Boxing Junkie’s “Who Wins?” feature, in which we pitted each of our Top 15 pound-for-pound fighters against five potential opponents and had our three staffers predict winners, is completed.
What did it reveal? A number of things.
The top fighters on our pound-for-pound list are there for a reason.
Nos. 1-3 Vasiliy Lomachenko, Terence Crawford and Canelo Alvarez went a combined 43-1-1 in their fights (five fights with three predictions each). See below for the final standings.
The results depended heavily on the opposition.
Alvarez went 15-0 (6 KOs) in part because he’s a great fighter, as stated above, but also because the competition at super middleweight isn’t as deep as some other divisions.
Alvarez, who recently won a light heavyweight title was paired with 175-pounder Artur Beterbiev in one of the Russian’s five fights and all three Boxing Junkie staffers predicted Alvarez would lose.
One could argue that the records of Crawford (14-1, 3 KOs) and Errol Spence Jr. (13-2, 6 KOs) are as impressive as Alvarez’s given the inordinate number of quality welterweights compared to super middleweights.
Size matters.
The best example of this is Mikey Garcia, the four-division titleholder who now is a smallish welterweight. His ability stacks up against almost anyone’s but he is at a disadvantage against a full-sized, elite 147-pounder, as we saw when he was dominated by Spence. Garcia went 7-8 (0 KOs).
Age matters.
No one doubts the greatness of Manny Pacquiao, particularly after his victory over Keith Thurman. However, at 41, he can’t fight at the same pace he once did. Plus, he also is a small 147-pounder. Those are reasons the Boxing Junkie staffers gave the nod to Pacquiao’s opponents by a wide margin. Pacquiao went 3-12 (0 KOs), the worse record among the 15 fighters featured.
Gennadiy Golovkin, 37, suffered a similar fate. He’s a great fighter but also an aging one, which caught up with him in our feature. Triple-G went 9-6 (5 KOs).
Fury is clearly No. 1.
The heavyweight division isn’t deep but Fury’s opponents – Anthony Joshua, Deontay Wilder, Oleksandr Usyk, Dillian Whyte and Andy Ruiz Jr. – have had success. And Fury emerged with a record of 14-1 (8 KOs), losing only a close decision against Usyk in the opinion of staffer Sean Nam.
Even special fighters lose.
Two good examples are Srisaket Sor Rungvisai and Josh Taylor, who had records of 8-7 (5 KOs) and 7-6-2 (2 KOs), respectively. That has less to do with their abilities than the fighters we had them face.
Sor Rungvisai, a junior bantamweight, had to contend with a gauntlet of superb opponents – Juan Francisco Estrada (in a third fight), Roman Gonzalez (also for the third time), Nayoa Inoue (a bantamweight), Kazuto Ioka and Kosei Tanaka. No one could emerge from those tests unscathed.
And Taylor, a junior welterweight, faced Jose Ramirez, Regis Prograis (in a rematch), Maurice Hooker, Terence Crawford (a welterweight) and Teofimo Lopez (a lightweight). Again, tough assignments.
FINAL “WHO WINS?” STANDINGS
Canelo Alvarez: 15-0 (6 KOs)
Naoya Inoue: 14-0-1 (5 KOs)
Vassiliy Lomachenko: 14-0-1 (4 KOs)
Artur Beterbiev: 14-1 (11 KOs)
Tyson Fury: 14-1 (8 KOs)
Terence Crawford: 14-1 (3 KOs)
Errol Spence Jr.: 13-2 (6 KOs)
Oleksandr Usyk: 10-5 (2 KOs)
Juan Francisco Estrada: 9-5-1 (1 KOs)
Gennadiy Golovkin: 9-6 (5 KOs)
Srisaket Sor Rungvisai: 8-7 (5 KOs)
Josh Taylor: 7-6-2 (2 KOs)
Mikey Garcia: 7-8 (0 KOs)
Leo Santa Cruz: 5-10 (0 KOs)
Manny Pacquiao: 3-12 (0 KOs)