My Top Ten ATG LHWs

[billeau2]

Iron Dan Hamza, that's his name. He set me straight not only on James Toney, but on Mayweather too. Plus I was ****in ****tail waitresses, two at a time.

The twofer one special! Dan lies in wait for James... a couple of times he got too close around the Buffet and was almost swallowed whole.

[Anthony342]

The twofer one special! Dan lies in wait for James... a couple of times he got too close around the Buffet and was almost swallowed whole.

You got that Godfather reference though, right?

[The Old LefHook]

These men are fools, churls and dunces. Gregory, Matthews and Franklin would take most people on their lists. They go by homemade criteria they dreamed up in their damned dollhouses.

[Marchegiano]

These men are fools, churls and dunces. Gregory, Matthews and Franklin would take most people on their lists. They go by homemade criteria they dreamed up in their damned dollhouses.

.. Matthews?

[billeau2]

You got that Godfather reference though, right?

Gotta be straight, went over my head lol.

[Marchegiano]

Well with the mounds of stuff I've seen you post here, I can't imagine all the hours it must have taken you to research all of that. Much respect.

I appreciate that.

Used to be the majority of my life. I had questions that needed answers and my father had passed from cancer when I was 24...plenty of reason for a constant distraction from my own life. It wasn't just I was a bit young, it was I'd never seen my father fail at anything. I didn't believe cancer could beat him, tbh, I'm still shocked.

Basic casual perspectives set me up really. Like how people regard BK as rock'em sock'em robots era. If that was actually the case then we'd have a gloved wizard of defense who started the whole defense craze. Mayweather can't exist without say Gans who has his own questions because defense is a thing he learned like May, going back and back I find Mendoza but even he leads you more backward, causing more questions. Mendoza takes his defense from swordplay. So now swords! learn about the talhoffers and **** and find myself right back in boxing before swords. Melankomas is there to say "Kid, we always blocked and moved." In like the first century. Back and back some more until I find the real era where defense really began. In the beginning, in Sparta. And even then, some are not satisfied and want to grow the meaning of boxing into any fist fighting event. In that regard, who, where, when, I am comfortable claiming cavemen. I'd imagine even Erectus moved out of the way of an oncoming stone or fist. Plenty pre-sparta but for me, my question is answered. As far as training, ideas being tested and re-imagined and re-tested, Sparta began it all, including defense.

Always been into history and the boxer's stories from non-boxing history, Like Yankee Sullivan, pulled me into boxing. I only got into filmed and modern boxing because I wanted to see what I was reading, and that is such a thrill I'm still watching for it.


I like Wilder because he fights like I imagined from descriptions of ancient and bare knuckle eras. I like Marciano because he leaves little to assumption, that is sword and shield or I didn't learn a damn thing. People tell me about resume and ****, and it's good to learn from, but, really, I don't actually give a damn who beat who. My interests are more sport-wide. Who did what to this sport.

Which is why I drop Mendoza as often as possible. He is, imo, the single most important shaper of the sport.

That leaves me with a special kind of knowledge that lets me seem more knowledgable than a lot of posters but the truth is most here who are good posters know the wins and losses much better than I do. I even used Boxrec ratings as a quick way to judge if a man fought ranked fighters before I hit the press of the era. When you're trying to figure out things like, why TF was cleeted kicking in boxing, it's not X beat Y articles you focus on.


More recently my company isn't doing great and I've had a baby. It's looking like my days as a proper researcher are about over. That's why I find myself here more often. Asking people for what they know rather than putting in my own work and telling people what I've found. Soon as my daughter is old enough I'll be back at it.

[Marchegiano]

Ok, I'll try to explain myself.

Being a great fighter 100+ years ago, isn't the same as being a great fighter today, imo.

If you were the best of the best in the 1890s, you had reached that position by proving your superiority over your contemporaries. We can't really ask for more than that of anyone - and we should admire and honour the fighters back then for their acomplishments.

However, if someone ask me to make a list of the best LHWs of all time, would I base that on the opinion of someone like Nat Fleischer?:

1 - Kid McCoy
2 - Phil. Jack O'Brien
3 - Jack Dillon
4 - Tommy Loughran
5 - Jack Root
6 - Battling Levinsky
7 - George Carpentier
8 - Tom Gibbons
9 - Jack Delaney
10 - Paul Berlenbach

No Ezzard Charles, no Archie Moore(!)... only pre-WW2 boxers he either saw or read about in his youth.

