Thanks for the reply Daxx!
Whilst your post was excellent and I really aggreed with most of it, I'm strill unconvinced.

As a young boxer myself, I would love to be able to say with confidence "Our generation produces just as good, gutsy and tough guys as any other."
However, I'm not so certain. Watching a fight between Gavilan and Graham recently (and subsequently Gavilan vs. Saxton I think) I became awre of the huge sacrifices these men made in non title affairs....every week!
Whilst some may view their mentality as ludicrous (in that they fough wars weekly) one also has to admire the courage and pride they had and they fury with which they went about their work. Perhaps driven by poverty, their mentality seemed to be of steel.

I must admit I'm a sucker for the old grainy balack and white fights and I guess there is a romanticist inside me which glorofies those heroes such as Gavilan, Walcott, Walker, Burley, Graziano, Zale, Armstrong and indeed Robinson, but also being as impartial as I can I sometimes feel that apart from the exceptional, many of the old class would exceed some of our best by a good margin.