Top 25 Flyweights of all time

[davie]

Davie, Borkorsor back in the early to mid 70s was awesome. Just going by numbers does a fighter like Borkorsor a disservice. At 112 he was an absolute monster. Outclassing top contender Fernando Cabanela was amazing in itself, but the demolition job he did on Betulio Gonzalez (whom you rate at 14 and which I feel is a viable rating) was never matched throughout Betulio's career. Completely whitewashing Sallavarria over 15 is also amazing. But when he moved to 118 it falls into place how almost unbeatable he was at 112 when he destroys the former #1 contender Julio Guerrero. Guerrero was an amazing banger and Venice did another demo job. As has been mentioned, the Rafael Herrera fight was amazing and Herrera was an amazing champion. Also not to forget, he also held Rodolfo Martinez to a split decision, dropping him in the process. Borkorsor is top 10 in my book.

Well I stand corrected, every day's a school day. I'm off to watch some youtube clips

Although I would add, as you point out, the Guerrero, Herrera & Martinez fight happen at another weight class and I didn't take them into account when ranking his performance at Fly.
It's like the old debate when someone puts SRR at no 3 for middleweight. He's better than anyone on the list but his achievements at 160lbs perhaps aren't.

[Counter-puncher]

Davie, Borkorsor back in the early to mid 70s was awesome. Just going by numbers does a fighter like Borkorsor a disservice. At 112 he was an absolute monster. Outclassing top contender Fernando Cabanela was amazing in itself, but the demolition job he did on Betulio Gonzalez (whom you rate at 14 and which I feel is a viable rating) was never matched throughout Betulio's career. Completely whitewashing Sallavarria over 15 is also amazing. But when he moved to 118 it falls into place how almost unbeatable he was at 112 when he destroys the former #1 contender Julio Guerrero. Guerrero was an amazing banger and Venice did another demo job. As has been mentioned, the Rafael Herrera fight was amazing and Herrera was an amazing champion. Also not to forget, he also held Rodolfo Martinez to a split decision, dropping him in the process. Borkorsor is top 10 in my book.

Well I stand corrected, every day's a school day. I'm off to watch some youtube clips
.

[Counter-puncher]

Seamus, king Carlos, scartissue, a quick thanks to you gents for the heads up on borkhorsor. He's fucken tremendous, I really enjoyed the Herrera scrap. Strange footwork, amazing counter left hands. And hererra as I already knew is a bad man

Whilst I'm on it, scartissue thanks for your heads ups on the scoring thread, I've seen a lot of fights and fighters I never had before thanks to that thread, its a great one. EDIT: I know I said that before but you really cant show too much appreciation for some of the fights I've seen. I already knew I loved Mexican little fighters but damn

[world ranked]

Darchinyan, Johnson should be higher didn't Arce do most of his work at 112

[davie]

Darchinyan, Johnson should be higher didn't Arce do most of his work at 112

Darchinyan, Arce and Donaire were all consider, All 3 passed through the division and had success there, but I didn't see enough to include them in a top 25. Maybe if they'd hung around a little longer. Donaire in particular was quality and one fighter I've seen plenty of to judge.

Mark Johnson had a decent reign as IBF champ (you could say WBB as well ) but I struggled for high profile opponents
He fought better names at the higher weights later in his career and had mixed fortunes. Not sure the circumstances, he might have been over the hill, maybe someone that followed his career better than me can keep me right, but certainly in his best run of wins the big names were just not there

[world ranked]

Darchinyan, Johnson should be higher didn't Arce do most of his work at 112

Darchinyan, Arce and Donaire were all consider, All 3 passed through the division and had success there, but I didn't see enough to include them in a top 25. Maybe if they'd hung around a little longer. Donaire in particular was quality and one fighter I've seen plenty of to judge.

Mark Johnson had a decent reign as IBF champ (you could say WBB as well ) but I struggled for high profile opponents
He fought better names at the higher weights later in his career and had mixed fortunes. Not sure the circumstances, he might have been over the hill, maybe someone that followed his career better than me can keep me right, but certainly in his best run of wins the big names were just not there

But you have a Darchinyan victim in there (Pacheco) who didn't have the run Vic had. Arce had one of the best fights in division in the 2000's versus Hussein and also got television time. Donaire run started with Vic in upset its just hard that 3 HOF guys who made there name in this division isn't top 25 on this list or need to be higher. HOF guys think about that

[davie]

Darchinyan, Johnson should be higher didn't Arce do most of his work at 112

Darchinyan, Arce and Donaire were all consider, All 3 passed through the division and had success there, but I didn't see enough to include them in a top 25. Maybe if they'd hung around a little longer. Donaire in particular was quality and one fighter I've seen plenty of to judge.

