Boxing afficianados have to deal with a lot of downtime between fights. In the course of any one month, you might be able to watch two or three big fights, all of them on Friday or Saturday nights. To fill up the dead time, boxing junkies, like all good and reasonable people, like to make lists. Lists of the top American heavyweights in history. Lists of the top fighters in each division. Lists of the best fights of the year, the best rounds of the year, the best knockouts of the year, and the biggest upsets of the year.
The most important list by far, however, is the list of the best pound-for-pound fighters in the world. This is a list that seeks to equalize all the weight divisions to see, essentially, who gets the most bang for his buck on a pound-for-pound basis. It’s the only way that you can compare a bantamweight to a cruiserweight while maintaing at least the foggiest semblence of intellectual honesty.
In the most recent issue of The Ring, boxing’s signature publication put out its latest list of the best pound-for-pound fightes in the world. It was:
- Manny Pacquiao – Lightweight
- Joe Calzaghe – Super Middleweight/Light Heavyweight
- Juan Manuel Marquez – Junior Lightweight
- Bernard Hopkins – Light Heavyweight
- Israel Vazquez – Junior Featherweight
- Antonio Margarito – Welterweight
- Kelly Pavlik – Middleweight
- Christian Mijares – Junior Bantamweight
- Rafael Marquez – Junior Featherweight
- Miguel Cotto – Welterweight
This list is fine as far as it goes, but it betrays one quality in particular that annoys me about such lists. It tends to look more at a fighter’s past accomplishments than his present potential. For instance, I defy anyone who has actually watched the 43-year-old Bernard Hopkins fight in the last year to say that he is still one of the top pound-for-pound fighters in the world. Greatness in the ring is fleeting; we should aim with these lists to capture the best fighters according to their present abilities and skill levels, not their track records.
With that in mind, The Boxing Corner is debuting its monthly pound-for-pound rankings, which will post around the middle of each month. Here is my list for October:
- Juan Manuel Marquez – Lightweight
- Manny Pacquiao – Lightweight
- Antonio Margarito – Welterweight
- Kelly Pavlik – Middleweight
- Chad Dawson – Light Heavyweight
- Israel Vazquez – Junior Featherweight
- Rafael Marquez – Junior Featherweight
- Joe Calzaghe – Light Heavyweight
- Miguel Cotto – Welterweight
- Ivan Calderon – Junior Flyweight
Juan Manuel Marquez earns the top spot because, on my scorecards, he won both of his previous meetings with Manny Pacquaio, although the judges scored one a draw and the other a narrow victory for Pacquiao. Further, Marquez gave the more impressive showing in his first fight at lightweight, taking out linear champion Joel Casamayor with a knockout, whereas Pacquiao entered the division against lesser opponent David Diaz. If Pacquiao somehow beats Oscar De La Hoya in December, I may reconsider this ordering.
At this point Antonio Margarito appears to be the most feared fighter in the sport, after his demolition of the great Miguel Cotto in late July. He appears to be headed for a fight with Sugar Shane Mosley in January, after which he will probably rematch against Cotto sometime in the middle of next year. Kelly Pavlik, at #4, faces his biggest test this Saturday when he fights Bernard Hopkins at a catch-weight of 170 pounds. I will preview this fight on Friday, but I do expect the hard-punching, hard-working Pavlik to take this fight fairly easily, cementing his status as one of the top fighters in the sport. Chad Dawson (#5) has already been written about here; his big win over Antonio Tarver this weekend, coupled with an earlier victory (albeit disputed) over Glen Johnson pushes him into the top ranks. Vazquez (#6) and Rafael Marquez (#7) will always be joined at the hip in my mind after the three brutal wars they waged in 2007 and 2008. Everyone is now waiting for those two to heal up so they can beat the crap out of each other once more.
Joe Calzaghe (#8) is overrated. His win over Bernard Hopkins in the spring was not that impressive, and now he appears to be gliding out of the sport with a November match against another old fogey, Roy Jones, Jr. I feel kind of dirty even putting Calzaghe anywhere in this top ten. It befuddles me that some people actually think he is the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world right now. Cotto (#9) may deserve to be even higher, despite his knockout loss to Margarito in July. That’s just a bad matchup for him on paper. His previous wins over Sugar Shane Mosley and Zab Judah place him in the top ranks of the sport. At #10, Ivan Calderon may be the best pure boxer in the world right now. He simply has no punching power whatsoever, but it’s still fun to watch other fighters try and fail to catch him with anything.
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