Top Five Greatest Fighters Ever

I understand :good

Just out of interest Kit...for example, would you rate Jimmy Bivins (great resume !!) over Joe Louis in a hypothetical p4p list ?

 

I would have no problem at all with anyone who wanted to rank Jimmy Bivins over Joe Louis. I think it's sheer folly that so many Classic fans rate guys like Bivins, Lloyd Marshall, Jimmy McLarnin etc lower than other fighters on the basis of things like who was a more major figure in the sport, who was more culturally/historically significant, etc etc. On here, you'll find Jack Johnson, Jack Dempsey, Joe Louis and even guys like George Foreman and Joe Frazier consistently rated higher than McLarnin, simply because they held the biggest prize of them all and were involved in high-profile fights. For me, this is totally bogus. There should be a very clear difference between ATG lists based purely (and rightly) on what happened inside the ring, and lists that are based on a criteria such as how important Johnson and Louis were for the sport, or how famous Dempsey was, or how many big fights Frazier had. These kind of things aren't important when it comes to just plainly evaluating boxing greatness, achieved in the ring.

Resume above all. Resume above all. Forevermore. This is what matters. This is what counts. JMHO. :good

 

Kitti, how do you view someone like Sullivan who has a terrible resume in comparison to most HW's who followed him, yet ruled for nigh on a decade and unified the various hybrid championships.

 

Sullivan doesn't really come into my thinking when it comes to the greatest heavyweights of all-time. An important figure, yes. Someone that should not be overlooked when discussing the history and development of the sport, sure. But I'm not so interested in accurately placing someone when I don't know much about the general quality and skill level of his opponents. There are some fighters I've never seen footage of that I feel compelled to research and assess. Sullivan is not one of them.

 

Ok then a more modern example: hearns as a ww, how do you rate him there?

 

Ability-wise, high.

P4P/all-time? Not particularly highly at all. He didn't stay there long enough, didn't have enough top wins (arguably only one).

Not a difficult one. Cut and dried.

 

I was thinking...There is no way to rate Duran over Ike Williams using the resume comparison.....at least at LW, Williams beat much better LWs....as a big fan of Williams I like this idea...few people do this though...
Actually Carlos Ortiz has a much better resume at LW than Duran too.....

 

see for me the achievement of being second only to leonard, of destroying a prime hof, of establishing a reputation as a h2h monster, that's enough to counteract the thin resume and justify his status as a WW great.

 

Mandell at LW: Kansas, McLarnin, Canzoneri, Petrolle, Terris, J Dundee, Bernstein (x2), McGraw, Seeman (x2), H Brown (x2) - Terris (D), Bernstein (D) - Goodrich (L), Singer (L)

one of the best resume's in the divisions history but you never see him argued as a top 3 candidate.

 

I agree with both those statements but to play devils advocate, you could argue that Duran might not have beaten better fighters but he doesn't have losses at the weight in big fights life say, Ortiz against Laguna, or Williams against Montgomery.

 

Joe Louis
Benny Leonard
Willie Pep
SRR
Roberto Duran

 

I'd argue that you are wrong. One win over Cuevas (27-6), 3 title defences against B/C list fighters, and a stoppage loss to SRL does not justify the description of a "welterweight great", same as Shane Mosley isn't a lightweight great. I'd have no problem with anyone saying Hearns is one of the top 5 ww's ever h2h; in fact, I think that myself. But because he looked great there doesn't translate into saying he earned/proved greatness, because he didn't.

I think you and Vic are thinking that I'm saying resume is the only factor though; I'm not.

Saying "resume above all" is not the same as saying "only resume". I consider resume by far the most important single factor, but I do take other things into consideration as well.

 

And that's our main difference because his greatness isn't questionable to me.

I understand exactly what you mean which is why i'm focusing on the fact I give achievement equal weighting. I'm highlightin the cases of strong achievement and weak resume as that's the difference for those I think are great (john l, hearns) whilst you disagree.

Mosley was never really better than the wbc guys at the time and they mixed at a higher level despite not looking as quality.

 

A title win, 3 defences, and a stoppage loss = strong achievement??? :huh

I don't think so.

You are rating Hearns at welterweight on the basis of Hearns as the fighter he proved to be through all weight classes across his whole career, which is bogus IMO.

Well, either that or you're rating him as a proven great welterweight because of one win over a top guy, 3 wins over mediocrities, and a stoppage loss he looked good in. This is a very dangerous road to go down - where does it end?

Is Manny Pacquiao a proven great light-welterweight because he obliterated one of the best lww's of his era there?

You have to draw a line between 'looking good there' and proving good there. Hearns was an h2h monster at ww and fully merits recognition as such. But he simply did not prove to be a great welterweight in the same way as many others who had many more meaningful wins there.

 

he proved himself to be the second best of the Leonard era which is a massive achievement in it's own. he destroyed a hof fighter in one of the best performances the division has ever seen. he built a reputation as one of the best fighters to weigh within 147.

his resume isn't **** poor neither: Cuevas, Finch, Gray, Weston, Curry, Muangsurin, Espada, Primera, Shields - Leonard (L).

all in all I have him number 19 as a WW.

Jones Jr breaks my top 10 as a LHW also.