Mark Johnson had a decent reign as IBF champ (you could say WBB as well ) but I struggled for high profile opponents
He fought better names at the higher weights later in his career and had mixed fortunes. Not sure the circumstances, he might have been over the hill, maybe someone that followed his career better than me can keep me right, but certainly in his best run of wins the big names were just not there

But you have a Darchinyan victim in there (Pacheco) who didn't have the run Vic had. Arce had one of the best fights in division in the 2000's versus Hussein and also got television time. Donaire run started with Vic in upset its just hard that 3 HOF guys who made there name in this division isn't top 25 on this list or need to be higher. HOF guys think about that

I didn't have Pacheco, you must be looking at Seamus's list. He did a top 50, I only did 25, see the OP.

As rare as TV time is for flyweights, I can't take that into account, it'd hardly be fair when comparing vs old time fighters.

As for "Think about HOF"?
Really? how many threads have been on here criticising who does and doesn't get in to the HOF every year.
I accept it's and achievement for the modern little men to get that accolade but as i said, much of their achievements were above or below the flyweight limit and when I made my list I only considered what was done at the 112lb limit.
Each man was a fantastic fighter and wouldn't have been far from my list. And had I done a top 50, then that could have been a different matter, but I'll be honest, there were 10-15 fighter I excluded from my list that I sat looking at for some time and grudged leaving them out, (and more still that I perhaps over-looked)
There's a lot of good fighters not in there. These lists are bloody hard work

[giacomino]

Thought I'd give this a go, I've been reading a bit about fly weights (particularly British ones). Feel free to tear it to shreds

1. Jimmy Wilde
2. Pascual Perez
3.Pancho Villa
4.Benny Lynch
5. Fidel La Barba
6. Miguel Canto
7. Frankie Genaro
8. Jackie Paterson
9. Pongsaklek Wonjongkam
10. Midget Wolgast
11. Peter Kane
12. Little Pancho
13. Roman Gonzalez (unless he travels up through the divisions, which he might, he will likely be a lot higher by the time he retires)
14. Betulio Gonzalez
15. Jackie Brown
16.Little Dado
17.Rinty Monaghan
18. Dado Marino
19.Chartchai Chionoi
20. Pone Kingpetch
21.Newsboy Brown
22. Sot Chitlada
23. Terry Allen
24. Fighting Harada
25. Juan Francisco estrada

Would have Laciar in the top 15, probably top 10

[world ranked]

Darchinyan, Arce and Donaire were all consider, All 3 passed through the division and had success there, but I didn't see enough to include them in a top 25. Maybe if they'd hung around a little longer. Donaire in particular was quality and one fighter I've seen plenty of to judge.

Mark Johnson had a decent reign as IBF champ (you could say WBB as well ) but I struggled for high profile opponents
He fought better names at the higher weights later in his career and had mixed fortunes. Not sure the circumstances, he might have been over the hill, maybe someone that followed his career better than me can keep me right, but certainly in his best run of wins the big names were just not there

But you have a Darchinyan victim in there (Pacheco) who didn't have the run Vic had. Arce had one of the best fights in division in the 2000's versus Hussein and also got television time. Donaire run started with Vic in upset its just hard that 3 HOF guys who made there name in this division isn't top 25 on this list or need to be higher. HOF guys think about that

I didn't have Pacheco, you must be looking at Seamus's list. He did a top 50, I only did 25, see the OP.

As rare as TV time is for flyweights, I can't take that into account, it'd hardly be fair when comparing vs old time fighters.

As for "Think about HOF"?
Really? how many threads have been on here criticising who does and doesn't get in to the HOF every year.
I accept it's and achievement for the modern little men to get that accolade but as i said, much of their achievements were above or below the flyweight limit and when I made my list I only considered what was done at the 112lb limit.
Each man was a fantastic fighter and wouldn't have been far from my list. And had I done a top 50, then that could have been a different matter, but I'll be honest, there were 10-15 fighter I excluded from my list that I sat looking at for some time and grudged leaving them out, (and more still that I perhaps over-looked)
There's a lot of good fighters not in there. These lists are bloody hard work

I respect the work but you Juan Estrada over the guys a mentioned. I know its your personal list but come on.

[King Carlos]

I'd rank Estrada over Darchinyan and Arce, too.

[scartissue]

Seamus, king Carlos, scartissue, a quick thanks to you gents for the heads up on borkhorsor. He's fucken tremendous, I really enjoyed the Herrera scrap. Strange footwork, amazing counter left hands. And hererra as I already knew is a bad man

Whilst I'm on it, scartissue thanks for your heads ups on the scoring thread, I've seen a lot of fights and fighters I never had before thanks to that thread, its a great one. EDIT: I know I said that before but you really cant show too much appreciation for some of the fights I've seen. I already knew I loved Mexican little fighters but damn

Thanks, Counter. BTW, I left a link today on that thread for another one you should find entertaining.

