Boxing fans tend to think of themselves as a tough breed, cut from the same cloth as the fighters that they support. Yet bring up certain fighters, and these supposed Clint Eastwod-types will start bickering like Star Trek fans arguing over who was the best Enterprise captain.
We’ve all been dragged into these sorts of spats before, whether with other boxing fans in person or on-line through e-mail, message boards, etc. As a writer for this website, comments that I thought were perfectly innocuous have been thrown back in my face by enraged readers that took my words to be sacrilegious insults against their favourite fighters. A response explaining my position only seems to bring back more venom.
Such exchanges can be quite fun: many boxing fans are supremely well-educated about the sport while at the same time possessing short fuses, so their messages often contain an entertaining combination of solid facts and colourful insults. The fact remains, however, that fans of certain fighters are particularly touchy. It is also often the case that these same fighters will attract similarly quick-tempered critics, who love nothing more than to rage on about why their targets are the most worthless individuals to come out of boxing.
In this raucous spirit, I present a list of ten fighters that are guaranteed to produce a snit fit whenever their names are brought up. These ratings are meant to reflect the amount of controversy they create at the present time: certainly at least a couple of the fighters lower on the list would be near the top in earlier years. But each one of them still generates heated debates, no matter how active they are as fighters right now.
10. Diego Corrales Corrales has his die-hard supporters, but there are plenty of folks out there that dance with glee every time he suffers some sort of setback. He is praised by some for his easygoing nature, but can’t shake off the legal troubles he had in the past. Corrales’ name is always sure to start a healthy spat.
9. Mike Tyson Hard to believe we’re still even talking about him, though he string of arrests dating back to the beginning of time keeps him in the headlines. It’s astonishingly easy to run into someone who holds onto the belief that he can still mount a successful comeback. Others cling tenaciously to his glory days and still complain about the “long count” given to Buster Douglas to whoever will listen. Perhaps they’re mistaking their love for Tyson to memories of their fading youths, just like people who think Rocky IV is a good movie. We’ll let their therapists work that one out.
8. Floyd Mayweather Most fans would agree that Floyd is a decent fighter. Few would dispute the fact that he has something of an abrasive personality. It’s a matter of how good you think he is and how much of a jerk you believe him to be that gets everyone worked up. Like Roy Jones before him (see below), Floyd’s record is torn apart by his detractors for its supposed lack of quality opponents.
7. Joe Calzaghe Calzaghe is the first of two prominent British fighters on this list. Many arguments over him split along national lines, but Calzaghe often seems to stir up plenty of controversy regardless of where the participants in the debate are from. You have his supporters, who point to his undefeated record, his win over Jeff Lacy, etc. Then you have his detractors, who mock the calibre of his opponents, who downplay Lacy as nothing more than a creation of the American hype machine, and who point to fights such as those against Salem and Bika in which he struggled. Calzaghe seems content to try and coast his way to a career undefeated record, which will no doubt be argued about for years to come.
6. Roy Jones Jones’ rabid fan base is just like Tyson’s but ten years younger. What makes them more vocal is the fact that he is still technically an active fighter, and hasn’t really done anything to embarrass himself, at least outside the ring. Jones’ critics, meanwhile, are particularly venomous, and are always ready to drop a laundry list of fighters that he did not face in his prime, and mock the quality of those that he did face to boot. The KO losses to Antonio Tarver and Glen Johnson were either days of glory or days of infamy, depending on which side of the fence you stood on.
5. Bernard Hopkins The furor over Hopkins seems to wax and wane, depending on how much attention he is getting at any particular time. His haters, however, are among the most vocal in the business. People that don’t like Hopkins make a point of disliking everything about the man, from his style to his attitude to his choice of opponents. His supporters, however, can be just as crazed, often claiming that he was robbed twice against Jermain Taylor (the first fight was close but not a robbery, the second he clearly lost). Hopkins’ wins are never pretty, and his style does not excite, which goes a long way to explaining why he sparks such heated arguments.
4. Jermain Taylor Few clear-cut world champions in recent memory have drawn the sort of ire that Jermain is subject to. Of course, anyone that has the audacity to beat Hopkins is going to have to suffer his insults. But the way a lot of people talk you’d think Jermain had no business even being near a boxing ring, when in fact he has gone toe-to-toe against both Hopkins and Winky Wright, two of the best men in the business, and has more then held his own each time, even if the results of some of these fights were not clear-cut. Jermain has been woefully inconsistent at times, though, and he seems to lack a killer instinct, which doesn’t endear him to those more bloodthirsty fans of the sport. These people wait with breathless anticipation for Jermain to finally be “exposed”. As long as that doesn’t happen, however, they’ll stick around to pick him apart after every outing.
3. Antonio Margarito Bob Arum should be paying Margarito’s supporters royalties for the attention they draw to him. Margartio is a talented fighter, to be sure, but given his record and his lack of particularly significant accomplishments, his fans have helped him become one of the more significant fighters in the game. For every fan that Margarito has, however, there is a vehement critic ready at a moment’s notice to dress him down. Some point to the blemishes on his record, others to his habit of starting his fights slowly, while others will simply hurl insults at him. It’s very possible that fan pressure is the number one reason Margarito is thinking seriously about taking the fight with his mandatory Paul Williams, rather than going for the big money against Miguel Cotto. A victory over either of these men may stem the arguments about him, but don’t count on it.
2. Manny Pacquiao The fighter with hands down the most rabid fan base in the sport, you can rarely get in a word about Pacquiao without one of his supporters hearing about it and calling you on it. Pacquiao has done plenty to earn this kind of adulation, but his career has certainly not been perfect. However, his critics can be particularly vehement in response to the sheer partisanship of many of his fans. Debates about his merits and/or faults can get downright ugly. Both sides can make solid arguments, but these are usually drowned out quickly in the crossfire of insults.
1. Ricky Hatton Despite the debates about Pacquiao, few fans in their right minds would actually say that he is a bad fighter, even if they feel that he doesn’t deserve the sort of praise he gets. With Hatton, however, you get opinions that are all over the map, and they are usually expressed in the strongest of terms. Anyone who has seen the madness that erupts in M.E.N. when one of his fights is on doesn’t need to hear about the adulation his fans shower on him. But outside the friendly confines of that arena, there are plenty of folks ready to tell you why he is one of the most incompetent human beings ever to grace the planet. And that’s usually the two brands of opinions you hear: it’s all or nothing when it comes to most people’s views on Hatton. Like Calzaghe, there is a nationalist element to all this, but it is probably stronger in Hatton’s case following all the back-and-forth business between him and Mayweather. The haters cringed following his win over Kostya Tszyu, then celebrated following his recent struggles in the ring. Meanwhile, his supporters will never stop believing. Put the two groups together in person or on-line, and watch the never-ending argument commence.
That’s the list. Surely I’ve missed a fighter or two. Where’s James Toney, for instance? I’ll give him an honourable mention. But please send us your thoughts if you believe I’ve made any grievous errors.
