The Top 25 Lightweights of All-Time – 11 to 25

[-Antonio-]

I can only go by stats because I've only seen a handful of Mosley's fights at 135 and they were against no hopers. Boxrec tells me he faced sub par competition at 135. I know that doesn't carry a ton of weight, just saying, his level of competition was not on the level of Castillo's whether he looked amazing defeating it or not.

In fact his fights against Forrest and Winky make up for what was a lousy streak of title defenses overall.

[Bhopreign]

It said, "To be continued", list ain't done. He might not be on it though.

I said that cuz how could Floyd be ahead of some of those guys already named, Floyd didnt stay there long and other than Castillo didnt face big name opposition.

[Doctor_Tenma]

I said that cuz how could Floyd be ahead of some of those guys already named, Floyd didnt stay there long and other than Castillo didnt face big name opposition.

If Floyd would have faced and beat Casamayor @ 135, I'm sure he would have been on the list.

[!! Shawn]

Yes, he could have. It would have been a great fight. And Castillo faced, and beat, significantly better fighters at Lightweight. And your P4P argument is wrong. Most would rate Joe Walcott a better fighter, overall, P4P, than Lavigne...but Lavigne was a better Lightweight and beat him twice to prove it.

Shane Mosley might, slightly, outflank Castillo overall because he was also an excellent Welterweight. Has nothing to do with whether he was better at Lightweight. Maybe he was...but he doesn't have the scalps to prove it there. This is Roy Jones fan thinking: I know he could have, so I'll pretend he did.

If the resumes were close, I could see favoring the 'skill.' They are not.

But I have a feeling you will have no problems putting Locche up near the top at 140lb where he deserves to be, even though he was shut out of the title picture until relatively late in his career.

And why is that? Because you can see with your eyes what he was capable of, and you use your brain to determine that had he had the opportunity, he would have carved out a much better resume for himself.

You cannot penalize Mosley for factors outside of his control. Nobody in the division was interested in unification at the time, that is not Shane's fault, and his willingness to make the hard fights is very evident by his decisions later in his career.

So you can't say he was avoiding unification, because we know thats not the kind of guy Shane is.

The fact is the Stevie Johnston was happy to make mandatory title defenses against relatively unheralded opposition, until his apple cart was upset by an unheralded mandatory by the name of Jose Luis Castillo.

[!! Shawn]

If Floyd would have faced and beat Casamayor @ 135, I'm sure he would have been on the list.

Casamayor made his name at 130lb, his only acheivment at 135 is a win over a post Castillo Corrales, and as we are well aware, that fight pretty much finished both fighters.

[TheGreatA]

But I have a feeling you will have no problems putting Locche up near the top at 140lb where he deserves to be, even though he was shut out of the title picture until relatively late in his career.

And why is that? Because you can see with your eyes what he was capable of, and you use your brain to determine that had he had the opportunity, he would have carved out a much better resume for himself.

You cannot penalize Mosley for factors outside of his control. Nobody in the division was interested in unification at the time, that is not Shane's fault, and his willingness to make the hard fights is very evident by his decisions later in his career.

So you can't say he was avoiding unification, because we know thats not the kind of guy Shane is.

The fact is the Stevie Johnston was happy to make mandatory title defenses against relatively unheralded opposition, until his apple cart was upset by an unheralded mandatory by the name of Jose Luis Castillo.

Locche still had great success even before winning the title though and he has ten times the resume at 140 than Mosley does at 135.

[crold1]

Locche still had great success even before winning the title though and he has ten times the resume at 140 than Mosley does at 135.

This. He had wins over Perkins, Laguna, and Lopopolo before he weven wons the title along with a draw v. Ortiz.

I rated Locche top 5 at 40. There's a case for #1. There is a stronger case to say Mosley doesn't belong in the top 25 for Lightweights than there is for Mosley over Castillo at Lightweight.

[!! Shawn]

Locche still had great success even before winning the title though and he has ten times the resume at 140 than Mosley does at 135.

I would hope so, he also had over 100 more fights at the weight than Mosley had at 135.

I am not knocking Locche, he deserves his spot, but to apply different criteria in grading Locche and Mosley is not honest, or fair.

You have to take into consideration the circumstances of the time a fighter was fighting in, and use your brain to draw conclusions about what would have happened had they been given the opportunity.

Does anyone doubt that Mosley would have had a less extraordinary career had he stayed at 135, instead of moving up to chase the bigger fights? Make no mistake about it, Mosley didn't move up because he could no longer make the weight, he moved up because he WANTED to fight the best, and that wasn't happening at 135lb.

So penalizing a 135lber who wanted to fight the best for moving up to fight the best, because the best wouldn't fight him at 135lb is ******. Its the same as penalizing Locche for not getting his title shot earlier.

[!! Shawn]

This.

I rated Locche top 5 at 40. There's a case for one. There is a stronger case to say Mosley doesn't belong in the top 25 for Lightweights than there is for Mosley over Castillo at Lightweight.

So then you are comfortable applying different standards...

[crold1]

So then you are comfortable applying different standards...

How is the standard different? Locche beat a slew of awesome comp and got rewarded for it; who cares when he won a title? Mosley's pre-title comp was awful but if he'd beat some notables he'd have been credited for it. His title comp was marginal. Mosley didn't have the comp...but still made top 25 in one of the deepest divisions in history. He also did move up in part because he couldn't make weight...it showed in coming in the ring as a MIDDLEWEIGHT by the end of his Lightweight run.

If this list was done purely on numbers, as the Jr. Division lists were, Mosley wouldn't even be there.