We constantly speak of Lomanchenko, Crawford, Canelo and many other modern greats, but do any of them have the means (quality opponents, star power, fan captivation) to be the greatest? Are we witnessing the next SRR and underapprecisting them with criticism? Are any of the boxers of the current era worthy? Do they even have available great boxers to compete against to create legendary rivalries?
BOTTOM LINE
Who is the greatest of this era at the moment and in your opinion what must they do to become a GOAT candidate?
Pacman no one come close to him in terms if achievements and also no one came close to challenge him for the fighter of the decade award not even floyd that will tell you how special pac in his prime.
Inoue has only just turned 26, and without the taxing amateur career of a Loma or an Usyk, he could have as much as 7-8 years left at top level. If he's as good as he appears to be (so far)... it's hard to see him not retiring as an ATG!
Ali was the greatest not only because of his victories, but also because he took part in social causes.
So, if Usyk wins a title at heavyweight and stops the war in Ukraine, he might become one of the greatest.
Not many boxers get the chance these days to have lots of fights and so build a solid reputation, Canelo and Manny are exceptions that illustrate the point. Then we have ducking and promoter's looking after their own interests all of which reduces real competition and just confuses the situation.
And of course we are are now in the era of instant gratification and superficial fanboys which just adds to the confusion and uncertainty.
“The greatest” is far too subjective.
There’s some with potential to be greats, but people today will never give full credit anyway.
Take Usyk for example, he cleaned out cruiserweight, imagine he went up and did the same at heavyweight, you will still get a load of people out there saying both divisions were weak or something and not acknowledging he did something great.
All you have to do is come on here after any fight. You never get most people in agreement and saying “fair play, great win”, instead you just get a load of excuses, discrediting etc..
USYK is great and if he moves up and beats either Joshua, Wilder or Fury he’s an ATG.
Loma is knocking on ATG status. He needs 2 more defining wins vs a Gervonta Davis, Mikey Garcia, Regis Prograis, Josh Taylor type opponent.
Loma is Special but his biggest fight would be Mikey Garcia.
Crawford Special but he on topRank island
Spence special but cant even fight the guys under his own stable.
I doubt we see any modern day fighters get ranked high on the ATG list! They will just get ranked high in their respective weight classes but not ATG.
There are guys like Inoue who i believe is very special but it’s also the level of competition that needs to be available for him to reach Mt Rushmore.
Pacman could have been the greatest had he beaten Floyd..
Beating Floyd wudnt have been enough to rank higher than sumbody like Leonard
“The greatest” is far too subjective.
There’s some with potential to be greats, but people today will never give full credit anyway.
Take Usyk for example, he cleaned out cruiserweight, imagine he went up and did the same at heavyweight, you will still get a load of people out there saying both divisions were weak or something and not acknowledging he did something great.
All you have to do is come on here after any fight. You never get most people in agreement and saying “fair play, great win”, instead you just get a load of excuses, discrediting etc..
i said 10 for example. it's not written in the stone. if someone doesn't have quantity (like every boxer in this century) he can only compensate with quality. so when there was only one champion and he fought 5+ times a year (or 45 like greb once :D) and he has a lot of wins over top10 guys in his and surrounding divisions that is almost impossible to achieve in one division now. so one would have to jump in weight several times and clean them since there usually isn't only one clear number 1 guy. nobody can do something like armstrong did in 1938. at this age (3 division champion at the same time when there were 8 or 9).
if one modern boxer wants to be the greatest, he must surpass those among the greatest. let's forget about those who are consistently ranked among the top10 for a minute. people like gene tunney and jimmy mclarnin aren't in the top 10 and have less than 100 fights.
tunney has wins over greb, dempsey, tommy gibbons and carpentier.
mclarnin has wins over labarba, pancho villa (reigning flyweight champion), sammy mandell (reigning lightweight champion), al singer (reigning lightweight champion), benny leonard, young corbett III (reigning welterweight champion who has wins over walker, conn, lesnevich, apostoli), barney ross, canzoneri and ambers.
you mentioned sugar ray leonard. he has wins over 3 p4p number ones (duran, hearns and hagler) and he is sometimes at number 10 on atg lists.
for one modern boxer to surpass them all in everybody's eyes, he has to do something like i wrote in my last post. it would be more possible if there were clear number 1 guys in every division and boxers fought much more. i am not saying that past boxers are genetically better than those now. they simply had more opportunities to achieve greatness. boxers now have more opportunities to earn a lot of money. so everybody has something.
