Most ranking books will feature Sugar Ray Robinson, Muhammad Ali, Joe Louis and Henry Armstrong at the top. All are solid, logical choices because they all have impressive records and there are plenty of facts to support the writer's contention. If the number one choice is Robinson, the author will support his choice by citing Robinson's massive body of work: his welterweight title, 5 middleweight titles, 109 career knockouts, 175 career victories, 25 year career and his long undefeated streaks. Joe Louis' highlights include his 25 title defenses and his 11+ years as heavyweight champion. For Ali, it's 3 heavyweight titles and a 16 year span of championship activity. Armstrong's simultaneous ownership of 3 world titles, 151 career wins and 101 career knockouts are his headlines. If a writer ranked Rocky Marciano near the top, chances are he will attempt to substantiate Marciano's ranking by citing his 43 knockouts in 49 bouts and his unique position as the only undefeated heavyweight champion in history.

 

Judging by the fighters that are nearly always at the top of ranking lists, we accept statistical evidence as a foundation for rankings. Facts are explicit, compelling and tend to end arguments. However while it's relatively simple to rank elite champions with towering achievements, how do we rank the majority of champions that generally fall below the acknowledged greats? Is it even possible to rank the majority in the same objective manner in which we rank Robinson, Armstrong, Louis or Ali?  Certailnly it's possible to objectively rank any champion based on his career performance. That's what records are for. A boxer's record is demonstrable, quantifiable proof of his ability as a fighter. What I've attempted to do here is to objectively compare the records of 700 boxing champions dating from 2001 to the 1880s.

 

Few take issue with Ray Robinson being the greatest fighter ever. His statistics jump off the page: Career fights, victories, knockouts, six world titles, longevity, etc. Robinson's basic stats are vivid and strong enough to separate him from the pack. A true student of boxing could read: "202 fights, 175 wins 109 KOs and  6 world titles and know that it's Robinson without seeing his name. Why not measure every champion by using the same objective criteria?  I'm sure all authors review a boxer’s basic record of wins, losses, draws, knockouts and title bouts to help form and organize their list, but they soon run into trouble because unlike the greats such as Robinson, does anything jumps off the page when looking at the basic record of and "average" champions? Not so much and that makes it more difficult to accurately rank them. In my study of 700 champions, I found 115 champions that had at least 100 career bouts, 120 champions that had between 70 to 99 career fights, 217 champions that fought 50 to 69 career fights and 248 champions that fought less than 50 times. The number of fights in a career can be used to rank as many boxers as you care to but that one category isn't sufficient to define career performance. Activity is an important and measurable component to consider, but again it's just one category. The champion with the greatest number of fights to a decision is Maxie Rosenbloom with 274, and the champion with the least number of career bouts is bantamweight champion, Byun Jung-Il, who boxed only 12 times. While Rosenbloom had the greatest number of fights, he is not the highest ranking champion, nor is Byun the lowest ranking champion. To determine their real positions, many aspects of a boxer's career must be taken into account and compared with the other champions before we can get a clear picture that will make it possible to rank them all based on results.   

 

In order to sensibly rank champions, especially those with modest records, it's vital to develop a workable statistical model using many performance categories that enable us to measure the quality of every champion's career. That was my target and I did this in order to to create a level playing field. Secondly, I decided to move beyond the age old use of opinion-based rankings that, year after year, protect the legacy of legends by virtually deifying them and exempting them from further scrutiny. As a result, the position of old time fighters often remains fixed at levels established perhaps a century ago. There appears to be an unwritten rule among boxing historians that forbids the reevaluation of legendary fighters. Obviously, I disagree which is why I developed my system by using 29 categories of career performance. This system has yielded facts that have never been available before. You may not agree with my findings and if not I'd appreciate it if you'd drop me a line and tell me why you disagree and what you propose to improve what I hope will be an ongoing project. Boxing author and columnist Thomas Hauser reviewed my book after it came out. Given the turn around time beginning with his request for a review copy and when his review was published I doubt that he had time to read enough of it. It appeared that he looked it over to see where the famous names were and if something didn't fit with his preconcieved notions, he was ready to rip. He said that he didn't agree with me beyond my first few picks. In fact, he picked at some rankings and summed it up by calling my ranking system "idiocy."  I don't mind criticism but I'm disappointed that he felt so strongly that I was wrong but he never offered his rationale or attempted to prove why I was wrong, nor did he suggest a way to improve. Sadly and typicallly, Hauser just offered his opinion that I am an idiot and he suggested that ranking fighters is an art rather than a science. I disagree. Writing about great fighters can be art if it's done well but subjectively ranking fighters is nothing more than an appreciation.  

