Which Era is Better: 1900-1920 or 2000-2020?

1900-1920 by quite a good margin, it was an insanely stacked era.

You've got 2 GOAT contenders in Greb and Langford, top 10 P4P ATG worthy fighters in Gans and Leonard, top 20 worthy McGovern and McFarland, arguably the greatest Flyweight ever in Wilde, top 10 ATG Middleweights in Ketchel and Gibbons, the greatest British FW and LW in Driscoll and Welsh, a top 5 ATG Welterweight in Britton, two top 10 ATG LHWs in Tommy Gibbons and Gene Tunney, as well as three top 15 HWs in Johnson, Dempsey and Wills.

Aside from the fact that the talent pool in the 2000's drops off a bit more drastically than in the 1900's, the top fighters of the former may not even be greater than anyone in the top 5 from the 1900's.

 

On resume 1920s. H2H I suspect that it would be much much closer.

 

I would not call a 21-year period in sports an era. The 1900-20 'era' has many renowned names, but the 2000-20 period has greater international representation. Boxing is perhaps the only sport with an anti-recency bias. Perhaps a hundred years from now (if the sport of boxing continues to exist), people will be rating the 2000-20 epoch highly.

 

It doesn't compare really, save 1 main factor, and it is a very, very important factor... that being Athletic Prowess & Science.

now that really became much more the standard & general attribute by the mid 20s, right up to today, but that doesn't negate the reality of TOUGH Hardy Men, capable of brute force resilience of the Turn of the Century Period.

But the dividing factor is also FIGHTS, Dozens and Hundreds of them, those lists only list 20 Men, at the turn of the Century there were THOUSAND of the Teak Tough men battling for supper world wide, involved in hundreds of fights, which also included bouts with these Top 20, 50 and top 100 Men Nationally and International ones too.

where as the present day bunch have fought 20 -40 fights on average, they are NOT all Athletic 1st Class boxers and have faced nowhere near the numbers of Opponents, which would ABSOLUTELY Equate to many of them losing and falling away, even if they faced Half the amount of Fights, never mind the amount of actual TOP Men showdowns.

Excluding the Giants, many of this Era's Fighters would'nt be able to continue shining with such demands, and Equal Size for Size bouts, many of the Old Teak tough men would probably ware them down and find a way to win.

it's the Two Opposite Ends of the same thing, Crude, Unrefined (Generally) and Pre and De -evolution of the Golden Years in between.

 

There’s no room in your Top 20 for a guy like De La Hoya because room is occupied by Wright, Cotto & friggin’ Ward!? Get outta here.

 

This

 

I'm not sure, what this exactly means?

 

That the quality of fighters takes a dip after a certain point. Floyd, Pacquiao, Roy Jones and Hopkins are the 4 greatest fighters of the 2000's for example, after that you get to guys like Marquez, Oscar, Mosley, Calzaghe, Wladimir Klitschko etc. After a certain point you get to guys like Fury, Vitali, Martinez, Cotto and Loma, whose careers are just way less impressive than their same era contemporaries.

That dip in quality happens sooner than in the 1900's. AKA there are less guys whose careers impress me in the 2000's. That dip happens after going through many more fighters in the 1900's, where I can name nearly 30 or so fighters and genuinely call them all great or something close to great, whereas I start having a hard time calling the 2000's fighters great at around the top 15 mark.

 

Mayorga is his biggest win? Do I detect someone with a bias on this subject already?

 

Langford alone is a canyons length ahead of the best guys combined of 2000-2020. The greatest fighter ever in your era counts for a lot…

 

Indeed!

Can we think of another sport, where the best present-day athletes would, according to the "experts", get their butts kicked by those from a century ago?

 

Old school by quite a margin.

 

Boxers just aren’t athletes the way track runners, football stars and soccer guys are. This is more of a game of violent pattern deciphering. Who is as good as Gans today?