josh taylor hall of fame?

[margaret thatcher]

loma's retirement brought up the question if he should make the hall of fame - i'd say yes


but one person im not so sure about who has similar win-loss is josh taylor. some people think he must be a lock because he went undisputed, but i have a lot more doubt. his prime was short and all in 1 division, he went downhill hard and hasnt shown any sign of climbing back up, and he's not particularly favoured among boxing media (the types who vote on hall). the last 4 years of his career have been rather negative tbh

tbh, i think as he continues his win-loss rate will just keep looking worse and arguably hurt his case more, but im curious - if he retired right now, do you think he should get into the international boxing hall of fame.

[margaret thatcher]

one thing to remember too, is there are loads of multi time world champs, lineal champs, etc who have never got in

you cant just measure them all by barry mcguigan (and tbh people prob underrate him too)

[KiwiRider]

I have enjoyed some of Taylor's fights immensely.
His coming of age fight with the much better drilled Postal, and the savage war with Reggie Prograis.
But it was too brief, and with too much inactivity.
He seemed like the type that fights best fighting regularly.
He would have had to defend those 4 belts against the top guys and at least clean out the division, and he didn't. He avoided the rematch with Prograis when Reggie worked himself back to #1 contender status, and he blagged and ducked the rematch with Catteral from a fight he lost- add another loss to his record.
I doubt he will even be nominated against his peers like Loma, GGG, Uysk, and Crawford who all deserve a place before him

[gilgamesh]

Taylor isn't a Hall of Famer to me. The amount of fights they had isn't really that big of a factor, it's more about who you beat, and what level you competed at.

Josh Taylor was Undisputed Champion, but I think his being Undisputed Champion was one of the easier paths to that claim that anyone has had in the modern era, and he's obviously the weakest of all Champions to have been Undisputed in the "4 belt era". I hate that term by the way, the 4 belt era.

[MightyWarrior]

100% - Came from nowhere to pretty much clean out the division and the best at his weight for a number of years. Ducked none of the killers on the block, took all of them on.

He was very unlucky in terms of his prime coming around the pandemic. He should’ve been a national hero in Scotland, a legend.

Also, the awkward truth that because of social media a lot of people didn’t like him for the stuff he talked about.

Whereas in years gone by before Twitter and whatnot, he would’ve just been seen as a great fighter with a few interviews after fights every now and again like legends of the past, Ken Buchanan etc I mean if Ken Buchanan was spouting off on Twitter, we’d be remembering a lot of different things about him other than the actual fights he was in.

[forcefraser]

Not for me. Beating Prograis, Postal and Ramirez isn't enough to put you in the hall of fame.

Catterall beat him twice and also beat Prograis far more convincingly, but quite rightly he is nowhere near a hall of fame mention

[Ezzard]

Definitely. 100%.

[Ruthless-RKO]

Do I think? Yes

Should he?

It’s a question mark.

[Dan Dares]

Not for me. Beating Prograis, Postal and Ramirez isn't enough to put you in the hall of fame.

Catterall beat him twice and also beat Prograis far more convincingly, but quite rightly he is nowhere near a hall of fame mention

This

[maverick23]

Not for me. Beating Prograis, Postal and Ramirez isn't enough to put you in the hall of fame.

Catterall beat him twice and also beat Prograis far more convincingly, but quite rightly he is nowhere near a hall of fame mention

By that reckoning, who has Loma beat to deserve to be in the HoF? Or do you not think he deserves to go in either?

[a force]

To be honest I don’t know. It’s hard to gauge.

I feel a bit for him because I don’t think the Prograis win gets the respect it deserves.

He fought Prograis when Prograis was 30 years old & bang in his prime staying active & looking superb.

4 years later at 34 Prograis looks past it & loses wide to Haney, 5 years later & he’s a bit more competitive but still loses clear enough to Catterall & I feel like there’s an attitude of ‘Prograis wasn’t all that’ when in fact he was a superb fighter & Taylor beat the prime version of him. It was an outstanding win. I can’t think of many Brits with individual wins as good as that.

I think he beat prime versions of 4 world class fighters in Prograis, Baranchyk, Postol & Ramirez & there’s not many Brits that can say that.

Unfortunately 3 of them have styles that don’t exactly lend themselves to having long careers & more recent defeats for them might take the shine off Taylor’s victories for some but they don’t for me.

[TheLeprechaun]

I think the Prograis win has been completely destroyed by how limited Prograis looked vs Zorilla and Haney. The Ramirez fight was 114-112 on all cards and lets be honest, Ramirez isn't exactly the second coming of Salvador Sanchez. I think Taylor was just in the right place at the right time to become undisputed at 140 at a very weak time and for a very short time. The robbery vs Catterall has to be held against him.

It's hard to leave out an undisputed king of a division though and that is a major achievement that nobody can take away from him. He was THE MAN AT 140 and nobody can take that away from him.

But if you ask me was he heavily overrated - definitely. I remember people saying he would beat Hatton or Witter. I don't see that at all.

[coneye]

When he was at his peak i liked him so for me its a YES . Although i do agree with everything Leprachaun said , he was the best of a bad bunch at the time

[forcefraser]

Not for me. Beating Prograis, Postal and Ramirez isn't enough to put you in the hall of fame.

Catterall beat him twice and also beat Prograis far more convincingly, but quite rightly he is nowhere near a hall of fame mention

By that reckoning, who has Loma beat to deserve to be in the HoF? Or do you not think he deserves to go in either?

