Usyk is only behind Floyd Mayweather in the last 20 years, surpassing Manny Pacquiao

Originally Posted By @Loudon

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I simply think Beterbiev, Calzaghe, Inoue and Ward would have beaten Usyk and you could say Usyk has accomplished more, but not over as longer period and not as dominant as Beterbiev, Calzaghe, Inoue and Ward so on that basis, alongside that IMO those fighters (Beterbiev, Calzaghe, Inoue and Ward) had more ability than Usyk that's why I rank them higher than Usyk.

Originally Posted By @Loudon

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He won those fights I know this but he was not scary in any of those wins and if you wanna get the top of all time great lists YOU HAVE TO HAVE A FEW SCARY WINS OVER ELITE GUYS.

The reason why Usain Bolt goes down in history is not just because he won 3 Olympic gold medals in the 100m at 3 Olympics, but that he was awesome.

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Shutting down after 70m in an Olympic 100m final ? Against the fastest men in the world ? And celebrating to the crowd ? Doing all of that and breaking the world record ?

THAT'S SCARY.

Winning is not enough for me if I'm judging someone as a great at boxing

 

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@Loudon

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Well, as a side note, I think any hope of seeing Triple G back in the ring again are pretty much gone when last march it was announced that he was gonna be the [url]President of Kazakh National Olympic Committee[/url].

I mean, that's a very high position in Kazakhstan – he's not only the head of Olympic boxing in the country, he’s the head of every sport of the national Olympic team in Kazakhstan. So, that’s a full-time job for him and also respect to him and others for fighting for boxing to [url]remain in the Olympics[/url]

Triple G - Made 300 mil. Never knocked off his feet in his entire career. Amateur or pros. No picture of another man standing over him. Now he’s the President of Kazakh sport. GGG is a success story.

His boxing career ? He dominated a somewhat lacklustre division, once he stepped up in competition, he wasn't so dominant. Jacobs, Derevchenko, lost to ginger x2, many ppl say GGG was robbed in his 1st fight with ginger n the draw was outrageous, I disagree, and then ginger did win the next two. But Triple G had an ATG great chin, had over 20 title defences, but I agree he would not get in my top 10 for greatest fights of the last 20 years. But maybe that's because he didn't have enough dance partners.

Crawford ? You know, if Crawford wasn't a boxer he'd be a serial killer, that's one cold, lifeless, monotone, blank, expression-less, personality-less dude. He'll need to take a few fights where he's the underdog, then he's on the road to immortality, but he doesn't have much time left to do it, beating Jenibek at 160 would be very impressive, throw in a win against the best young lion like Boots or Vergil, then maybe he can lure Canelo out for a major fight and if he wins all of that ? He can walk into the halls of Valhalla and would be (alongside Mayweather) the best fighter of the last twenty years.

And he'd be able to sit at the same table with the best of all time.

 

Dubois

 

Under what criteria would you put Calzaghe ahead of Pacquiao because I don't see how Calzaghe has an edge?

 

Being bias will do that. I don't think Pac has any wins better than Joe's big two in p4p terms. It could be a bit anti-Pac, it could be a bit pro-RJJ, I'm not sure but I can safely say there are two biases on my part working against Pac.

Roy, IMO, is the best p4p name you can have a win over outside of Mayweather in this time span.

Being anti-Pac is probably strong language in reality but I don't know what else to call it. It's not that I dislike him or think poorly of his record so much as I am unsure how to handle Pac. Quite a big chunk of his career is juxtaposition to Mayweather and he eventually lost that. He lost some fights I strongly feel he won but won some fights I strongly feel he lost. His claim to 8 divisions is really a stretch. Sometimes I read glowing reviews and I agree, sometimes I read very harsh reviews and I agree with them too. I'm as likely to chill with a pac fanboy as I am a pac hating anti-fanboy because I just don't have strong feelings. When folks say his resume is a lie, they ain't wrong, it is. When they say he's one of the greatest of our lifetime they ain't wrong either. He is. I still don't know how to rank the man.

So, bias bro.

 

This is where you were asked to apply CONTEXT.


Joe’s 2 P4P wins were:

Bernard Hopkins

Roy Jones


No problem.

However, you have to look at the SPECIFIC VERSIONS of them who he fought.


Hopkins

A great win, as he was still an elite level fighter.

However, he was past his best at 43, and Joe barely beat him.


Jones

A nothing win.

Why?

Because Roy Jones was no longer a world level fighter.

He’d literally not had a top level win in FIVE YEARS.

He’d lost 3 consecutive fights to Tarver and Johnson 3-4 years earlier.

Then a year after losing to Joe, he lost to Danny Green, Hopkins and Lebedev, which was his second run of 3 consecutive losses.


Do you understand this?


