Does a loss(es) on a fighters' record skew the fans perception?

No, it can actually strengthen perception in the long run, especially if it's avenged. Pacquaio gets credit for avenging his loss to Morales. If Kovalev gets revenge vs Ward his legacy will be stronger for having fought Ward twice. Loma is a special case because of his long amateur career, so he started out fighting some good opponents where as many other fighters get fed weak fighters for their first 30 or so fights. It's why a lot of guys get to about 30-0, but very very few get to 40-0. Once you get the high profile of 30-0, or 25-0 for that matter you start getting bigger fights against better opponents. All it takes is one opponent to be a bad match up for you or to have the night of their career to earn a loss, or you can lose a controversial decision. Every fighter is going to have close fights when they start fighting elite competition, they're bound to lose a controversial decision along the way. That Loma loss was fluky and he's getting all kinds of love despite it and despite only being 9-1. Pacquaio has several losses and is still considered an all time great, top 50 at least, and many have him in their top 20. And I have to address Mayweather, because most of these threads are really about him. Floyd fought tomato cans at first, but unlike a lot of fighters, he didn't wait until his 30th fight to start fighting champs, he fought Genaro in his 18th fight and has been fighting World Champions ever since. And I don't care what anyone says, nearly every opponent he has had since then was a threat. For him to come through unscathed in the loss department is arguably the greatest feat in boxing history. Now what if he had lost? That 1st Castillo fight could have went the other way, but he would have avenged it immediately. I don't think it would have taken away from his legacy. He'd still have beaten more champions than and been in the biggest fights of anyone. What's remarkable is that he was only in 2 close fights his entire career, so he had very few chances to lose the zero. Haters gonna hate though. Just look at how hard it is to win every time. GGG just found out that no matter how good you are you can struggle with a guy who is a bad match up. Chochalito just found out too. What Mayweather did is a standard that is going to be hard to match. But that doesn't stop guys from being in the all time great discussion. Leonard, Duran, Hagler, Ali, Roy Jones Jr., Swet Pea, ODH, those guys are all greats and took losses. Marciano and Calzaghe were undefeated and no one should have them top 10, I don't have either in the top 25. They both had only a few quality wins and those wins were either against aging and way past priime guys or guys coming way up in weight.

When I see an undefeated record I can boil it down to 2 things. Either the guy is some amazing talent or he hasn't faced enough difficult competition and question whether his resume is padded or not. That is, until I watch him fight. Then I can properly assess the fighter and categorize him per my own criteria.

In the Mayweather era, one loss is obviously enough to shatter someone's legacy. Prior to that nonsense, a true test of a fighter's championship caliber was how well he could take a loss, especially a KO loss, and bounce back. Can he be the same fighter, is his heart still in it? Fighters who could come back from adversity and get right back on top are what true champions are made of--so no, a loss isn't the end all be all. Of course who you lose to makes a difference too.

It definitely does have a visual affect When you see a guy with a glistening record, you know, something like 27-0, even with less than stellar competition, it's still easy to be swayed by it But a perfect example is the Lomachenko vs Gary Russell example Russell was what, 24-0 going into their fight? Meanwhile Vasyl was 1-1. To a casual fan who had no idea who either was, they would expect a complete blowout by Russell. But beneath the thin surface of those records, Lomachenko had already faced a tougher opponent in his second career fight than Russell faced in all 24 or whatever of his fights. And that was put on full display in their fight, as the 1-1 fighter completely outclassed the 24-0 fighter. Yeah we do get caught up in shiny records...I'm just as guilty as anybody, but in reality it's obviously way more important about WHO you fought. That's a good point. I remember so many people thinking that was easy work for Russell not taking into account that Lomachenko A) gained experience in his 2nd fight B) was robbed in multiple ways. I think records is a casuals way of looking at it. It's more important who you fight, when you fight them, how you fight them than having a shiny record on paper. It fits certain people's arguments.

