Quote Originally Posted by milmascaras1 View Post
titofan,

yes indeed, puerto rico/mexico rivalry is tops in boxing. but do you know what bewilders me? how can puerto rico produce so many quality world champions with such a miniscule population as compared to other densely populated countries? it's really amazing!

years ago i had a black friend who was from new york and she told me that her dad made her carry a knife to school every day because she was always getting into fights with puerto ricans. she even told me that if whenever there was a fight, 9 times out of 10 it involved a puerto rican.

that's why you guys are so good at boxing cause you're fightin' mofo's!!1

LOL... yeah, Puerto Ricans in NY by and large give the rest of us a bad rap (or maybe a good one, depending how you look at it). But seriously... I think the reason for the disproportionate number of great champions coming out of an island with such a miniscule population (in comparison with other boxing powers) is that we have what I would call a spectacular boxing development program. You go to just about any town on the island, and you'll find fights being held at local gyms, where you'll see amazing young talent. Just the other day I was discussing with a friend at work how the future looks promising for more P.R. champions, based on the young talent coming up through the ranks these days.

A year or so ago I did some research on the number of historical world champions from the different countries, and compared it to the populations of those countries. And while the boxing powers you'd expect are near the top of the list: (U.S., Mexico, England, Venezuela), little Puerto Rico was far and away at the top of that list (champions divided by population, that is). Obviously in terms of sheer number of historical world champions, the U.S. and Mexico and #1 and #2, respectively.