What Makes Whitaker Rank So High As An ATG?

[GrandpaBernard]

Please somebody educate me.

[Japanese Boxing]

His defense alone is a marvel.

[Scott9945]

Whitaker rarely lost a round in his prime. And he was fighting much higher caliber opponents than the Klitschkos. He's got a great chance against anyone ever at 135 or 140.

[crold1]

Whitaker rarely lost a round in his prime. And he was fighting much higher caliber opponents than the Klitschkos. He's got a great chance against anyone ever at 135 or 140.

Beats a TON of great Welters too. He would have had problem with larger Welters like Leonard, Hearns etc. but against guys like Ross, McLarnin, and Napoles, he's in all the way. Napoles and Pea would have been a damn clinic both ways.

The thing about Pea that I love is people are so fixated on his d, they miss that at his best his offense was awesome. GREAT to the body and just tortured guys by making them miss and beating the hell out of them. Just wrecked McGirt in the second half of their rematch. Made Pineda spit blood. Even backed up Chavez as their fight wore on.

[Anthony342]

Yep, defense counter punching and making guys miss is what makes him great, there ya go. He was so good, I even watch him and I usually only watch blood and guts warriors or big punchers. But every now and then, I will enjoy watching someone like a Whitaker, Ali, Leonard or a Mayweather, Jones, guys like that.

[Emon723]

No one was able to beat sweet pea convincingly until he was 35, Whitaker was second to Chavez in the pound of pound ratings for about five years, and when they fought, he proved to everyone who's the best fighter in the world, its fun to watch him if you appreciate sweet science.

[TBear]

First Whitaker unified all the lightweight titles. Something todays titlists avoid. Then he retained all the belts by dominating all the contenders the sanctioning bodies had. He wanted to move up and challenge the p4p #1 for the WBC light welter title but Don King didn't like the idea of his fighter(Chavez) fighting Whitaker so after beating the IBF 140 title holder he moved to welterweight and beat WBC champion Buddy McGirt. They knew Chavez wanted that welterweight title and Chavez had to fight him after all. Then after beating Chavez the judges some how made it a draw. Add to that a bunch of welterweight defenses and a rise to light middle to beat WBA 53-1 Julio Cesar Vasquez to take his title.

Bottom line, after all was through and done nobody was heard saying that Whitaker wouldn't fight someone along the way. Something you hear alot about fighters in the present.

[IronDanHamza]

First Whitaker unified all the lightweight titles. Something todays titlists avoid. Then he retained all the belts by dominating all the contenders the sanctioning bodies had. He wanted to move up and challenge the p4p #1 for the WBC light welter title but Don King didn't like the idea of his fighter(Chavez) fighting Whitaker so after beating the IBF 140 title holder he moved to welterweight and beat WBC champion Buddy McGirt. They knew Chavez wanted that welterweight title and Chavez had to fight him after all. Then after beating Chavez the judges some how made it a draw. Add to that a bunch of welterweight defenses and a rise to light middle to beat WBA 53-1 Julio Cesar Vasquez to take his title.

Bottom line, after all was through and done nobody was heard saying that Whitaker wouldn't fight someone along the way. Something you hear alot about fighters in the present.

Couldn't have put it any better.

[lastrealfan]

I have in my top ten p4p list with no doubt so this made me really breakdown why. First off I didn't think he lost a fight until Trindad beat up the shell of his former self Pea. The Ramirez loss was strait bull**** and the Chavez draw was just as bad, I gave pea ten rounds in both of those fights.The DLH lose I had him winning 7 rounds to 5 and he knocked DLH down.His only real loss to me like i said was to Tito and when he broke his Clavicle in his last fight.

In my opinion he was the best lightweight ever and would have beat Duran the man most consider to be the best lightweight of all time. He was the undisputed LW champ and could have stayed at that weight and reigned for ten years plus if he wanted to instead he moved up and fought bigger guys just to prove his p4p status.

He could have even stayed at 140 and dominated the fighters of that era for the weight, the best of them Chavez had really nothing for pea, even though there fight took place at 147. In fact that should have favored Chavez as he was actually the bigger man. The top 140 pond fighters of all time get whooped by pea, fighters like Pryor and Tszyu. He would have disgraced Ricky Hatton and Cervantes.

What keeps Pea from getting the credit he deserves is he went up to welterweight and fought these giant welters like Delahoya and Trindad and Hurtado so he didn't look that great against those fighters. What should be noted is that he was giving up huge advantages in height and reach to those guy and still whooped all of them except form Tito.

He even went up to jr middle and whipped Julio Ceasar Vasquez who was a pretty damn good ighter at 154, that's crazy for a guy who wasn't even a big lightweight. No doubt Pea is top ten P4P all time and would give a beating to Pac or Mayweather if he was fighting now.