Number of active (at least one fight during the year in question) pro boxers, that can be found in BoxRec's database for the 1940s:
1940 11387
1941 10164
1942 9227
1943 9207
1944 10340
1945 11320
1946 17500
1947 16841
1948 14533
1949 13439
Number of active boxers in the 2010s (2018 is the last year, where these numbers are available):
2010 18615
2011 19603
2012 19843
2013 20529
2014 20291
2015 22086
2016 23537
2017 23683
2018 23535
Since we're talking about "Robinson's time", it might be interesting to take a look at what the welterweights looked like in the 1940s (the division and decade, where I believe most people agree, he was prime). Looking at The Ring's end-of-year Rankings, we find that for the whole decade, a total of 59 WWs made it into the Top-10 at least once. Of these, 55 were North Americas (which here, besides the US, include Canada, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Cuba).
The 4 men not originating from North America were:
Ron Richards, Australia (#9 in '41)
Arthur Danahar, UK (#6 in '45)
Charlie Fusari, Italy (#10 in '46)
Aldo Minelli, Italy (#9 in '47)
Fusari, by the way, came over with his parents to the US as a child, and never fought in Italy (or outside the US for that matter) - so he was not really a "foreigner", with regards to his boxing career.
"It doesn't make sense to you that boxing centralized to a few giant markets produces better fighters than where boxing aficionados are spread between 3 continents." That does indeed make a lot of sense, when we're talking about the 1940s - because back then everything was more or less happening in the US, with very little of importance going on in the rest of the world.
But surely the same thing doesn't apply today - with top boxers from all over the world making an impact. Imagine if everything was still centered in the US, and non-Americans (because of war, less intercontinental travelling, or whatever) hadn't been able to mix it up with the best boxers in the last 10 years or so... where we would never have heard about Pacquiao, Loma, GGG, Usyk, Inoue, etc.! I don't think, that would have resulted in a better era.
1940 11387
1941 10164
1942 9227
1943 9207
1944 10340
1945 11320
1946 17500
1947 16841
1948 14533
1949 13439
Number of active boxers in the 2010s (2018 is the last year, where these numbers are available):
2010 18615
2011 19603
2012 19843
2013 20529
2014 20291
2015 22086
2016 23537
2017 23683
2018 23535
Since we're talking about "Robinson's time", it might be interesting to take a look at what the welterweights looked like in the 1940s (the division and decade, where I believe most people agree, he was prime). Looking at The Ring's end-of-year Rankings, we find that for the whole decade, a total of 59 WWs made it into the Top-10 at least once. Of these, 55 were North Americas (which here, besides the US, include Canada, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Cuba).
The 4 men not originating from North America were:
Ron Richards, Australia (#9 in '41)
Arthur Danahar, UK (#6 in '45)
Charlie Fusari, Italy (#10 in '46)
Aldo Minelli, Italy (#9 in '47)
Fusari, by the way, came over with his parents to the US as a child, and never fought in Italy (or outside the US for that matter) - so he was not really a "foreigner", with regards to his boxing career.
"It doesn't make sense to you that boxing centralized to a few giant markets produces better fighters than where boxing aficionados are spread between 3 continents." That does indeed make a lot of sense, when we're talking about the 1940s - because back then everything was more or less happening in the US, with very little of importance going on in the rest of the world.
But surely the same thing doesn't apply today - with top boxers from all over the world making an impact. Imagine if everything was still centered in the US, and non-Americans (because of war, less intercontinental travelling, or whatever) hadn't been able to mix it up with the best boxers in the last 10 years or so... where we would never have heard about Pacquiao, Loma, GGG, Usyk, Inoue, etc.! I don't think, that would have resulted in a better era.
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