 

To Hauser and other devotees of the subjective method of ranking boxers, objectivity is the enemy. For the record, Mr. Hauser used the word IDIOCY in his column but he later apologized to me for his "intemperate" remark -- by private email which I appreciate. Still, Hauser made no attempt to support his beliefs with facts and that is the inherent weakness of any practitioner of subjective rankings. He concluded with: "Give me good old subjective analysis." Well, there's plenty of that. The practice of subjective analysis is certainly old, rarely good and pretty much the same from book to book. If that's what he wants, he's welcome to all of it. If one wishes to be entertained rather than informed, these books are fine reads but how much more Homeric musing about Jack Johnson, Benny Leonard and Joe Louis can we take?  Haven't the bones of these great old fighters been picked clean by now? Mr. Hauser may be wary of sailing off the edge of the earth; he may prefer to remain in familiar waters and blissfully move about in a narrow area, but touting the need for more "good old subjective analysis" in ranking boxers adds nothing to our knowledge. If he thinks I'm wrong, I challenge him to make his case. I want to learn new things about boxers and I assume Hauser does as well. What can we learn by maintaining status quo and by defending untested positions that were first voiced decades ago? Mr.Hauser, don't just say I'm wrong about Benny Leonard and others. Dig in and do some work. Test your opinions and test my system. Try using good old facts to prove your point.   

 

My proof? Over a ten year period, I compiled the records of 700 champions and analyzed their performance in 29 categories. I discovered the "average" boxing champion's career record is 57 bouts, 44 wins, 26 knockouts and about 3 years of activity in championship bouts. 57, 44, 26 and 3 is roughly 25 percent of Sugar Ray Robinson's career of 202 bouts, 175 wins, 109 knockouts and nearly 15 years of championship activity. Obviously, the average champion in a field of 700 is nowhere close to Ray Robinson's level of performance but it is still possible to separate the jumble of tightly-packed mid-level champions by digging for more information that will break a logjam. By detecting just one subtle difference, a champion with exactly 57 bouts, 44 wins, 26 knockouts, but one additional year of championship activity - even if it's just one title bout - will rank slightly higher than another with a similar basic record. When all 29 categories are added to the mix, I am able to refine the results and quantify career performance. A basic W-L-D-KO  analysis provides a thumbnail sketch of what boxers accomplished but by going deeper than a basic analysis the similarities and differences in every champion come to the surface. I can then pinpoint  how, where and why one champion outranks another.    

 

What else is different here in comparision to opinion-based greatest hundred fighter books is that in the latter, the author usually begins by taking 150-200 well-known fighters and then he tweaks and whittles the large list down until he gets the 100 that he knows and likes (and hopes will make sense to readers). I started with the largest list I could find;  700 fighters that were  champions from 1882 to 2000. This may disappoint fans of the so-called uncrowned champions, great fighters best represented by men such as Peter Jackson, Harry Wills, Sam Langford and Charley Burley. These were men that were superb boxers and deserving of a title shot, but they never got one. For whatever the reason, be it the color line, their superior ability or simply poor management, these excellent fighters never got a title shot. While that's unfortunate, only title holders make the cut in this  book because winning a title is the primary goal of every serious professional boxer. Those that do become champions are boxing's elite.

 

Mostly, I wanted to avoid creating my own subjective list of great champions and pontificate on who was better. The only way to avoid interjecting myself in the debate is to keep my opinions to myself. Instead, I went all the way back to the beginning of boxing's modern era when John L. Sullivan stated his preference to fight with padded gloves and box three minute rounds. Moving forward decade by decade, I built a database of every champion in every weight division from the 1880s through 2000. Sugar Ray Robinson emerged as the number one ranked champion. On the bottom at number 700 is Jorge Vaca. In the middle at number 350 is 19th century welterweight champion Matty Matthews, who ranks just below 1920s champion Pete Latzo, and just above 1980s champion Robin Reid. All 700 champions were ranked on a 100-point scale. Robinson scored a 97.89, Vaca's score is 34.76. Matty Matthews, the man in the middle, scored 54.03. Only five of the 700 champions scored 90 points or more and Muhammad Ali is not one of them, although he is very close at 89.43 and he did grade out as the number one heavyweight of all time. That's my method in a nutshell. My rankings are entirely based on career results and my ranking positions are settled by as little as one one-hundredth (.001) of a point. Generally, you won't find more than two points separating any grouping of five fighters.  

