Why don't some classic boxing fans and historians give modern fighters credit?

I voted other for the reason that you left out. Americans do not participate in boxing in numbers that they use to in the past. Fighters do not fight as often or as frequent as they did in the past. As much as I like Ward, he would have been maybe a little above average in the days of murderers row. There is a clear gap between today's and yesterday's talent pool.

 

Perhaps it is just caution.

You withhold judgment until the picture becomes clear, which is often after the fighter has retired.

 

So if you are standing on the corner and the light turns red ,am i to believe you don't know if you should cross the street or not? Or do you wait until the light turns green again and think ,maybe i could have crossed the street in the first place? You have to wait till someones career is over to see how good they were????

 

In some ways that confuses the matter more.

You sometimes have to wait for fighters younger opponent’s careers to play out, before you can see how good they were.

 

I rank fighters exclusively based on resume, so how they look on film is almost irrelevant to me.

 

To janitors point, Wlad is a great example.

Depending on his next fight, his legacy could go in pretty different directions. If he beats AJ, he's a god. But nobody knows for sure if he will win or lose, or else they would bet the house.

 

Ward and Mayweather are very skilled, however their skill sets wouldn't standout so much in other eras. Probably Mayeather's, but I imagine Ward having hell against the likes of Toney, McCallum, Nunn and the killers of the 40's such Williams, Burley, Booker etc. He has is quite easy because no present MW-LHW can match his skill set.

 

Absolutely.

Let’s look at what we didn't know when Lennox Lewis retired.

Nearly all of Vitally Klitschko's important wins were still ahead of him.

We did not know that Rahman and Briggs were going to become belt holders again.

Even Golotta should arguably have picked up a belt.

These events significantly changed the value of these wins.

 

Obvious:
The game is heavily watered down. Easy to be a champion so fighters who should never be called champion are in fact are. Because it's easy to be a champion there is less interest in really learning the skills of great boxing.

Fans so now used to watered down boxing find it tough to determine what great fighting skills are all about. Amateur level skills are mistaken for great boxing.

ROIDS are rampant in the sport. Many fans look at size, muscularity, height, weight as important parameters ignoring the lack of true boxing ability. Remove the ROIDS and what would you have?

 

There really needs to be only one belt per division....

 

Take Joshua for instance. He might be the best heavyweight in history, win his next 50 fights by knockout and unify every title claim in the division.

Or he might lost his next 3 fights in a row and retire without ever beating a world class fighter.

Classic boxers have the advantage of being retired. Their career is signed sealed and delivered. Currently active fighters are more dynamic than that. Things change with ever passing fight.