Win you rate higher....Duran over Barkley or Hearns over Hill?

Easy to say a guy choked when fighting Thomas Hearns. Hill couldn't do anything with a guy who jabbed with him. His jab was always effective, and then he fights Hearns and Hearns is outjabbing him. No one has ever outjabbed Hill other than Hearns. No one ever outboxed Benitez but Hearns. Hearns is that great. Hearns beat real ATG's, and Duran beats Moore and Barkley and gets credit. I like Duran, but the way people overrate him is a little ridiculous and then it makes me want to mention some facts which Duran fans will discredit. But the facts you cannot discredit is how many greats he actually did beat. The facts speak for themselves. Duran gets more credit for beating Moore than Hearns for beating ATG Benitez (who beat Duran easily), and then Duran gets more credit for beating Barkley than Hearns does for HOF Hill. See the nonsense and overrating?

 

If Barkley would have beaten more guys who were top rated then you could say he beat Hearns with skills, but he lost too much to most top rated guys for it to have been anything more than a style matchup. And as a matter of fact, Hearns would have stopped Iran Barkley in the 4th round had he not become careless and Barkley would have just been another title defense. Fact is that Barkley was not a great fighter and that is who Duran beat.

 

He won world titles in 3 weight classes didn't he? He beat Thomas Hearns twice, Darrin Van Horn, Michael Olajide, James Kinchen, Wilford Scypion and gave Michael Nunn a good fight. Against Duran he clearly fought his best fight.

I'd say Barkley was more than the clubfighter who got lucky that he is made out to be. Hill might have accomplished more but he was always short of being great and he never beat a great fighter. I don't think that beating 20 decent fighters in a row in title defenses proves that you are suddenly great even though you lost to every great fighter you ever fought. It just proves that you have consistently been above average.

But you are correct that it was just a styles thing. If you exchange their opponents, Duran likely loses to Hill while Hearns again loses to Barkley as proven by their second fight. Hill was a good style for Hearns because he was a jabber and didn't push for the knockout. Barkley was much more physical but Duran was adept at dealing with that.

However I don't think there's a comparison when it comes to the size disdvantage Hearns and Duran faced. They may have gone up as many weight classes, although Duran started at bantam, but Duran looked like a midget next to the natural light heavy Iran Barkley while Hearns was eye-to-eye with Hill and had a longer reach.

 

He beat Hearns 2 times, otherwise Barkley would have never become a 3 time champ. Hill never beat an ATG you say, but has Duran?

 

he beat leonard

 

Ray beat him easily in the rematch. All Ray had to do was stay on his toes and it was an easy fight, which is something Duran fans do not see or do not want to see.

 

right or wrong, duran did beat an all time great. course that is possibly the only one....

 

I didn't even talk about all-time greats. Fighters like Buchanan, DeJesus, Marcel, Palomino were all very, very good if not great. Of course the Ray Leonard win doesn't count because it goes against your argument.

What are Virgil Hill's best wins, a split decision over Henry Maske and a KO of Fabrice Tiozzo? Or Bobby Czyz perhaps? Not all that impressive. You are probably not going to see any of these fighters make the hall of fame.

Oh yes, Barkley beat an all-time great Thomas Hearns whom Virgil Hill was outboxed by, thus his achievements do not count. I forgot about that.

 

Thank you. I will take that as a compliment. These are just opinions. I do not mean to upset anyone. My favorite fighter is Thomas Hearns and I don't care who insults him. Just opinions, but I do think my opinions are based more on facts. Duran does not have the wins over ATG fighters, which is why I do not get his overrating especially his win over Barkley. Iran Barkley. A guy who lost to Kalambay and Nunn and Benn and Toney etc etc etc. He was dropped by Olajide in a great fight at the Felt Forum.

 

Dejesus and Palomino are not ATG fighters. Very good but not ATG. The Leonard win was neutralized by the losses in the rematch. All Ray had to do was move and the fight was easy for him. Compare the 1st and second fights. Duran is fighting the same but Ray is not. The variable was Ray Leonard. Once he changed his fight plan the head to head matchup was his.

 

Maske,Tiozzo,Tate,Stewart,Czyz etc. HOF fighter for sure and has some records. Not a knockout puncher, but borderline great fighter. No one is overrating Virgil Hill, but Duran is certainly overrated.

 

The only one he beat beat him easily in the rematch. And the guys Ray could beat Wilfred,Tommy and Marvin all beat Duran easily. I think Ray comes out on top in comparisons to Duran.

 

All-time great is a different term for me than great. Being great means you're one of the greatest of your own time, being an all-time great means you're one of the greatest of all time. That's how I see it atleast.

I don't have a problem with Virgil Hill never having beaten top 50 p4p all-time great. I have a problem with him not beating anybody who had a claim to being the best other than perhaps Henry Maske in 20 years of fighting. He just wasn't that great. For the most part he came up second place against the very best.

How does a win get neutralized if the winner goes onto lose in a rematch?

You're clearly not putting it into a perspective. Duran was the lightweight champion of the world. Leonard was the welterweight champion of the world. Leonard is arguably top 2 ATG at welterweight. The Leonard who fought Duran was the same Leonard who beat Wilfred Benitez and would have likely beaten Thomas Hearns too. But Duran managed to beat him.

Now how many lightweights have beaten a top 3 ATG at welterweight? I guess you could say Ike Williams if you rate Kid Gavilan in the top 3. But Williams got beat in rematches and Gavilan is not quite as great as Leonard, arguably. That's still a huge win for Williams. It's even bigger for Duran. It's one of the greatest wins of all time and you're talking about counting it out as if it was nothing. That's silly.

 

The Hall Of Fame's standards are at an all-time low if those fighters make it.