How Do You Rank All Time Greats?

[Hawkins]

I've seen the argument that its only fair to rate fighters from Louis to Lewis because there isn't enough footage of those before hand to accurate gauge them in conjunction with the modern guys.

[bklynboy]

The only question is how to rank and quantify these characteristics. For instance how does one quantify Agility,Power,Jab and Speed? How do we compare the jabs of Klitschko, Tyson, Holmes, Ali, Marciano, Louis ... ? I suppose one can have several classifications:

1 - outstanding, HOF
2 - better than average
3 - average
4- below average
5- terrible

I guess a program could be written that would allow us to rank fighters by using the criteria mentioned by Iron Man.

[The Iron Man]

I done it on a Excel Spread Sheet Here :

[IMG]http://i95.***********.com/albums/l151/Errol100/top10.jpg[/IMG]

[AntonTheMeh]

I've seen the argument that its only fair to rate fighters from Louis to Lewis because there isn't enough footage of those before hand to accurate gauge them in conjunction with the modern guys.

pretty much,it sucks because there are so many innovators,harry greb joe gans,and even ray robinson in his prime that we will never get to see.

[bklynboy]

to me it's got to be separate.
everybody knows the guys today are more talented with the exception of a few

i say separate with the modern era from the 40's to today
and the old timers from the thirty's and back
joe louis is the bridge

I would agree with that in general but probably push it up to 1960 with Ali as the bridge. The fight game was a lot more brutal in the 50s than currently and the refs stop fights a lot sooner. Part of me likes the 1940's as the break because WWII was the break for so many things .

[AntonTheMeh]

in today's era of sports with the obsession with numbers i'm surprised they don't take into account compubox numbers,the win loss record of opponents and the record of the fighter cause everything else is hard to rate.

[AntonTheMeh]

I would agree with that in general but probably push it up to 1960 with Ali as the bridge. The fight game was a lot more brutal in the 50s than currently and the refs stop fights a lot sooner. Part of me likes the 1940's as the break because WWII was the break for so many things .

yeah but i believe that joe louis rocky marciano[maybe as cruiserweights]
and ray robinson could compete today.

[bklynboy]

I like that [referring to the Iron Man spreadsheet] -- I've thought of writing a ranking program a number of times. It would be interesting.

[The Iron Man]

There are soo many different catagories i could add to that!

[bklynboy]

yeah but i believe that joe louis rocky marciano[maybe as cruiserweights]
and ray robinson could compete today.

I think the earlier greats could compete today as well. I think they would be killed if they were simply plunked down in the ring. If they would be given six months to watch videos and train I think the elite fighters of yesteryear could more than hold their own today.