We can also look at the all-time p4p list of a modern (still living) historian like Tracy Callis:

1 - Bob Fitzsimmons
2 - Sugar Ray Robinson
3 - Nonpareil Jack Dempsey
4 - Sam Langford
5 - Charlie Mitchell
6 - Henry Armstrong
7 - Stanley Ketchel
8 - Jack Dempsey
9 - Ezzard Charles
10 - Phil. Jack O'Brien

Unlike Fleischer, Callis had not even been born, when most of these men were active - but from a lifetime of studying old newspaper reports, he has convinced himself, that these are the 10 best boxers who ever lived!

I have all the respect in the world for the pioneers of the sport, but no matter how great they were IN THEIR OWN TIME, I find it absurd to believe, that boxers no one has ever seen, like Nonpareil and Mitchell, are in the top-5 of all time... simply based on what reporters wrote 130 years ago! There's of course no way of proving, they are NOT... but to me (for what it's worth, if anything) his list makes little sense.

Now once we get into the late 30s and early 40s, with the emergence of boxers like (for example) Louis, Pep and Robinson, boxing had evolved into what I think most of us would call "modern" (for lack of a better word). So during the past 80 years or so, I believe there's a much stronger correlation between resume/accomplishments and actual ability. But then again, it's all subjective and just my personal opinion.

I hope this clarifies my position.

Well, ****, I feel like I've been pushed into accepting things I should have resisted then.

It's hard to remember the ins and outs of it, but I can tell you safely, the only reason I regard resume, historians, or titles is because I was told to and was told, many times, that is how you form a non-bias criteria.

My original is a thing almost no one gives credit to nor cares about in regard to greatness.

I still maintain the innovators, are the greatests. Everyone has their thing and I try to write to consensus mentality to address their things; resume, titles, ratings, historians, ringside reports. For me, all of that comes from wanting to connect with fellow fans. It's not a natural consideration for me and when I do these forms of interactions including what I think of as consensus criteria's talking points takes a real mental effort.

So what I mean to say is I personally don't disagree, but, why fight the mass? I personally don't agree that Wlad was ever lineal or that Maher is not a legit champion. I include Wlad as lineal and leave Maher off champions' lists because the masses do not agree with me.

The seen aspect I do disagree with. I wouldn't expect Jeffries or some such to fight today like he had then. I'd expect Jeffries to fight quite differently. I would not expect Dempsey or anyone else who you can see fight to fight that way today anyway, so, what good is film in all time? Even if Cribb-Moly was filmed and we could study how Cribb fought what does that really mean to an imaginary 2021 Cribb? Skillsets and such are not what should be the take from a pre-modern career, hell, any career. traits, aspects of who they are as men, ought to. You can downplay Marciano a lot, but, one thing you can't take from him is drive. You can say he was crude, you can say his resume is ass, but you can't say Marciano was passive. Marciano is coming. You can watch it, you can read it, doesn't matter, what you're going to learn is Marciano is coming. I mean there's plenty to learn but let's keep it to one aspect. Mendoza is an innovator. Mendoza is going to innovate. To put Marciano in 1780 and pretend he ain't coming because the rules are different and allow for hours of fighting is to miss who Rocky was. Marciano is coming, 1780, 1953, 2021, makes no difference, he'll be on you like glue. Because what Rocky had was drive. What Rocky used was many but all centered around that drive. Mendoza the innovator has less drive. 1953 Mendoza might have invented rope-a-dope or some such but he damn sure ain't going to come right at a man. Mendoza will look to outsmart, Marciano will look to out gun.

I don't feel like I can argue better for Marciano than I can Mendoza even though he has films. I don't feel like watching him do it proves more than reading him do it. I don't feel like either man would fight the same using the same movements but I do feel like you have to preserve their personalities otherwise they're just made up fantasy characters.

Marciano being born in 1980 and therefor having more defense skills seems far more unlikely and fantasy than Marciano being born in 1980 and having even more offensive skills.

Cribb's going to come with proper training and dieting. It's his thing. He's going to try to outlast then outgun. Don't need to see it to know it and judge how well he actually did with it.

[Bundana]

Well, ****, I feel like I've been pushed into accepting things I should have resisted then.

It's hard to remember the ins and outs of it, but I can tell you safely, the only reason I regard resume, historians, or titles is because I was told to and was told, many times, that is how you form a non-bias criteria.

My original is a thing almost no one gives credit to nor cares about in regard to greatness.

I still maintain the innovators, are the greatests. Everyone has their thing and I try to write to consensus mentality to address their things; resume, titles, ratings, historians, ringside reports. For me, all of that comes from wanting to connect with fellow fans. It's not a natural consideration for me and when I do these forms of interactions including what I think of as consensus criteria's talking points takes a real mental effort.

