.
Unlike Mosley, who drew against Mora, lost to Pac, lost to Canelo, lost to Mundine, and never did anything of note again.
Unlike Pacquiao, who might lose against Bradley and is about to retire.

And in terms of boxing skill, no 2 ATG boxers are alike, and it's almost impossible to find one ATG that does EVERYTHING better than another. Floyd's upper body movement was not as fluid as Whitaker's, his control of the center was not as good as Whitaker's. That's why against an old DLH, Floyd got driven to the ropes time and time again by the mere threat of a jab, winning a very competitive fight, while against a prime DLH, an old crack-addicted Whitaker was still able to make him look silly.

 

You're comparing Whitaker's greatness, someone who's 20th all time (IMO) to Mayweather.

The biggest mistake is to assume Whitaker and Mayweather are the same fighters just because they're defensive fighters. Whitaker has a greater offensive ****nal (which doesn't necessarily correlate to higher KO percentage, by the way). Whitaker's defence is also more instinctive than Mayweather's. Mayweather is the king of hard work, Whitaker's defensive brain is just bigger. i.e Mayweather against a pressure fighter more readily becomes overwhelmed and shuts down - this is not so much the case of Whitaker.

Whitaker certainly beat better fighters. Julio Cesar Chavez? One of the greats! One of the very best pressure fighters of all time lol...and a very convincing win for Whitaker (I don't consider massive robberies to count against a fighter). A legacy win like this goes a long way when we're comparing greats, whereby small margins goes a long way.
Another ATG win = Azumah Nelson, who although the smaller guy, was still in good condition..Whitaker put on a great performance against him.
McGirt was elite, and is a HOF'er in terms of H2H ability. Whitaker beat him twice, he was a tricky opponent. Cotto is a very good fighter in my book and I like to use him as a benchmark to assess other fighters for some reason. McGirt > Cotto.
Hey let's not stop there, Whitaker, being as past prime as Mayweather is now, fought an even fight with a PRIME DLH. Many people think a prime DLH would beat Mayweather. DLH had stamina problems in his career, exacerbated by being past prime vs Mayweather, which helped in allowing Mayweather to take over.
Don't hide behind phrases like 'lineal x,y,z weight champ'. Whereas Mayweather struggled and in the opinion of most, lost to Castillo...past prime Whitaker was doing bigger things, having even fights with a prime ATG in DLH.

So already, that's 3 ATG at-or-near prime fights, and 2x victory vs a HOF level fighter.

Now throw in one of the best 154lbers in a very good and very big, strong, heavy handed Julio Cesar Vasquez who was the guy at 154lbs and was clear favourite over Pernell.

They're not C graders, I don't think I made that clear, I should have written 'other C grade contenders'.

What are you going by when you say he wasn't more successful against lesser guys he fought, boxrec scorecards?

 

lol I think it was misunderstood. I think Cotto, Canelo, Corrales etc are better than C graders. The other fighters that I hadn't mentioned in that post are more like the C graders.

The problem is, people are fallaciously giving Mayweather the credit for beating a Roach-trained Cotto. Roach visibly made legit improvements in Miguel that weren't present vs Mayweather. This is just the truth.

I think Bradley-Pacquiao 3 will be an interesting fight, Bradley looks more sound now and Pacquiao may slip a bit more.

 

He makes my top 10 p4p all time.

 

P.S Nelson was finished when Genaro fought him, this is a known fact lol.
As for McGirt, Whitaker beat him twice..

 

I can't say that I remember many picking JMM, if that were the case, then JMM would have been the favorite to win the fight wouldn't you think?

 

The biggest problem with Floyd Mayweather is he lacks any defining wins or even a defining performance in a loss. Sure the Corrales and Castillo wins are extremely impressive in the grand scheme of things.

Yet when we're comparing ATG's there is heightened scrutiny. And his signature performance just doesn't stack up. If Mayweather is a top 20 ATG he needs to have that otherwordly performance.

For Ali it's Foreman, For Foreman it's Frazier, For Hagler it's Hearns, For Jones it's Toney, For Pacquiao it's Barrera.

You see Floyd simply cannot stack up his best win and come close to the greatest modern TV fighters.

 

I used to post on cbz. I remember a significant minority thinking Mayweather bit off more than he could chew after the layoff

 

Great post. I also use Cotto as a benchmark. He's just such a solid, well-rounded, formidable and accomplished guy who falls short of true greatness. He's also one of my favorites. But that doesn't stop me from recognizing when a fighter is more capable than he is. And as I posted before, I think Cotto is a top win for Floyd.

Spot on, not sure why people are acting like Floyd beat those versions of both fighters. He should get credit for both wins but one must examine the specifics. The same way Pac's win against Cotto was great given he hadn't faced a huge welterweight yet but we know he didn't have a great trainer in his corner so it is diminished.

I agree, I might favor Tim. He made lots of improvements (I detailed them in a video). It depends on how hungry Pacquiao is IMO. He has to be creative and aggressive. If he shows up like he did against Floyd I don't see him having the mental stamina to put in the effort against a sharp well prepared Bradley.

 

Agreed. Depth can make up for a lot, but, you get more credit for climbing a mountain once than you do for climbing a hill 10 times.

That's not to say Floyd couldn't beat greater fighters than he has in history. I give him an even chance against JCC. He might beat one of the Fab 4, etc. But I'm not going to pretend he did.

 

Mayweather climbed the hill so many times that we became tired of watching it. His depth is extremely impressive.

But I like your ****ogy. After we've seen him climb the hill we wanted to see him climb the mountain. Which he never did.

 

Louis, Hopkins, Lewis, Tyson, etc. Lots of great fighters do not have career defining wins. The Pacquiao fight was supposed to be his moment, and will go down in history as one of the biggest fights ever, but he was basically too good for Pacquiao to get him out of his comfort zone. Again, it's not Mayweather's fault that he doesn't fight down to the comp like Holyfield or Gatti.