Ramirez was a very good fighter. Incredible record, and, really close to being HOF material. But, in my opinion he falls a little short.
Good fighter but falls short of great status. Ramirez did give Arguello a tough fight, beat Rosario in the rematch but was also outclassed badly by the likes of Mancini, Camacho, Whitaker.
I think Jose Luis Ramirez should be in the Hall of Fame. There's a fine line between being very good and great. The "very good" fighters - Terrance Alli, Cornelius Boza-Edwards - lost to him, and the "great" fighters tended to beat him, but not always. Some lost, some squeaked by (like Arguello and Chavez). Ramirez was never 'dynamic' enough to be a first-ballot-type of fighter. But his biggest wins came against Hall of Famers, and nearly all his losses (and there weren't many) came against Hall of Famers. He never went through a bad period where he was a punching bag for nobodies. (And a lot of HOFs suffered that fate.) There's also something to be said for consistency. The guy had 111 fights in 15 years ... that's an average of almost eight fights a year every year for 15 years. And he won better than 90 percent of them. He was also a lightweight champion. When one of the reasons why guys get in the Hall of Fame is because they beat "you" ... and there's a question of whether you deserve to be a Hall of Famer ... maybe "you" deserve to be there, too.
But on the flipside alot of people thought he beat Arguello, there's actually some posters here @Saintpat @scartissue who thought Ramirez beat Whitaker or earnt a draw which is baffling to me. I normally respect their scorecards but i didn't quite understand their scoring for that fight.
Ramirez should've of been 2-0 against Rosario and he beat Arguello aswell. Scoring a knockdown in a 10 round fight, and appearing to have your opponent befuddled with Southpaw stance for 10 rounds. Its a bit puzzling how Arguello got the decision for me.
I thought Ramirez won a close but clear decision over Rosario, by winning pretty much all the rounds in the 2nd half of the fight after Rosario had a strong start, i know it was deemed very controversial at the time. The Arguello fight for me was a clear win for Ramirez with the knockdown in the region of 2 or 3 points. Everyone on eye of the ring thinks Ramirez beat Rosario. https://eyeonthering.com/boxing/edwin-rosario-vs-jose-luis-ramirez-i Mixed results here for the Arguello fight but i thought Ramirez clearly won it with the knockdown. https://eyeonthering.com/boxing/alexis-arguello-vs-jose-luis-ramirez
At least Ramirez got his revenge over Rosario in the rematch. I wonder why there was never a second fight with Arguello given the mixed reaction on the results? Personally I always thought he was a pretty limited fighter that never looked that impressive, albeit he was a tough fighter. I think he just had a style that suited him against Rosario and Arguello.
That's what I always say about Sumbu Kalambay who gave an undefeated Mike McCallum his first loss and gave him a boxing lesson. That alone should have gotten him in the ballot.
He didn't do enough IMO, he sort of had Rosario's (a better fighter) number, beat a past it Boza-Edwards and had a close fight with Arguello but other than that was soundly outclassed by the other very good or great fighters he fought, Whitaker (despite the robbery win in the first fight), Olivares, Chavez, Camacho and Mancini.
