(Poll) SRR the greatest of all time? According to Ali - Yes!

[them_apples]

Ray Leonard and Roberto Duran both showed great diversity against better opposition then SRR. Robinson just fought A hell of a lot more. It depends on what floats your boat.

I like to put Robinson as one of the greatest WW of all time, based on achievement's, the best.

p4p wise I take into account fighters jumping weight classes as it requires more skill then a physical advantage. (Ray was a lot bigger then his opponent's at 147).

For p4p we got:

Duran
Leonard
Armstrong
Hearns
Whitaker
Pacquiao

in no particular order, even Holyfield get's a shout, incredible that he was so durable coming up from cruiser. He looks tiny compared to Bowe and actually beat him at his own game in one of the fights.
Mayweather

[MR. V]

let me see a modern day boxer try and reach a wimping 80 win career and have 5 pro fites in 28 days. that'll never happen. sugar ray was the best ever and nobody well ever ever come close.

[Kid McCoy]

Alright. Cut the ****. I say 1919 jack dempsey, scaled down to 160, knocks maxim's head off. They said ray could "rip punches like dempsey." He couldn't. Dempsey threw his left hook from a southpaw stance like a haymaker and it was harder pfp than any hook ray ever threw, even against fullmer.

But by the same token, shrink Joey Maxim down to 147, Ray's best weight, and Ray KO's him.

But they were fighting in reality, not p4p, and in reality it was a guy who peaked at welter fighting the light-heavyweight champ.

[Obama]

Ray Leonard and Roberto Duran both showed great diversity against better opposition then SRR. Robinson just fought A hell of a lot more. It depends on what floats your boat.

I like to put Robinson as one of the greatest WW of all time, based on achievement's, the best.

p4p wise I take into account fighters jumping weight classes as it requires more skill then a physical advantage. (Ray was a lot bigger then his opponent's at 147).

For p4p we got:

Duran
Leonard
Armstrong
Hearns
Whitaker
Pacquiao

in no particular order, even Holyfield get's a shout, incredible that he was so durable coming up from cruiser. He looks tiny compared to Bowe and actually beat him at his own game in one of the fights.
Mayweather

SRR beat the NBA and soon to be World Lightweight Champion (Sammy Angott), whilst never losing and maintaining a record of 21-0 with 18 KOs. He was basically what RJJ was at Middleweight. Considering Robinson had also had the LHW title in the bag before he feinted in the outdoor sun, he realistically was good enough to be a 4 division Champion WITHOUT junior titles. If you add the junior titles, that's a 7 division Champion. Also, keep in mind Robinson was already 19 years old when he turned pro. He had an extensive amateur career before that where he had a record of 85-0, winning the FEATHERWEIGHT Golden Gloves Championship in the process. Had he turned pro at an earlier age, like Manny Pacquiao did, he very well could have been in contention to be what we would refer to as today a "9 division" World Champion. Kinda puts what guys do today in perspective, now doesn't it?

[TheGreatA]

Alright. Cut the ****. I say 1919 jack dempsey, scaled down to 160, knocks maxim's head off. They said ray could "rip punches like dempsey." He couldn't. Dempsey threw his left hook from a southpaw stance like a haymaker and it was harder pfp than any hook ray ever threw, even against fullmer.

Dempsey couldn't knock out worse light heavyweights than Maxim.

I guess Archie Moore, Ezzard Charles and Jersey Joe Walcott couldn't punch either since none of them were able to finish off Joey Maxim and each of them had several tries at that.

[TheGreatA]

Ray Leonard and Roberto Duran both showed great diversity against better opposition then SRR. Robinson just fought A hell of a lot more. It depends on what floats your boat.

I like to put Robinson as one of the greatest WW of all time, based on achievement's, the best.

p4p wise I take into account fighters jumping weight classes as it requires more skill then a physical advantage. (Ray was a lot bigger then his opponent's at 147).

For p4p we got:

Duran
Leonard
Armstrong
Hearns
Whitaker
Pacquiao

in no particular order, even Holyfield get's a shout, incredible that he was so durable coming up from cruiser. He looks tiny compared to Bowe and actually beat him at his own game in one of the fights.
Mayweather

He was certainly not any bigger than 5'11 Kid Gavilan, 6 feet tall George Costner, 5'11 Jackie Wilson, 5'10 Fritzie Zivic... Some of his greatest wins at welterweight.

Robinson regularly overcame 10+ lb weight differences while facing middleweights and light heavyweights.

The time he lost to LaMotta he was giving away 16 lbs in weight. Maxim outweighed him by the same amount.