In my experience, hardcore aficionados of the sport seem to care WAY more about win-loss records than most casuals do, even though they'll usually try to tell you it's the other way around (and for some it might be, but not all.) So often when an undefeated fighter loses, they'll claim that said fighter's drawing power will be tarnished in the eyes of the casuals, and that their popularity will never be the same. Unfortunately, there is minimal evidence to support these assertions. The three biggest fights of Mike Tyson's career came AFTER he was KO'ed in the prime of his career by Buster "Jello" Douglas. Muhammad Ali had five losses to his name, but many still refer to him as "The Greatest." Manny Pacquiao already had a few losses to his name by the time he rose to prominence. Even after being KO'ed by Marquez, people were still so invested in a fight between he and Mayweather that it drew 4.6 million. Oscar Dela Hoya lost nearly all of his biggest fights, but his popularity hardly ever waned. He still had enough momentum that he helped give the rub to both Mayweather and Pacquiao when they beat him. If you wanna use MMA examples, there's always Conor McGregor and Ronda Rousey. Diehard fans of the sport claimed Conor's hype train had been permanently derailed when he got choked out by Diaz, but their rematch months later drew the largest buyrate in UFC history, and now people are clamouring for a mega fight between he and Mayweather. Rousey lost in horrible fashion, got publicly berated for it, cried on national television and admitted that she had suicidal thoughts, and was for all intents and purposes dismissed by many as little more than a hype job... And yet she returned a year later and did pretty much the same number against Nunes as she did against Holly (1.1 million.)

Sure, but most people in the world are idiots.

A loss doesn't make a boxer garbage. It does provide more info about him as a pro. Losses matter imo. However it's clear some posters go way overboard. Loma for example. The loss doesn't make him any less talented or special. It does however tell me his style will needs to be tweaked when in with larger men with a wealth of pro experience. I think if loma and salido fought next loma would take what he learned in that first fight beat salido soundly. I think that is a big reason why Salido seems reluctant to sign for a rematch. Maybe he is just holding out to maximize his take. As with anything we discuss there are mature, rational, adult ways of looking at things and then there is the childish, petty way of doing same.

It probably does. I'm truly selfish when it comes to boxing, I wanna be entertained period. I'm not a big boxing aficionado so I'm not really bothered about skill unless it's aesthetically pleasing like Loma, Mayweather (Ward bores me silly). I'm more into KO ratios. When I see two fighters with records like 30 wins 0 losses 50% KO ratios I know I'm in for a boring ass fight.

It depends on how they lose, who the fighter is and how silly you are. Lucas lost to Garcia and people who said he was the boogie man really don't support him anymore, even though he lost to Zab frickin Judah. Loma got roughed up by a bigger guy and people wont let that loss go because even though he's much better now, its room to hinge on him being a man who lost to OS. Floyd fought a really good JLC and people throw it out there to slander Floyd. Same with Andre x Sergey. So even tho the last two aren't losses officially, they still reign as losses in the eyes of many people who want to use that as reasons to hinge on them not being great because even though they are, the idea is they can't win close matches.

It definitely does have a visual affect When you see a guy with a glistening record, you know, something like 27-0, even with less than stellar competition, it's still easy to be swayed by it But a perfect example is the Lomachenko vs Gary Russell example Russell was what, 24-0 going into their fight? Meanwhile Vasyl was 1-1. To a casual fan who had no idea who either was, they would expect a complete blowout by Russell. But beneath the thin surface of those records, Lomachenko had already faced a tougher opponent in his second career fight than Russell faced in all 24 or whatever of his fights. And that was put on full display in their fight, as the 1-1 fighter completely outclassed the 24-0 fighter. Yeah we do get caught up in shiny records...I'm just as guilty as anybody, but in reality it's obviously way more important about WHO you fought.

No fighter with a lose is greater than an undefeated one. Marciano, Ottke, Mayweather, Calzaghe, Golovkin, Thurman, Ward, Pirog, Joshua, Spence are all ATG caliber fighters. Duran, Pacquiao, SRL, SRR, Ali, Jones, Hopkins, Lomachenko, Lewis, Holyfield, Kovalev are garbage because they've lost.

It often does. Hearns is a perfect example. People see highlight clips or boxrec and say, "his chin doe". The guy walked through shots that would floor a lot of guys. Everyone claims they want the best to fight the best, but then they absolutely trash the loser. Look what they did to Postol. Incredible how one loss to a P4P guy means he was garbage all along (despite doing the impossible and making Matthysse quit).