Prime Andre Ward sweeps the current field at 168

[Lomasexual]

Currently? Sure, he'd clean up and dominate.

All time? Don't be ******. RJJ would humiliate him, and even Calzaghe would have made him look like an amateur. Ward was a great fighter at SMW, yeah, but don't be ignorant.

[Cutthroat]

I would imagine so, yes. That Ward is better than the current crop is hardly a controversial opinion.

As for All Time? Not so sure. All Time 'Easily'? No.

EDIT: And he beat Froch, sure. He's just a better boxer. Humiliate him though? Nah. He was never able to tame Froch even if he was outboxing him for most of the fight. There's a reason Ward reckons it was the toughest fight of his career.

He beat Froch pretty easily and he had trouble because he had a double fracture in his left hand which makes his W even more impressive.

[Curt Henning]

oh yeah...prime ward easily owns this current crop...the one he did become king of was more talented by a good margin imo...despte what some will want you to believe...you know the types "oh the 168 division when ward was there was actually overrated"..LOL...the same guys that will write a 50k word essay trying to tell you that the MW division that golovkin reigned over was actually "underrated"...LOL

[Cutthroat]

168 right now is probably the weakest division from 126-HW in the sport right now

With the exception of Plant/Uzi None have fought each orher and no one has more then 1 decent win on their resume and Benavidez doesn’t even have that.

160 is worse, the top guy in the division got beat 2x by a guy with 0 wins at the weight. The #2 guy in the division Jacobs, is struggling with Euro level guys like Sulecki & Derey. The 3rd guy in the division, Charlo, just struggled mightily with Andy Lee's leftovers, Korobov.

[Curt Henning]

Currently? Sure, he'd clean up and dominate.

All time? Don't be ******. RJJ would humiliate him, and even Calzaghe would have made him look like an amateur. Ward was a great fighter at SMW, yeah, but don't be ignorant.

i dunno if calzaghe would have made ward look like an amatuer...thats highly unlikely....youre acting like calzaghe has some great resume...wards is actually much better and they are both A level fighters

i think it would have been a great matchup on paper that may not have exactly produced the best fight....but it would be tough to predict the winner.....both guys are excellent in different ways and i could see either guy coming out the winner

but lets not act like calzaghe was levels above ward...never was and never will be

[Curt Henning]

160 is worse, the top guy in the division got beat 2x by a guy with 0 wins at the weight. The #2 guy in the division Jacobs, is struggling with Euro level guys like Sulecki & Derey. The 3rd guy in the division, Charlo, just struggled mightily with Andy Lee's leftovers, Korobov.

eh...i disagree...i think MW is kinda weak....but they have 3 guys there that are still better than the top 3 at 168....even if you believe charlo is overrated id put the top 3 at 160 over the top 3 at 168 p4p wise...even with an old and fading golovkin in that mix

168 simply doesnt have 4 guys as good as canelo, golovki, jacbos and charlo

[Madison Boxing]

Lol funny how whenever brits run a division you guys call it 'weak'. Andre ward wasnt all that....

[boliodogs]

Definitely 168. I'm not so sure about 175. Ward really did not impress me at 175 in any of his performances.

I don't know how much of it was Ward and how much was just Ward being inactive from contractual issues/shoulder surgery.

The last fight where I felt Ward was dominant was the Edwin Rodirguez fight...at 168. Ward looked real sharp offensively and defensively and in complete control.

Even the Barrera fight Ward just didn't look comfortable. He scored a KD, but he never seemed able to really deter Sullivan.

Bivol won every round from Barrera with ease and knocked him out in the 12th. Bivol says making 168 is no problem.

[Curt Henning]

Lol funny how whenever brits run a division you guys call it 'weak'. Andre ward wasnt all that....

lol...if thats what you call "running a division"....have at it then! cong**** on your division! LOL

[Lomasexual]

i dunno if calzaghe would have made ward look like an amatuer...thats highly unlikely....youre acting like calzaghe has some great resume...wards is actually much better and they are both A level fighters

i think it would have been a great matchup on paper that may not have exactly produced the best fight....but it would be tough to predict the winner.....both guys are excellent in different ways and i could see either guy coming out the winner

but lets not act like calzaghe was levels above ward...never was and never will be

Don't think I am underselling Ward. I'm not. I won a fair bit of money by the rule 'always bet on Ward'. That's how good I thought he was.

But realistically, I saw him get outboxed by Kovalev.

That says a huge amount. People predicated that Kovalev might win by virtue of his knockout power, but assumed that Ward would easily win if it went to the scorecards.

Nope. Ward got cleanly outboxed. Not by a huge amount, it was a close fight. But the sheer fact he got outboxed by Kovalev?

I'm not trying to minimise how good Kovalev was either - I think he was also great.

Joe would have been too much for him. Joe was smarter, faster, could adapt better and was relentless. Ward couldn't knock him out and couldn't keep up with Joe's stamina. Ward would have taken three of the first six rounds, then lost all of the last six.

It might be hyperbole to say that would make Ward look like an amateur - but it would have been a definitive, and not all that close - win to Joe.