So what I mean to say is I personally don't disagree, but, why fight the mass? I personally don't agree that Wlad was ever lineal or that Maher is not a legit champion. I include Wlad as lineal and leave Maher off champions' lists because the masses do not agree with me.

The seen aspect I do disagree with. I wouldn't expect Jeffries or some such to fight today like he had then. I'd expect Jeffries to fight quite differently. I would not expect Dempsey or anyone else who you can see fight to fight that way today anyway, so, what good is film in all time? Even if Cribb-Moly was filmed and we could study how Cribb fought what does that really mean to an imaginary 2021 Cribb? Skillsets and such are not what should be the take from a pre-modern career, hell, any career. traits, aspects of who they are as men, ought to. You can downplay Marciano a lot, but, one thing you can't take from him is drive. You can say he was crude, you can say his resume is ass, but you can't say Marciano was passive. Marciano is coming. You can watch it, you can read it, doesn't matter, what you're going to learn is Marciano is coming. I mean there's plenty to learn but let's keep it to one aspect. Mendoza is an innovator. Mendoza is going to innovate. To put Marciano in 1780 and pretend he ain't coming because the rules are different and allow for hours of fighting is to miss who Rocky was. Marciano is coming, 1780, 1953, 2021, makes no difference, he'll be on you like glue. Because what Rocky had was drive. What Rocky used was many but all centered around that drive. Mendoza the innovator has less drive. 1953 Mendoza might have invented rope-a-dope or some such but he damn sure ain't going to come right at a man. Mendoza will look to outsmart, Marciano will look to out gun.

I don't feel like I can argue better for Marciano than I can Mendoza even though he has films. I don't feel like watching him do it proves more than reading him do it. I don't feel like either man would fight the same using the same movements but I do feel like you have to preserve their personalities otherwise they're just made up fantasy characters.

Marciano being born in 1980 and therefor having more defense skills seems far more unlikely and fantasy than Marciano being born in 1980 and having even more offensive skills.

Cribb's going to come with proper training and dieting. It's his thing. He's going to try to outlast then outgun. Don't need to see it to know it and judge how well he actually did with it.

I'm not quite sure, I get what you mean!

Are you saying, that we shouldn't rank guys like Jeffries and Dempsey based on how they actually fought - but based on how we GUESS, they would fight today?

But that wouldn't really be Jeff and Dempsey, but two completely different fighters!

If you're saying, that the old-timers deserve as much respect as modern fighters - yes, I agree. I think, I have already said that.

However, when making best-of-all-time lists, I just can't get myself to include boxers from way, way back, that we either have no footage of... or who actually look like ****, if we are in fact able to watch them on film.

Again, this is not in any way to put them down! Sullivan, Corbett, Jeffries, Ketchel, etc. are iconic figures, who paved the way for future generations of fighters. For that, they deserve our respect and admiration... I just don't think, they belong on a "best" list.

But again, that's just my opinion.

[Marchegiano]

I'm not quite sure, I get what you mean!



But that wouldn't really be Jeff and Dempsey, but two completely different fighters!

If you're saying, that the old-timers deserve as much respect as modern fighters - yes, I agree. I think, I have already said that.

However, when making best-of-all-time lists, I just can't get myself to include boxers from way, way back, that we either have no footage of... or who actually look like ****, if we are in fact able to watch them on film.

Again, this is not in any way to put them down! Sullivan, Corbett, Jeffries, Ketchel, etc. are iconic figures, who paved the way for future generations of fighters. For that, they deserve our respect and admiration... I just don't think, they belong on a "best" list.

But again, that's just my opinion.

Q: Are you saying, that we shouldn't rank guys like Jeffries and Dempsey based on how they actually fought - but based on how we GUESS, they would fight today?

A: Not at all! I'm trying to express the opposite. I'm saying there are very little comparable things from the past to the present. Most things, like skill sets, are really apples-n-oranges. Some things are not and those things are the things to be compared. Like power. Champions fought. Why kind of person they were, if they break easy, stuff like that. I wouldn't assume an olde tyme fighter's modern skillset, I don't think skillsets are applicable to time.

[Marchegiano]

So many guys flipped in and out of the division... I mean is Jones a light heavy? If this is his class then he goes way up the list... But am leaving a couple of spaces for guys who I cant place and probably forgot lol. This is the best I can do for now.

As I see it you only need to be great in the division to be considered a great of the division.

For example, Tunney only has Dempsey as a great HW win, but, that's better than anyone Akinwande beat. If a fella rates Dempsey like a god then I have no issue with him rating Tunney highly off that one name.