 

Another difference is that some authors that subjectively rank may emphasize intangibles such as power and toughness to justify a fighter's rank. Those that appreciate scientific boxing skill, quickness and guile may elevate master boxers. Still, regardless of style --  power puncher or slick boxer -- the objective for all fighters is to win the fight. How he wins is far less important than how often he won. In Ray Robinson, we had a man who is acknowledged as the finest example of a fighter with every asset -- power, speed, grace, determination, intelligence and toughness. If we had never seen Robinson in action, what could we tell about him if we simply reviewed his record? He must have been tough because he was stopped only once in 202 fights. He certainly had power because he knocked out 109 opponents, which is the second highest number of knockouts among all champions. Can a knockout artist also have superior boxing skills? 84 of Robinson's fights went the distance and he was awarded the decision in 66. How about guile and determination? Robinson lasted for 25 years; only 20 champions have fought that long, or longer. Ray Robinson had all the tools, but what made Robinson our greatest fighter is that he combined his abilty with with a great desire to win. That is what made Robinson more productive over a longer span of time than any champion in history. This is not an opinion it is a fact. An oft-reported assessment of Robinson is that he could knock out sluggers and out-box boxers. One look at Robinson's record tells us exactly that. Still, having great tools does not necessarily mean a fighter is a great fighter; only that he has the capacity to be great. Robinson proved his greatness by winning many fights and by being productive for many years.

 

While Robinson won and endured, there are many highly-skilled fighters that impress us but suddenly flame out and fade away. Here we get into the murky area of ranking by career value versus peak value. When writers consider fighters whose records do not quite jump off the page, they may have no recourse but to offer their opinion based on a slice of time that they believe a fighter was at his peak. This approach tends to keep famous old time fighters such as Benny Leonard forever fixed in boxing's upper echelon and subjective analysis offers the famous a lifetime pass into future top 100 rankings because someone that attempted to subjectively rank boxers would have to be an idiot to not place Benny Leonard high on his list. Why? Because just about every expert in the twentieth century says that near the top is where Leonard belongs. Well, Benny Leonard is not in my top ten. Keep reading and I will tell you why. 

 

Throughout my review of these 700 champions, I noticed some unappreciated champions that stood shoulder to shoulder with more famous fighters that have appeared on recent top 100 lists. Now, is it really worth knowing that Mario D'Agata, Rudolfo Gonzalez and Soo Hwan Hong rank within .06 points of each other?  Probably not. They are nowhere close to being top 100 champions, but I was surprised when I found that the scores of D'Agata, Gonzalez and Hong were within a half a point of Rocky Graziano, who was included in a recent top 100 list. While Graziano's record grades out here as below average, putting him in a top 100 list suggests the analyst lacks a way to find a better answer. Maybe the analyst sampled too few fighters to begin with. If he set out to create a list of 100 by starting with only 150 or 200, he will exclude at least 500 of the champions that I have included in my study. Graziano was a well-known fighter and a character in and out of the ring. The late Paul Newman starred in 'Somebody Up There Likes Me;' the story of Graziano's life. Only a handful of sports champions have had movies made of their life story but that, of course, has no bearing on how Graziano performed in the ring. After his career was over Graziano became a TV personality and he remained in the public eye for the rest of his life. Films and still photographs of Graziano's second fight with Tony Zale vividly portray a snarling, bleeding and battered Graziano lashing out with his right hand, smashing Zale into submission and leaving Zale dazed and draped over the middle rope. In the face of this graphic imagery what is lost in the mix is the most important fact about Graziano and that is the second fight with Zale was Graziano's one big moment; his only championship victory. Graziano was unsuccessful in his attempt to defend his title in a rematch with Zale and in three of his four title fights Graziano was quickly kayoed every time. Graziano was certainly an exciting fighter to watch but he had a very brief peak: One championship win against three defeats. Graziano's championship peak lasted literally one fight and his championship record of 1-3 is certainly not the stuff of legends or deserving of a top 100 ranking. In terms of peak value, Graziano was unable to defend his title and his reign is measured in months rather than years. He peaked and he fell in less than one year and when he is objectively evaluated against every champion since 1882, Graziano's record is barely enough to make it into my top 400 champions. In terms of career value, Graziano does not show particularly well either. He was 43-6-5 when he got his first title shot against Zale in 1947 and Zale handed him his seventh loss and his first defeat by knockout, plus, he had a relatively short career that ended at age 30. In all Graziano answered the bell 83 times and he was 67-10-6 with 52 knockouts. When Graziano fought competent fighters, he usually lost. I believe that the only reason why others give Graziano a nod as one of boxing's greatest 100 fighters is that his post career celebrity status bucks up a below average career. Graziano is an example of overrating the fireworks display fighters; the big punching 'kill-or-be-killed' street brawlers who excitingly pounded their way to a championship. If we remove Graziano's style and post career celebrity, among the 700 champions I reviewed, my system ranks Graziano at #386 all time and number 39 of the 59 middleweight champions that I rank. Rocky Graziano ranked number 99 in Bert Sugar's latest top 100 list which I feel is wrong and a glaring example of the subjective ranking method going off the tracks. Graziano was a one-trick pony who was one of the ring's true characters and his persona enhanced our perception of his career. His position in Sugar's book comes at the expense of 287 champions that had better career results.