[world ranked]

I'd rank Estrada over Darchinyan and Arce, too.

So hopefully you think he's going to the HOF because two are. Estrada known to fame is a loss.

[davie]

I'd rank Estrada over Darchinyan and Arce, too.

So hopefully you think he's going to the HOF because two are. Estrada known to fame is a loss.

At 25 it's not too great a stretch to imagine he could be involved in many more top fights and become a multi weight world champion.
Who knows where he'll end up but he's had some pretty impressive acheivements at fly so far, he might stay at fly for a few more years and build a really impressive run of defences there.
At no25 on my list, of course it's not odd we might debate whether he deserves on there but lets remember Darchinyan and Arceared potentially HOFers for work done in various weight classes not just flyweight.

[SaadOffTheDeck]

Newsboy brown should be much higher than 22. Johnny coulon is worth a shout.

[elmersalsa]

Horacio Accavallo and Hiroyuki Ebihara deserved a shout.

[Keko]

Recently saw this top 10
1.Jimmy Wilde
2.Ricardo Lopez
3.Pasqual Perez
4.Pancho Villa
5.Miguel Canto
6.Peter Kane
7.Pone Kingpetch
8.Masao Ohba
9.Frankie Genaro
10.Benny Lynch

[SaadOffTheDeck]

Fidel laBarba needs to be on any top 10, no business for Lopez there.

[Keko]

It this often so for La Barba!
Lopez light flyweigt and i agree!

[SaadOffTheDeck]

It this often so for La Barba!
Lopez light flyweigt and i agree!

I can't say I've seen a ton of all time Flyweight lists. For me, LaBarba has a more impressive resume than Wilde. He's always underrated, great results at featherweight too.

Lopez is a top 2 Straw.

[Keko]

It this often so for La Barba!
Lopez light flyweigt and i agree!

I can't say I've seen a ton of all time Flyweight lists. For me, LaBarba has a more impressive resume than Wilde. He's always underrated, great results at featherweight too.

Lopez is a top 2 Straw.

Watch this
Boxing lists book
Teddy Atlas ,flyweight
1.Jimmy Wilde. 2.Pancho Villa 3.Ricardo Lopez 4.Pasqual Perez. 5.Miguel Canto. 6.Masao Ohba 7 .Frankie Genaro 8.Midget Wolgast. 9.Peter Kane 10.Fidel LaBarba

Bert Sugar ,flyweight
1.Jimmy Wilde. 2.Pasqual Perez. 3.Ricarso Lopez 4. Pancho Villa 5.Benny Lynch. 6.Peter Kane 7.Miguel Canto. 8.Pone Kingpetch. 9.Frankie Genero. 10.Small Montana

I agree for straw Lopez,he or Calderon are often nr 1,but Vorapin and Nietes are the same to top!

[SaadOffTheDeck]

Teddy's ratings suck, Sugar was more knowledgeable but he is too buried in the golden years.

[Celtic Chaos Cartel]

No Prince Nassem, Although it's true he didn't reach his full potential but he could outbox n entertain as good if not better than all the names on the list perhaps he should have stayed at flyweight for longer
Jimmy Wildes a good shout, hes someone who I know little about but he's Welsh so enuff said

[SaadOffTheDeck]

No Prince Nassem, Although it's true he didn't reach his full potential but he could outbox n entertain as good if not better than all the names on the list perhaps he should have stayed at flyweight for longer
Jimmy Wildes a good shout, hes someone who I know little about but he's Welsh so enuff said

Naz was a feather brother, though he wouldn't be on that list either. Jem Driscoll is your man there.

[Celtic Chaos Cartel]

No Prince Nassem, Although it's true he didn't reach his full potential but he could outbox n entertain as good if not better than all the names on the list perhaps he should have stayed at flyweight for longer
Jimmy Wildes a good shout, hes someone who I know little about but he's Welsh so enuff said

Naz was a feather brother, though he wouldn't be on that list either. Jem Driscoll is your man there.

Naz started off as a flyweight in 94 or sumthing like that but understandable he ain't on the list...I was more curious of other ppls opinion of him an how he's rated/unrated, I seem to be one of a few who thinks he was quite unique flawed but pretty dam good for a southpaw...

had to research the name J Driscoll tbh, as I'm not to clever on the flyweights division and thanks for bringing him to my attention I like the history of boxing spec if theres celtic origin to the namesake, slightly before the Mighty Atom aswell

[el_grande_mauro_mina]

Just seen this list, I would have Pascual Perez as my no.1, Jimmy Wilde was a great fighter but there is this massive tendency to overrate him, O.F.Snelling did an excellent piece on Jimmy Wilde and people overrating him in his book 'The Bedside Book of Boxing' Chartchai Chionoi is in my top 5 - that was a hell of a fighter and a champion as was Santos Laciar.