Originally Posted by
powerpuncher
while i commend you for putting in the effort to do this, there are a few things i totally disagree with. but first off, i will say that head to head, pac probably had the tougher competition.
first, the de la hoya fight with floyd should 100% be on his top 5 list. that was a huge win. de la hoya was getting to the end up his career at the time but definitely wasnt done. it was a great win. to me, probably floyds best win. he even went up in weight to do it.
with pac, if you are saying that de la hoya was at the end of his career, then morales and barrera were both at the end of their careers too. i actually think that both of them were more on their way out than de la hoya was when he fought floyd. the morales that lost to pac was not at all a prime morales. barrera was still considered good but was getting at the end of his career.
also as you stated, pac had more dominant wins against hatton and de la hoya but by that time, both of those fighters were completely done. i think that the de la hoya fight was just a genius plan by roach. he knew that de la hoya would be completely weight drained at 147 and knew that pac would be a huge underdog and that that win would push him over the top. no way any version of pac beats the 154 pound version of de la hoya that fought floyd. pac may still beat a prime hatton but not that easily.
i think that pac has some better wins and probably better quality opposition slightly when it comes down to it but not really enough to be significant. floyd is a sure top 20 and probably top 15 of all time while pac is more of a top 30 maybe top 25 (although that is obviously my opinion).
Oscar: if u want to put him on Floyd's top 5 I can live with that. He was U ranked P4P at the time and hadn't had a meaningful/impressive win since Vargas YEARS before, but ok. I think that kind of drives home my point on quality of opposition.
Barrera: DEFINITELY NOT on the way out. He was at an all time high for their first fight, boxing better than ever and viewed by most as one of the top 3 fighters in the sport having just rattled off a series of impressive wins which included Hamed n Morales. Marcos went on to have a few more significant wins after the Manny beat down, so really I just think your statement is completely false.
Morales: First fight with Manny the guy had a disputed loss to Barrera on his record n that was it, n was recognized as a top fighter regardless of weight after beating IMPRESSIVE competition. Google his record n remind yourself of how great this guy was. He went up n lost to Raheem by decision prior to the rematch with Manny, but was still ranked P4P n not showing decline from his prime. After the two beatings Manny gave him, there was a definite deterioration, but a Manny broke him in the rematch n finished him in the rubber match. Remember, Erik was fighting well in the rematch n ahead on the cards before Manny broke through n stopped him.
Your final point on Pac not being capable beating 154 version of Oscar n having a harder time vs Hatton doesn't really fight in this discussion. You can only judge quality of opposition by who the guys fought n when. Oscar was done when he fought Manny n was pretty far gone vs Floyd. Hatton had one loss when Manny pancaked him and based on both guys styles I can't see how u can say that fight would've gone any different. Hatton was overwhelmed in the first round and the knockout shot obliterated him. It's not like Floyd beat him so bad that it took his punch resistance.
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