Top 20 Lightweights of all time

You got some great threads going Suze. Hope you hang around some.

 

Just off the top, what about Joe Brown? By some criteria, # of defenses, etc., he had one of the best lightweight championship reigns of them all. He was erratic before being champion, and fought way too long after losing the title at 36, but I don't see how he doesn't make the top 20. I would rate him above Carter, for certain.

On Rummy's lists of those who rated highest longest in The Ring's yearly rankings, Brown was the #2 lightweight since the 1930's.

 

Bob Montgomery

 

You forgot Freddie Welsh.

 

Brown was champion for six years and 11 successful defenses. He finally lost at 36 to Carlos Ortiz.

Jimmy Carter was champion for only 4 years, but lost the title during the time to the ordinary Lauro Salas and Paddy DeMarco. He regained it both times, but finally lost it for good to Wallace Smith in 1955. Brown swept Smith.

The argument that Carter beat better men? I don't know. Ike Williams might indeed be better than anyone Brown defeated, but he was having trouble making weight and was weak at 135 when Carter upset him. The rest? Del Flanagan? Enrique Bolanos? Could be, but off the top of my head, Brown had a pretty strong run as champion. Smith, Orlando Zulueta, Joey Lopes, Ralph Dupas, Kenny Lane, Johnny Busso, Paulo Rosi, Dave Charnley, Battling Torres, Cisco Andrade, Bert Somodio, and Charnley again. And Brown went to England to defend against Charnley and to the Philippines to defend against Somodio. He was really an excellent champion. He had arguably the best reign of any lightweight champion.

Carter got a draw with Tony DeMarco, but Brown beat Virgil Akins who in turn beat DeMarco.

Overall, there is a case for Carter, but I think he was the more inconsistent fighter, and I don't see that his opposition was necessarily better. He certainly didn't match Brown's championship reign.

One other factor. The two fought in 1947, and Brown won.

 

Way too obvious of a trap

 

I'm not going to put them in chronological order.
Williams
Leonard
Gans
Duran
Canzoneri
Armstrong
Ross
Lavigne
Whitaker
Mayweather Jnr
Brown
Ortiz
McFarland
Welsh
Buchanan
Ambers
Mandell
DeJesus
Angott
Chavez

 

Nice list. I am glad Joe Brown made it.

 

Thank you.Brown had a fine jab and could bang too I grew up reading about him, Charnley ,and Ortiz.

 

Carter is believed to have dropped the title twice to facillitate betting coups. Nast Fleischer wrote an editorial about it called "A Dangerous Habit".I think we have spoken about this before?

 

Arguably the two best fighters to ever fight inside the lightweight limit were Sugar Ray Robinson and Henry Armstrong.

Robinson grew into a welterweight pretty quickly after turning pro so doesn't deserve consideration here and Armstrong's title reign was too brief for him to be considered near the very top of the list. Had he chosen to stay at lightweight rather than keep the welterweight title, he'd probably be top 3, though.

Gans, Leonard, Williams and Duran are the 4 best lightweight champions in history. After that, there are a number of fighters who could occupy positions from 5 to 20 almost interchangeably.

Whitaker seems to be making lists quite high up these days. I'd have him on the edge of the top 10 but no higher. His record and opposition is no more impressive than Canzoneri's, Ortiz's or Bob Montgomery's, for example.

Glad to see Joe Brown getting some props too. He deserves consideration in any list of great lightweight champs.