You can't hold today's fighters to the standards of yesterday. That's just not fair.
A great fighter should clean out a division or two, ( at least) while facing the best comp available. Simple.
No, not even close. The old-timers and all-time greats had over 200 some odd bouts. Today fighter's make too much money which is the reason why there are fewer fights among them today.
Does Ali really have 10 phenomenal victories? SRL? Floyd? Better question: can you name 5 fighters with 10 phenomenal victories.
i said 10 for example. it's not written in the stone. if someone doesn't have quantity (like every boxer in this century) he can only compensate with quality. so when there was only one champion and he fought 5+ times a year (or 45 like greb once :D) and he has a lot of wins over top10 guys in his and surrounding divisions that is almost impossible to achieve in one division now. so one would have to jump in weight several times and clean them since there usually isn't only one clear number 1 guy. nobody can do something like armstrong did in 1938. at this age (3 division champion at the same time when there were 8 or 9).
if one modern boxer wants to be the greatest, he must surpass those among the greatest. let's forget about those who are consistently ranked among the top10 for a minute. people like gene tunney and jimmy mclarnin aren't in the top 10 and have less than 100 fights.
tunney has wins over greb, dempsey, tommy gibbons and carpentier.
mclarnin has wins over labarba, pancho villa (reigning flyweight champion), sammy mandell (reigning lightweight champion), al singer (reigning lightweight champion), benny leonard, young corbett III (reigning welterweight champion who has wins over walker, conn, lesnevich, apostoli), barney ross, canzoneri and ambers.
you mentioned sugar ray leonard. he has wins over 3 p4p number ones (duran, hearns and hagler) and he is sometimes at number 10 on atg lists.
for one modern boxer to surpass them all in everybody's eyes, he has to do something like i wrote in my last post. it would be more possible if there were clear number 1 guys in every division and boxers fought much more. i am not saying that past boxers are genetically better than those now. they simply had more opportunities to achieve greatness. boxers now have more opportunities to earn a lot of money. so everybody has something.
There are guys like Inoue who i believe is very special but it’s also the level of competition that needs to be available for him to reach Mt Rushmore.
Pacman could have been the greatest had he beaten Floyd..
SRR would have destroyed Pac Man.
I just don’t see it
Especially with social media where everyone has a voice
It’ll always be a 50/50 discussion amongst fans
And a lot of haters as you can’t tell from this site
Some of these guys would rather give it to a platform ( Dazn or espn or ) you get what I mean
only thing is hes never really dominated any of his big fights but you are correct
Fair point. He was the underdog vs G though, right? He wasn't even supposed to win those fights much less dominate.
no because they don't have enough tough fights. that implies shortage of stars so nobody can achieve say 10 phenomenal victories because they aren't available. for example inoue would have to clean bantam, defeat 3 top guys at super bantam, russell, warrington and santa cruz at feather, berchelt and tank at super feather, lomachenko at lightweight, then number 1 at 140 and finally the number 1 at welter at that time to be in the conversation for the best ever. something like this is highly unlikely to ever happen with any fighter until the end of time.
Does Ali really have 10 phenomenal victories? SRL? Floyd? Better question: can you name 5 fighters with 10 phenomenal victories.
Nope
First off , their records are all padded with bullchit fights
Second , they don’t fight often enough ( imo ) to be even considered
Third , the times of the best fighting the best is long gone , most fighters may have 5-6 top guys on their resume
That’s my fughin take on it and I’m sure you can tell the frustration from a fans point of view
Your frustration is easy to see, but easy to relate to. Very respectable opinion.
Your not the only one that feels that way I'm sure as evidenced by a previous poster.
If Spence/Crawford/Thurman were to all fight one another consecutively within the next 3 years, or Inoue jumps all the way to Lightweight and defeats Lomanchenko, or Lomanchenko jumps to Welterweight and conquers them all, Do you feel any may have done enough to be in the discussion? Not saying that any of that is in anyway possible. Is there no way possible anyone can become the next SRR?
If Canelo captures a major title at 175, he would be in the conversation. The opponents are there for him.
only thing is hes never really dominated any of his big fights but you are correct
Nope
First off , their records are all padded with bullchit fights
Second , they don’t fight often enough ( imo ) to be even considered
Third , the times of the best fighting the best is long gone , most fighters may have 5-6 top guys on their resume
That’s my fughin take on it and I’m sure you can tell the frustration from a fans point of view