If Roy had been prime, it would have been a MONSTER win.

But because he was about to turn 40, where he’d not had a top level win since 2003, it meant nothing.

You can’t just rate on the name, because Roy was ONCE great.

Otherwise we’d be saying that Spinks and Holmes had GREAT wins over Ali.

But they didn’t.

Because they didn’t beat great versions of him. They beat shot versions of him.


Now how hard is this to grasp??


This is what Joe said before he fought Roy.:

“A fight with Roy is pointless. He’s no longer a great fighter. He’s been shot for years”

Now that is a FACT.


So PLEASE read this carefully:

Manny had MANY wins superior to a win over a SHOT Roy Jones.

He had much better wins. More wins against top level fighters.

His resume is superior in every possible way.


Please take this onboard.

 

He’s purely looking at the names, and NOTHING else.

So with that logic, we could rate Dennis Lebedev as an ATG, seeing as though he has wins over Roy Jones and James Toney.

It’s terrible logic, with zero context applied.

By Calzaghe’s own admission, his win over Roy meant nothing.

He literally wrote that in his own 2007 autobiography.

Some of these posts are utterly bizarre.

He has no understanding of anything.

 

I know how records work bud.

It is okay to have a different opinion. You can't shout me into mirroring yours. I disagree, it's fine. I don't hate you for it, I don't understand why you're so attached to changing my mind.

Likewise, having a different opinion doesn't allude to my knowledge of the sport. Youse unearthed my translation from an ancient greek to poke fun at it. Let me ask you, do you think I skipped over boxrec and went straight to translating ancient text?

It's RJJ. I promise you have nothing to say that hasn't been said about the man. I promise you're not going to unearth anything a quick google search can answer that I did not know. It's a difference in opinion. Nothing else. You can not teach me to share your opinion, I am my own person.

I'd be more than happy to talk to you about why or why not but this whole agree with me or you must not know any better mentality is stupid and childish and I'll have none of it.

If you want to speak like grown ass men I will respond. When you start crying like a baby I'm just not going to respond to that. Especially since after, what five? posts you have yet to submit a name on a resume you say is better than RJJ on Joe's and no telling me but it's not a good win though is not submitting any name from any resume. It's just crying because I don't agree.

 

You have been very aggressive.

You have insulted me and mocked me.

Now if you want to start over, that’s okay.

Let’s do that.

I hope that you’ve had a nice Christmas.


Regarding the topic, of course you’re entitled to your own opinion.

However, I’m going to challenge that.

That’s what the forum is for.


Now I understand how great Roy Jones was. Ask anybody here, what I think about him. I’m regarded as one of his biggest fans.

But like I keep saying, you can’t rate on his name. Only the quality of the win.


Now why is Joe’s win over a SHOT Roy Jones, better than Manny’s top wins?

How can Joe’s body of work, compare to Manny’s?

Manny fought prime versions of GREAT fighters.

Joe spent most of his career fighting non world level fighters, before fighting a 43 year old Hopkins and a shot Jones.


Looking logically, how can Joe’s resume rate higher?

By what metric?

By what logic?

 

This is also how I see it. All absolute greats in their own rights.

 

TomThumbIsNumb,


Thanks for the replies. I’m really enjoying the debate.

We can’t start fantasising about fighters being the same weight.

It’s not realistic.

We need to stick to traditional ranking criteria, which covers many factors, with the most important ones being: Ability, resume, and accomplishments.

Of course it’s fun to speculate, but it’s only fair to rate on what they’ve actually done.


Now Floyd was a genius, and I have no issue with you ranking him above Usyk.

Ward and Calzaghe are the ones that I don’t agree with, and it’s just for the main three factors which I’ve just noted.


Ward was very skilled, but not on another level to Usyk. He could also fight dirty at times.

Calzaghe was nowhere near as skilled as Usyk. He could be very scrappy. He could show very poor technique. What made him great, was that he was awkward, due to his hand speed and his volume. But many times, he concentrated more on volume rather than accuracy. Many times he would miss wildly, and he’d often cuff with the inside of his gloves.


Again, neither of them have a resume as strong either.

And neither of them accomplished as much.

To me, it’s just that simple.


Joe sat on a low level belt for 10 years, and to my knowledge, he fought less than a dozen world level fighters in his entire career.

Usyk has fought more world level fighters and superior competition, in much less time.


Under traditional ranking criteria, it’s just illogical to rank either one of them higher.

You can say this about practically any fighter.

Ward was skilled and dirty, similar to Hopkins.

Joe was a volume punching swarmer.

Floyd had the old shoulder roll style.

We’ve seen all of those styles before.

Usyk is a great technician.

This is easier said than done.

Look at Tyson and AJ’s complete body of work.

They were the top 2 HW’s of this generation.

