Top 20 seems about right. He has a lot of things going for him: - He's widely considered the best fighter in the history of the 130 lb division (albeit, one of the neophyte divisions of the sport,) where he accrued a 27-0 record with 20 KO's. - He's the true champion of 4 weight classes as well as the true champion of 2 weight divisions simultaneously (WW and JMW.) Even if he fought in the old school days, he still ascertained 2 lineal championships in LW and WW. - Aside from being recognized as the best fighter in the history of the SFW division, he's also widely considered one of the top 10 fighters in the history of the WW division. That's a marvelous achievement for a guy to be considered elite in 2 divisions that are spread several weight classes apart from each other. - This point continues from the previous point on his longevity- he was fighter of the year in 1998 and in 2013. That's a 15 year span and something I've never heard/seen any fighter accomplish in any era. - He's also widely been viewed as a top 10 P4P fighter since 1998 with around ten years as the #1 fighter pound for pound in the world. - For all the flak he gets on "cherrypicking" since he became a PPV star, he's built up a pretty impressive resume that includes wins over 25 former/current champions with at least 8-9 of them that are hall of fame bound fighters or already in the Hall. That means he fought close to 10% of his professional career against HOF fighters. - He beat the other true standout fighter of his generation who is also a definitive ATG in the great Manny Pacquiao. - From an all around skillset standpoint (offense, defense and ring generalship,) he's probably one of the ten greatest ever. He was an offensive virtuoso in the lighter weights who had to change his style as he got older and went up in weight classes (which made sense.) ATG handspeed, elite combination punching ability, ATG counterpuncher and ATG accuracy. -Worst case, he's a top 5-7 defensive fighter ever with guys like Benny Leonard, Willie Pep, Pernell Whitaker, Locche, Benitez, Joe Gans and maybe Packey Mcfarland as the only other guys that can be mentioned in the same breath as him defensively. Truthfully i think he's the very best of the bunch as he's pretty much a combination of many of their styles and statistically speaking, he's the hardest guy to connect against. The only thing keeping him out of a top 10 ranking is he didn't have the fighters of SRL/Duran/Hagler's ilk to challenge himself against.
1st I corrected and said he wouldn't have had reach against PWill, but again it wouldn't have mattered as PWill did not fight well at range. As far as my IQ on the Duran situation. You should check yourself, as the piece of knowledge came from Leonards ESPN 30 for 30 that came out. So that wasn't something made up but recited
it is hard to rate someone when there is doubt of cheating involved. the whole accomplishment of cheaters becomes smoke and not worthy of the list of atg's. not even considering the cherry picking, extreme fear of his nemesis, demands to gain advantages, and the help of refereeing and judging. never had at least a career defining fight with a fellow atg to negate the allegations and show his worth.
Yes Leonard had said that many times. My point is do what. Duran is a professional, plus he had never waited 5 months for a next fight in the last 9 years, so this commonly floated excuse hold no water as he never waited longer than 5 months to fight. So why say he should have then !
Can you name a top great fighter north of 135 that he fought that was peak, great and at their weight class they earned their greatness in?
Guys from 1980 on who I definitely rate higher than him. -chavez -Pacquiao -Whitaker -Jones Jr -Hagler -Duran -Hearns -Leonard -Pryor Guys who have a case. -DLH -Hopkins -Lewis -Holyfield -Ward -Morales -Toney -Arguello
But it matters when it comes to Mayweather, who the only fighter he had come down was Canelo. You are a joke. Ignore ! atsch