Lower ranked fighters vs Higher ranked fighters - Hypothetical Fights.

These pit lower ranked fighters who have an advantage over the higher ranked (Size, Strength, Chin, Speed etc), or where the greater fighter has a weakness that can be exploited by the lower ranked fighters greatest strength. Just a little exercise to pick out some of the variables that often make rankings unreliable and just to highlight why the same things make the sport such a hard one to fathom or give definitive answers for.


Julian Jackson vs Thomas Hearns (Power vs Chin) Middleweight

Don Curry vs Floyd Mayweather Jr (Slight Size advantage) Welterweight

Shane Mosely vs Roberto Duran (You knew he had to be here ) (Speed and Possibly Power) at LW/WW Your choice

All fighters considered at best performances

interesting match ups shah.

jackson got blasted out twice my mclellan who had that tommy style/reach advantage over him... so you'd have to pick tommy if he was careful... but tommy wasn't always careful, even in his best performances and jackson only had to hit you once. jackson has 2 top 10 all time ko's on his cv against norris and graham, who in boxing terms he shouldnt have laid a glove on... tommy to win this 3 times out of 4, and to get sparked in the other.

Curry v floyd at welter...this is tough, i'm not sure curry's pot shotting style lends itself particularly well to beating mayweather, but he's bigger, just as quick and harder hitting. Pick-em for me.

mosely v duran, despite having him high in my atg ratings i always find myself giving lesser fighters a chance against him in match-ups. Given who duran did lose to (and who he beat of course) at welter, you'd say this could go either way... but on best performances, duran beat leonard at his peak, so you'd err to him and at lightweight, duran would grind out a tough points win for me.

sorry mcclellan... i know the spelling upsets some on here

We are generally offended by your presence anyway, so no point correcting your spelling.

Seriously though, Jackson was a terrifying puncher with every punch and If Tommy doesn't deck him early then I cant see Hearns winning. Its rather a strange one because of Hearns own monstrous power. He is of course the superior boxer but does tend to gas himself out.

Jackson awesome puncher but so was Tommy, I dont see Hearns hanging his chin out and losing this at any time, range finding jab then bang Hearns connects and Jackson goes down.

Hearns would be far too fast and clever for Jackson.

Fair enough - how do you see the other two fights going?

Duran only ever lost to Leonard at Welterweight having beaten him and the very good Palomino, it was 154lbs and above that he struggled against lower fighters so can't give Mosley much chance against such a great fighter. Speed is with Mosley but power has to be fairly even.

Hearns' stamina is often underrated. He could easily go 15 at jr middle and his workrate wasn't bad at all.

I think it's often forgotten with Jackson, thanks to his terrifying power, that his chin was no rock either. He got taken out early several times. I think Hearns is a far, far superior pure boxer and would be much more difficult to hit. If Jackson can find him he has a great chance, but I think the Hitman gets his target first. I pick Hearns by KO within the first half.

Curry v Mayweather
Can't really decide on this one. Curry's the more powerful but throughout the fight I don't see many punches landing. I lean towards Curry based on his moments being more effective but not by much.

Mosely v Duran
This has the potential for war. Both men could KO top contenders, both had solid chins and didn't mind a scrap. Duran's more subtle defense would see him taking less to land his own. A Duran UD seems most likely, but could Mosely fight hard for 15? He could be stopped late, Duran at his best just has far more experience. At lightweight especially his opposition's much better. Also, if a close to prime SRL couldn't live with Duran at his 147 best I don't see how Mosely does.

Curry v Mayweather
The Curry who beat Starling and McCrory looked awesome,and a bigger natural welterweight than Mayweather,in a 50/50 fight I pick Curry to use his accurate punching and power to unsettle Mayweather and score a close pts win.

Mosely v Duran
Mosely in his prime had superb boxing skills and power but I see Duran leading him into a dog fight and that's Duran's game.
No ko either way but Duran nulifies Mosely's hand speed and uses his own skill and agression to win by UD.

In general terms, Jackson stopping Hearns is the sort of result which could perhaps crop up once every few fights. But remembering that the article says we're meant to be considering each fighter in their best performances, surely this just becomes a formality for Tommy? Jackson tended to have signature moments, rather than signature performances. The things which define him (the brutal knockout of Graham, for instance) often came at a time when he'd been largely outboxed up until that point. I think, nine times out of then, Hearns stops Jackson early.

Curry-Mayweather, given it's at 147 lb, is an interesting one. Mayweather's often derided for not really having a 'legacy' in any of the divisions he's won titles in since leaving Super-Featherweight, but I'd say he's just about worthy of that at Welterweight. I've seen enough to suggest he beats Curry in a stinker, sweeping up most of the late rounds as he often does. Floyd by a point or two.

Mosley is a nice little snack for Duran at his Lightweight best, or getting close to that. Absolutely no disrespect intended towards 'Sugar Shane', but I can't for the life of me see how he beats the Duran who absolutely swept aside DeJesus in their final bout. If Duran underestimates Mosley he could find himself in a tough fight, but if he affords him the respect he deserves (Duran was often at his best against his toughest foes who he knew carried more danger) then he's got too much for Shane, and sweeps to a late stoppage over fifteen rounds. Over twelve, he probably has to settle for a UD.

Mosley had skill but Duran had superb skills himself as well as a much under rated defence, always seems to get unfairly labelled.

88Chris05 wrote:In general terms, Jackson stopping Hearns is the sort of result which could perhaps crop up once every few fights. But remembering that the article says we're meant to be considering each fighter in their best performances, surely this just becomes a formality for Tommy? Jackson tended to have signature moments, rather than signature performances. The things which define him (the brutal knockout of Graham, for instance) often came at a time when he'd been largely outboxed up until that point. I think, nine times out of then, Hearns stops Jackson early.

Curry-Mayweather, given it's at 147 lb, is an interesting one. Mayweather's often derided for not really having a 'legacy' in any of the divisions he's won titles in since leaving Super-Featherweight, but I'd say he's just about worthy of that at Welterweight. I've seen enough to suggest he beats Curry in a stinker, sweeping up most of the late rounds as he often does. Floyd by a point or two.

Mosley is a nice little snack for Duran at his Lightweight best, or getting close to that. Absolutely no disrespect intended towards 'Sugar Shane', but I can't for the life of me see how he beats the Duran who absolutely swept aside DeJesus in their final bout. If Duran underestimates Mosley he could find himself in a tough fight, but if he affords him the respect he deserves (Duran was often at his best against his toughest foes who he knew carried more danger) then he's got too much for Shane, and sweeps to a late stoppage over fifteen rounds. Over twelve, he probably has to settle for a UD.

I'm not quite sure it is. Like Milky pointed out earlier. Hearns did get careless at the best of times tendency to try and destroy his opponents often left gaps that his height prevented opponents from exploiting - even Cuevas was unable to dent him. Jackson had no such problems tagging McClellan who was of a similar size to Hearns. While Hearns is far superior as a boxer, Jackson exceptional power makes a series of fight a little closer than it really ought to be.

the imaginary fight is at middleweight... hearns fought 6 times at middle and got knocked out twice. Granted he looked pretty good in the others, but that was tommy. Jackson might have been vulnerable, and not in tommy's league as a boxer... but he was good enough to land those bombs on plenty of decent fighters.

True jackson was a highlight reel fighter and was getting a lesson from graham (though i suspect he was blinded by bomber's shorts in that fight) and had lost the first round to norris, but in his signature defeats to mccallum and mcclellan 1, he was holding his own before the ko's. Not in hearns class but no crude slugger. Hearns would win this more often than not, but no formality for me Chris.