 

It's vital to rank boxer's only on what they achieved in the ring. Nothing more is needed. Life stories are important to know and add color and context but they have no bearing on ranking.    

 

It is useful to compare career patterns, such as the age of champions when they turned pro, had their first title bout, won their first and last title bout, fought their last title bout and when they retired. In studying these factors, subtle differences emerge and form what I call the Career Quality of all champions. Breaking down the careers of 700 hundred champions into 29 components brings to light similarities and differences that led me to discover where every champion belongs in an historical ranking. I am not concerned with how a fighter wins or how he looks doing it. I don't care if he had a great chin, a lethat jab,  lightning fast hands or inexhaustible stamina. These are simply physical attributes that only contribute to, but do not guarantee success. Floyd Patterson was praised for his fast hands and combination punching but he is better known and often ridiculed for getting knocked down more than any heavyweight champion in history. Sonny Liston, who twice humiliated Patterson in less than one round, was often praised for having a great chin and terrific power. Despite the obvious physical advantages and the head to head dominance Liston had over Patterson, what did each man accomplish over the course of his entire career? The imposing Liston may have had a great chin and terrific power but those assets helped him win only two of four title fights. The smaller, seemingly fragile Patterson won eight title fights, lost five and was the first man in history to regain the heavyweight championship. Who had the better career?  Patterson by a wide margin. Like Rocky Graziano, Sonny Liston made an enduring impression on those who saw him but his championship career was a blip.

 

My ranking system is based entirely on career results and the overall result I sought is how well and how long did each champion perform compared to his peers? While I advocate an objective, unbiased ranking system, I admit that there can be drawbacks to objective ranking when too few statistics are used. In a narrow-focus ranking there may be a tendency to zero in on and debate the importance of each ranking category, rather than to focus on the overall results of the fighter. For instance, by winning world titles 6 times, Ray Robinson deserves to be ranked above Henry Armstrong, who held 3 titles. However, in Armstrong's favor, we know that he fought more title bouts and he won more title bouts than Robinson did, so Armstrong has an advantage there. Should we give more weight to titles held, or title fights won? I do not believe that any category should be weighted, so I didn't do that. Individual performance against the average performance of 700 champions within each of the 29 categories is the key. Robinson didn't come out first in every category, but he finished at or near the top enough to come out on top of the pack. Armstrong had a better ratio of wins by knockout for his career than Robinson, but Robinson won more fights and his championship career was much longer, spanning from 1946 to 1961, while Armstrong's lasted from 1937 to 1941. What it boils down to is that over the 29 categories, Robinson outperformed Armstrong across the board more often than Armstrong bettered Robinson. If we can avoid trying to quantify the importance of one category over another, we can properly focus on the fighters results and that evidence will show exactly where champions rank in every category; be it titles held, titles won, career knockouts, length of career, and 25 more. To accomplish this, the task is to generate meaningful points of comparison that enable us to compare and rank fighters based on a wide array of statistics, rather than a few. By developing 29 ways to measure champions and by using 700 champions rather than hand picking 150 or 200, I feel that I have hit my target.

 

Why do I use 29 categories to rank fighters? Anybody can offer an opinion and back their call with a few selected facts. If somebody believes that Ray Leonard was a better fighter than Sugar Ray Robinson, and if their assessment is backed with selected statistics where Leonard has an advantage over Robinson, then the argument for Leonard is defensible. However, if we analyze each fighter in 29 categories Robinson's superiority across the entire range is clear and a fine champion such as Leonard will fall in well below Robinson. Many of the categories that I use rarely (if ever) have been taken into account when analyzing and ranking boxers. If we examine career longevity and activity, we'll see that Sugar Ray Robinson had 202 bouts in his career while Ray Leonard had 40 professional fights. Comparing them side by side in that single category gives Robinson a significant edge, but as compelling as their head to head comparison may be, I can also detect where Robinson and Leonard rank against the entire pool of 700 champions. The key factor here is that by using a base of 700 champions I can tell you that 533 champions had more fights in their career than Ray Leonard had, but only 6 champions had more career fights than Ray Robinson. What that tells us is Robinson not only took on more risk than Leonard did, he accepted more risk than almost every champion in history -- and he produced. Robinson deserves credit for that and my system ensures that he (and every other champion) receives credit for what they achieved. When all 29 factors are considered, Robinson's superiority over Leonard -- and every fighter – is quantifiable and compelling.