Whitaker or Mayweather - who was greater?

This is razor close either way

 

Mayweather was better. Whomever says Mayweather ( who I never cared for due to his thug like behavior out of the ring ) didn't fight anyone needs a re-fresher course. He has what will be 5 or more wins over hall of fame opponents.

While Withaker was robbed at least once, he was also in quite a few close fights. Mayweather was seldom in a close fight.

 

Whitaker top 20
Mayweather top 30

 

Whitaker got hit more statistically than Floyd did.

 

Whitaker schooling about an 80% Chavez>>>>anything Floyd did.

 

Canelo was far better than Vasquez when he fought Floyd.

 

True, but why is the question to ask. While they both could make their opponent miss, Mayweather had a great straight counter left that hurt his man. He was hard enough to hit the way it was, but a miss meant you are getting tagged.

For a laugh someone should ask Max Kellerman who would have won. He might knock himself out trying to pick the winner.

 

Floyd would have spanked any fighter that was only at 80%.

 

But I needed a common foe, and Hota is it. I agree May beat Hoya, but the point still stands on what I said. A past his prime beat or ran a prime Hoya close; conversely, a closer to prime May got ran close by a well past his best and drained Hoya.

 

Agree totally. I believe Whitaker's to be better. He dominated whole fights with it, against all style and was never out jabbed or had it taken away. He controlled a monster Hoya with it, while a faded Hoya controlled May with his till he faded.

Just one more point, Pea was a decisively better body puncher and imo more grittier in general.

 

In Classic land, Mayweather gets zero credit for humiliating Juan Manuel Marquez and winning every minute of every round from him. Never in the history of boxing has such a highly regarded boxer been so thoroughly outsmarted and outboxed from bell to bell. Mayweather also gets zero credit for absolutely dominating the much bigger and younger Canelo Alvarez, pitching a near shutout against a future first ballot hall of famer. Seems to get only a little more credit for spanking Chico in another one-sided masterpiece of a performance against a bigger, once-feared opponent.

Close call and I understand how people can think that Whitaker had a greater career, but I don't get the people who think this is so one-sided that there's no serious argument for Mayweather. Oh well.

 

I have Mayweather higher then Whitaker slightly. Also as good as the Chavez and Nelson wins are you need to take into account that it was at Welterweight and Lightweight respectively which neither achieved much at and Chavez was past his best.

 

This post seems disingenuous. The reason Floyd gets zero credit for jmm is that when Cotto, Margarito, Mosley and Paul Williams were all fighting one another Floyd “retired” with only baldomir and Judah on his record. When the aforementioned 4 had knocked eachother around and the mouthwatering prospect of a pacquiao was there he “unretires” and drags a counterpunching man up who had never fought any higher than 135, and even then only 2 fights - not to mention he agreed to a catch weight of 145 and then failed to even try to make the weight.
At the time he fought clenelo there were fights with Paul Williams and Sergio Martinez that fans wanted. Clenelo was still very young and green and was nowhere near the fighter he is today. And again another catch weight. The Alvarez win wasn’t bad but it looks far better on paper.

 

At the time he fought Canelo, Paul Williams hadn't fought for over a year (due to the accident) and Sergio Martinez had been fighting at middleweight for 4 years (Mayweather was still a welterweight).

I don't see how any fair and reasonable boxing fan could hold it against Mayweather for not moving up in weight to a sixth weight division in his late thirties to fight Sergio Martinez. Not as ridiculous as the loonies who criticize Mayweather for not moving up in his early 40s to fight Gennady Golovkin but still.

 

And you left out the fact that Mayweather had been out of the ring for almost two whole years when he owned Marquez like a third-rate sparring partner. I get weighing the win less than if he and Marquez had both somehow met in their primes but come on. That's a big win and it's ridiculous how badly and easily Mayweather outclassed Marquez--the same Marquez who went life-and-death with Manny Pacquiao multiple times.