What Do You Think of ESPN's Rankings?

ESPN.com recently listed their 50 greatest boxers of all-time. The goal was not an 'all-time, mythical pound-for-pound ranking' but rather an assessment based on four criteria:
In-ring Performance
Achievements
Dominance
Mainstream Appeal

Check out the complete list below. It will come as no surprise who is at the top of the list. If you accept that Sugar Ray Robinson belongs in the top slot (or even if you don't), who do you think belongs at number two? Vote in our poll.

What do you think of the list? What would you change? Who was left off? Who doesn't belong?

1. Sugar Ray Robinson
2. Muhammad Ali
3. Henry Armstrong
4. Joe Louis
5. Willie Pep
6. Roberto Duran
7.Benny Leonard
8. Jack Johnson
9. Jack Dempsey
10. Sam Langford
11. Joe Gans
12. Sugar Ray Leonard
13. Harry Greb
14. Rocky Marciano
15. Jimmy Wilde
16. Gene Tunney
17. Mickey Walker
18. Archie Moore
19. Stanley Ketchel
20. George Foreman
21. Tony Canzoneri
22. Barney Ross
23. Jimmy McLarnin
24. Julio Cesar Chavez
25. Marcel Cerdan
26. Joe Frazier
27. Ezzard Charles
28. Jake LaMotta
29. Sandy Saddler
30. Terry McGovern
31. Billy Conn
32. Jose Napoles
33. Ruben Olivares
34. Emile Griffith
35. Marvin Hagler
36. Eder Jofre
37. Thomas Hearns
38. Larry Holmes
39. Oscar De La Hoya
40. Evander Holyfield
41. Ted "Kid" Lewis
42. Alexis Arguello
43. Marco Antonio Barrera
44. Pernell Whitaker
45. Carlos Monzon
46. Roy Jones Jr.
47. Bernard Hopkins
48. Floyd Mayweather Jr.
49. Erik Morales
50. Mike Tyson

Sugar Ray named century's best

Associated Press

NEW YORK -- Sugar Ray Robinson, poetry with a punch, is the Fighter of the Century.

He also was voted the greatest welterweight and middleweight boxer of the century by a five-member panel of experts assembled by The Associated Press.

Muhammad Ali, the century's top heavyweight, was the runner-up in the overall category. Ali and Robinson each received two first-place votes.

"I have always been a great fan of Sugar Ray Robinson," Ali said through his wife, Lonnie. "I looked up to him throughout my career. I know Sugar Ray's family will be especially proud that so many held him in such high regard and he was selected as the AP Fighter of the Century."

Robinson was a world welterweight champion and five-time middleweight champion, with a 175-19-6 record and 109 knockouts from 1940-65. Fourteen loses and four draws came after he turned 36. He held his last middleweight title at 38.

"He would have been ecstatic," Ray Robinson II said of his father being voted the century's top boxer. "I'm tired of hearing how great everybody else was and how they could have beaten Dad. No, they couldn't have."

Robinson never lost to a welterweight. When he gave up the 147-pound title to challenge Jake LaMotta for the middleweight championship in 1951, his record was 121-1-2, with the loss (to LaMotta) and both draws coming in non-title fights against middleweights.

Ali was selected the top heavyweight one point ahead of Joe Louis, who made 25 successful title defenses. Each of them received two first-place votes.

"When I consider I was selected out of a category that included boxing's greats -- Joe Louis, Jack Dempsey, Rocky Marciano, Jack Johnson and Gene Tunney, it really gives this honor a very special meaning," Ali said.

Henry Armstrong, the only boxer to hold three world titles simultaneously (featherweight, lightweight and welterweight), finished third as Fighter of the Century.

Rounding out the top 10 were: Louis, Willie Pep -- who got the other first-place vote and was selected as the No. 1 featherweight -- Dempsey, Roberto Duran, Benny Leonard, Billy Conn and Harry Greb.

Marciano was third among heavyweights and received one first-place vote in the category. Rounding out the top 10 heavyweights were: Dempsey, Johnson and Larry Holmes in a tie for fifth, Sonny Liston, Joe Frazier, and Sam Langford and Jersey Joe Walcott in a tie for ninth.

Ali (56-5, 37 knockouts) was the first man to win the heavyweight championship three times. He had three legendary fights with Frazier, two with Liston and one with George Foreman.

Although a heavyweight, Ali often was compared to Robinson because of his boxing ability and at his peak he had a middleweight's speed. He retired in 1981.

Robinson, who died in 1989 at age 68, was picked over Armstrong as the best welterweight. As top middleweight, he was chosen over Greb, a star of the 1920s.

Robinson almost won the light heavyweight championship in 1952. He was far ahead of Joey Maxim when he collapsed from the heat on a boiling New York night and could not come out for the 14th round.

It was as a welterweight that Robinson was at his best. He was champion from 1946-50 and was 5-1 against three other top 10 welterweights of the century.

He beat both Armstrong and Kid Gavilan (No. 9) twice and split two fights with Carmen Basilio (No. 6). The two matches with Basilio, however, were for the middleweight title, and both were decided on split decisions.

Robinson also is remembered for his six fights against LaMotta, the No.7-ranked middleweight. Robinson won five of them.

The top fighters in six other weight classes were Archie Moore, light heavyweight; Aaron Pryor, junior welterweight; Roberto Duran of Panama, lightweight; Alexis Arguello of Nicaragua, junior lightweight; Mexicans Ruben Olivares and Carlos Zarate, bantamweight, and Pancho Villa of Philippines and Miguel Canto of Mexico, flyweight.

Robinson and Ali are often the two most debated for this accolade.

I watched Raging Bull recently, thought Jake beat Sugar Ray a good few times.

He beat him 1 out of 6 times, You must remember 'Raging Bull' is not a historical document but is partly seen through the eyes of a person

That list is a load of S**t

Mine would be......

Ali
Duran
Chavez
Hagler
Leonard
Robinson
Dempsey
Hearns (Coz he's my most fav of all time)
Tyson

Followed by any man in any order.

Anyone who puts Hagler ahead of Leonard is ace in my book!

Leonard ran from Hagler in ther 80's fight. He was shit scared !

12 rounds down from 15, a larger ring, all so Leonard had a better chance against him.

I would have put Hearns above him too but for the fact Hearns didn't have a chin.

Looking at old boxing threads and couldn't help but having to respond to this post. It's not about who ran from who, Leonard was never a brawler, why would he get into a brawl with Hagler? Fact is Hagler is a knockout fighter, and when he did have Leonard cornered, Leonard got out of it every single time with his quick fists and movement. Hagler was completely outboxed and made to look very mediocre...

Leonard was a dancer who relied on movement and speed, Hagler knew this. Hagler shouldn't have abandoned his southpaw style like a twat in the first couple of rounds, it probably cost him the fight. Leonard should be above Hagler in any list - Leonard is a welterweight, Hagler is an out and out middleweight, Leonard hadn't fought for a number of years and had the balls to come out of retirement to face the greatest middleweight of his generation...

Hagler knew he'd lost the fight at the end, his little dance and jig at the end is one of the most cringing sights I've ever seen in sport

The brilliance of Leonard is he was able to adapt to any style put in front of him. He almost outbrawled the great Duran in the first fight and outpsyched him in the 2nd...look what he did aganst Hearns, on his way to losing the fight and brawled his way to a knockout in the last couple of rounds to win it after Dundee told him "you're blowing it"...