Robinson basically went from competing as a featherweight in the amateurs, to defeating the lightweight champion in a non-title bout at 135 lbs, becoming perhaps the greatest welterweight of all time, winning the middleweight title 5 times and challenging for the light heavyweight title against Joey Maxim.

That is the definition of "pound for pound".

[RightCross94]

Robinson was actually the unofficial 135 lb champion, he beat sammy angott in a non title match

he almost won the LHW title, weighing in at 158 lbs

and la motta outweighed him by heaps
he showed incredible versatility against a wide range of opponents, he got up on his toes and boxed, he had the power to put you away, the chin to slug it out in the trenches....

robinson is the greatest fighter ever, there is no doubt in my mind

[RightCross94]

In terms of accomplishments he's up there.

He jumped weight classes back when there wasn't inbetweens (am I right about this?)

he also went 90 some odd fights unbeaten

For me it's hard picking if he is the greatest p4p or not because his competition wasn't as good as others with shorter careers.

I also don't believe you can claim to be the greatest of all time when a fighter could come after you and surpass you. The whole "greatest" Idea is a joke in itself.

Either way I have Robinson in my top 3.

there are a couple things that need to be taken into account.

Having a long reign and not losing can't be one of the big reasons for a fighters greatness, if that was the case, Joe Calzaghe is the best fighter of our generation (which I strongly disagree). It's not possible to fight as much as back in the day, so having 40+ fights and never losing is a big feat. By today's standards.

Joe Calzaghe however has fought below average competition his entire career and just squeaked a decision over his toughest opponent who was 43 year of age.

Ray Robinson has had a similar career, he fought the names he could, but the majority of his 90-0 were not great competition. This needs to be taken into consideration as well.

The only reason I brought Joe Calzaghe up is to clarify that not everyone is using the 90-0 to determine his greatness. I realize SRR fought better competition than Calzaghe, but enough to garner the top spot?

What would have happened if he ran into Ray Leonard? or Marvin Hagler..even the 6'1 Thomas Hearns or Roberto Duran. Those kind of caliber fighters simply did not exist during his fighting days. Jake Lamotta has nothing on Marvin Hagler.

All speculation and trying to see if anyone actually has a reason to make him p4p no.1 other then just hopping on the band wagon.

robinson had phenomenal levels of opposition, he fought basically everyone from 135 to 160 and then the 175 lb champ

he could beat all those guys imo, they would all be very close fights but if ray had a best of 3 with all those guys i say he wins 2 out 3 against all

[RightCross94]

Maybe I'm a contrarian trying to prove I'm smart, but here's an argument. To me, the top pfp guy all time, if he's fighting at middleweight, has to be able to beat joey maxim at light heavyweight, very decisively. Even if it's 200 degrees. Plain and simple. Ray outboxed him, got tired, and collapsed. Sure it was 200 degrees, but it wasn't any cooler in maxim's corner.

Fighting at 160, I think a ton of guys would have beat joey maxim, most notably, at least historically,

jack dempsey
mike tyson
bob fitzsimmons
harry greb
muhammad ali
henry armstrong
even bernard hopkins

I think dempsey, fitz, tyson and armstrong all would have knocked maxim out.

Not all those guys are in the running for pfp alltime, but some of them are.

Also, part of me wants the PFP best all time to be a guy who could do major damage in a brawl, since a lot of fights in real life are like that. I think mike, jack, and greb would do better out of the ring.

but ray didnt start at MW, he started at 135 and was WW champ already when he moved to MW


wtf are you on about?? guys like ali would have weighed 160 when they were 14-15 or so years old, how could they have fought and beat joey maxim as teenagers?

thats idiotic and purely speculation, just because a fighter boxes instead of brawls doesnt mean they cant streetfight, ray was a black kid growing up on the streets of harlem in the 30's...im sure he could handle himself

[glidesmack]

The whole idea of a pound for pound debate involves scaling fighters up or down to the same size. If anyone doesn't understand this from now on I'm just going to assume they're total idiots and won't clarify myself.

Even though the debate centers around who the best fighter is assuming everyone's the same size, I think I good way to measure that, ironically, is to see how fighters do when fighting out of their division. If a fighter can succeed at higher weights than their own, they'll probably do pretty well against opposition of equal weight.

several fighters have done exceptionally well against significantly larger opposition. A few that come to mind are greb, dempsey, tyson, armstrong, and bob fitzsimmons. Even ali and gene tunney did better against taller men than robinson did. Robinson had no problem with fighters who outweighed him by 15-20 pounds but they had to be shorter.