Russel Jr, Martinez, Walters, Lanares, Rigondeaux, Pedraza, Commey and Kambosis to name a few, all World Champions.

It's a bit stronger than Taylor's record.

[THEBUTCH]

A definite yes for me. He packed a lot in to a relatively short time.

I would have liked to see Josh win British and European titles too and defend them but he was fast tracked to world title glory and boxers were more than happy to go there own way rather cross swords with Taylor on his way up, especially after he annihilated the then unbeaten O'Hara Davies.

Anthony Yigit (European champion at the time) said live on TV with Taylor standing right next to him that he was going a different route that didn't involve Josh. Taylor looked absolutely gutted....he just wanted to challenge Yigit for the European title.

[maverick23]

Not for me. Beating Prograis, Postal and Ramirez isn't enough to put you in the hall of fame.

Catterall beat him twice and also beat Prograis far more convincingly, but quite rightly he is nowhere near a hall of fame mention

By that reckoning, who has Loma beat to deserve to be in the HoF? Or do you not think he deserves to go in either?

Russel Jr, Martinez, Walters, Lanares, Rigondeaux, Pedraza, Commey and Kambosis to name a few, all World Champions.

It's a bit stronger than Taylor's record.

Vasquez, Postol, Baranchyk, Prograis, Ramirez so 5 world champs or former world champs for Taylor.

I’m not sure what Loma’s best win. Probably is the Russel Jr win. No genuine elite wins really. Rigondeaux didn’t belong above 122.

The other thing that frustrates me about Loma’s record is he didn’t avenge any of his defeats. I always like when guys do that like Hagler and Lewis.

[a force]

I think the Prograis win has been completely destroyed by how limited Prograis looked vs Zorilla and Haney. The Ramirez fight was 114-112 on all cards and lets be honest, Ramirez isn't exactly the second coming of Salvador Sanchez. I think Taylor was just in the right place at the right time to become undisputed at 140 at a very weak time and for a very short time. The robbery vs Catterall has to be held against him.

It's hard to leave out an undisputed king of a division though and that is a major achievement that nobody can take away from him. He was THE MAN AT 140 and nobody can take that away from him.

But if you ask me was he heavily overrated - definitely. I remember people saying he would beat Hatton or Witter. I don't see that at all.

It’s only been destroyed if you don’t follow the sport.

He fought Zorilla 3 years & 8 months after he fought Taylor & was 34 years old. The Haney & Catterall fights came after Zorilla.

It’s incredibly harsh to judge Prograis off fights when he was clearly well past his best.

[margaret thatcher]

things i think loma has going over taylor:

-deeper resume
-longer stretch of world class success
-success across several divisions
-lost to better fighters
-came back from losses with good wins ; taylor is on 3 straight losses, and many thought he lost the first catt fight too. he hasnt clearly won a fight in like 5 years. like loma he hasnt avenged his losses and in fact he lost his only rematch

things i think taylor has going over loma:

-winning all the belts. this is the core of taylor's argument. something loma didnt do. loma had 3 at one time if i recall but never the full monty.

taylor could still do more, but with the similarities between his and loma's records was interested in how people see it now. and with how he's looked lately i wont be surprised if he loses all his meaningful fights from here.

[gilgamesh]

things i think loma has going over taylor:

-deeper resume
-longer stretch of world class success
-success across several divisions
-lost to better fighters
-came back from losses with good wins ; taylor is on 3 straight losses, and many thought he lost the first catt fight too. he hasnt clearly won a fight in like 5 years. like loma he hasnt avenged his losses and in fact he lost his only rematch


taylor's big thing in his argument, by far, is winning all the belts , something loma didnt do. loma had 3 at one time if i recall but never the full monty.

taylor could still do more, but with the similarities between his and loma's records was interested in how people see it now. and with how he's looked lately i wont be surprised if he loses all his meaningful fights from here.

Even with "winning all the belts" though. Loma has like 5 wins on his record that are better than anything Josh Taylor ever did.

[margaret thatcher]

ya i agree loma has the better wins, but still being undisputed with all the belts is a very good achievement few can claim these days

[THEBUTCH]

There was the spell when Taylor boxed 6 unbeaten boxers on the spin. Quite a rarity.

[TheLeprechaun]

I think the Prograis win has been completely destroyed by how limited Prograis looked vs Zorilla and Haney. The Ramirez fight was 114-112 on all cards and lets be honest, Ramirez isn't exactly the second coming of Salvador Sanchez. I think Taylor was just in the right place at the right time to become undisputed at 140 at a very weak time and for a very short time. The robbery vs Catterall has to be held against him.

It's hard to leave out an undisputed king of a division though and that is a major achievement that nobody can take away from him. He was THE MAN AT 140 and nobody can take that away from him.

But if you ask me was he heavily overrated - definitely. I remember people saying he would beat Hatton or Witter. I don't see that at all.

It’s only been destroyed if you don’t follow the sport.

He fought Zorilla 3 years & 8 months after he fought Taylor & was 34 years old. The Haney & Catterall fights came after Zorilla.

It’s incredibly harsh to judge Prograis off fights when he was clearly well past his best.

Prograis took up boxing late and was one dimensional and always had problems when he fought movers. His best opponent up until he fought Taylor was Terry Flanagan. He just wasn't that good. I don't think he even slipped that much in the Zorilla and Haney fights. That's just his level.