Yet they both lost to Usyk, twice each, whilst having had huge physical advantages over him.

The reason why they couldn’t do what you’ve said, is simply because Usyk was just too good for them both.

So let’s give him the credit that he deserves.

Everybody has their own favourite types of fighter to watch. But I absolutely enjoy watching his southpaw skills.

But let us look at Ward and Calzaghe who you rate higher.

Neither of those were shockingly talented fighters that wowed anybody.

Again, Ward could often be dirty, and Joe was never a great technician.

Okay.

But context is the key.

He fought very good, prime CW’s, who were tough stylistic match ups for him.

He then beat the best 2 HW’s of his generation, twice each, whilst being massively undersized in terms of height, reach and weight.


Context.

If you fight, top, prime fighters, it’s going to be hard.

If you fight lesser fighters, it’s obviously going to be much easier.


If you’d have given Floyd 10 Gatti type of fighters, he’d have dazzled in 10 fights.

But if you’d have given him 10 De La Hoya, or 10 Castillo type of fighters, then they’d all have been very tough and competitive fights for him.


It’s the same with Ward and Calzaghe.

If you gave Joe a Lacy, or a shot Roy Jones, then he’d dazzle.

But every time you gave him a Reid or a Hopkins, he struggled.


It doesn’t matter if Usyk hasn’t put a beat down on many guys.

The fact is:

He has beaten some great CW’s and HW’s, whilst most of them were in their primes.


Also, just how many elite level fighters did Floyd, Ward and Calzaghe beat down?

Genuinely elite level fighters, who were at the top of their games?

List them for me please.

I can guarantee you that it won’t be a long list.

Again, context.

1. It’s very difficult and quite rare for a fighter to put a beat down on a fellow top level, prime fighter.

2. Again, under traditional ranking criteria, he simply has to rate above Ward and Calzaghe.


Unless your criteria is different, or you’re just rating on your own personal preference, they cannot rank higher.

I’m not telling you what you can and can’t do, obviously. But I’m just saying that in terms of ability, resumes, and accomplishments, that Usyk simply rates higher.


By any metric, Usyk has more ability than Joe.

His resume is absolutely superior in every possible way.

He became undisputed in 2 divisions.


So again, you can only rate a guy like Calzaghe higher, if you’re rating on what entertains you the most etc.


Regarding the other sportsmen that you’ve listed, yes, they had great, long careers.

Like many European level fighters, Usyk turned pro late.

So he’s not dominated for a long time. But it doesn’t really matter. Because we’re just going to judge him on the main factors, which is how fighters have been ranked for decades now.


Great debate.

Thanks.

 

Let us start a fresh, where we can have a great debate.

Just tell me in your own opinion, why you would rate Joe’s win over Roy Jones, higher than Manny’s win over MAB.

 

Tier 1 Manny, Floyd.

The rest would be guys like Usyk, Canelo, Ward, Inoue, Crawford, GGG, Wlad etc.

 

TomThumbIsNumb,

Again, it’s not realistic to imagine the fighters being a different size. And I’m assuming that that’s what you’ve done above, as obviously Inoue couldn’t beat Usyk in an actual H2H fight.

Regarding Inoue, he’s doing amazing, and I rate him very highly. But as of yet, Usyk has a much stronger resume.


Beterbiev has had 21 fights in 10/11 years.

Usyk has had 23 fights in 11 years.

You can say that Beterbiev’s dominated his opponents more, but then he’s fought much lesser competition, and he has an inferior resume.


Calzaghe dominated for much longer.

However, he again sat on a low level belt for years, where literally most of his opponents were non world level fighters.

Again, to my knowledge, out of his 45 opponents, less than a dozen of them were world level fighters.


His first 23 opponents before he fought Eubank, were non world level opponents.

He then made 21 defences of his WBO belt, where more than half of the defences were against non world level fighters.

So, yeah, He was much more dominant than Usyk. But again, he fought much lesser opposition.


Regarding ability, again, Calzaghe was absolutely not more skilled than what Usyk is.

1. That simply isn’t true. Not if you’re following traditional ranking criteria.

2. I genuinely want you to list the scary performances of Ward, Floyd and Joe.

1. It was an absolute privilege to watch the great man’s career.

2. To me, you’re putting your own personal preference over how we normally rank fighters.

 

TomThumbIsNumb,

I’m not sure if he’ll come back now. But I was a big fan of his. And he’d have had a much stronger resume, if people hadn’t have avoided him.

That’s great. I’m pleased for him. And he seems like a very genuine and honourable man.

Did he make that much? That seems like a huge amount to me. Are you sure?

This is why I think that he’s somewhat overrated by many.

I’m a big fan myself.

Let us just hope that he can get those fights within the next year.