The Welterweight Division: Confused?
January 26th, 2009
By Peter Howells: On the back of an amazing display from ‘Sugar’ Shane Mosley to topple Antonio Margarito from the top of the Welterweight mountain, I’m left wondering.. Is anyone else confused about who the best in the division truly is? Anyone who believed Light-heavyweight king Joe Calzaghe’s words when he said that boxing is dying, only has to look at the Welterweight scene to know that simply is not true. I truly believe that the array of talent around the Welterweight division makes it one the most exciting divisions ever which is great when you consider the state of our Heavyweight division at the moment.
You’ve got your fighters who fight there in most of their fights; and that’s confusing enough. Williams beat Margarito back in 2007, only to then lose to Carlos Quintana, which though he avenged this defeat, was a blemish that seemed to put him out of the picture for a while. Then we had last year’s fight of the year which saw Margarito break Miguel Cotto down and knock him out. Margarito was quickly announced the best in the division which was true, right? Wrong. Last night the legend that is Shane Mosley outclassed Margarito for 9 rounds before finally doing the seemingly impossible and knocking out the guy who can’t be knocked out. So stands to reason to assume that Mosley is the true Welterweight champ, right? Wrong again, and there’s only one reason why; Mosley dropped a decision to Miguel Cotto late 2007. So let’s try straighten things out: Cotto beat Mosley, Margarito then beat Cotto, only to then lose to Mosley. I’m lost.
Then we have the fighters who haven’t been fighting at Welterweight regularly recently. The aforementioned Paul Williams looms in the background claiming he’s been avoided by the likes of Margarito and Cotto recently, so has subsequently claimed an alphabet interim junior middleweight championship. Some fans believe that given the chance, Williams would be the best of them all. Hopefully we’ll get a chance to see soon.
English phenom and reigning King of the light-welterweight division Ricky Hatton is also a name sometimes mentioned around the Welterweight scene. While even Ricky himself admits that he struggles with the higher weight, there’s no doubting that he’s a player in the division, considering he won a world title at the weight back in 2006 with a points win over contender Luis Collazo. He’s written off in America a lot but don’t kid yourself, If he expressed an interest in fighting any of the big guns in the division, they’d jump at the chance because of the huge amounts of money he brings to the table.
Just when you think it couldn’t get more muddled, there’s the current pound for pound king himself Manny Pacquaio. He defied all odds recently by stepping up two divisions to completely dismantle ring legend Oscar de la Hoya and show that he deserves to be mentioned in the same breath as the rest of them. Whilst completely outsized by his rivals, many believe that after his recent performance he can more than hold his own. Luckily he’s set to try and take over the light-welterweight division first by taking on Ricky Hatton (hopefully!).
And now the cherry on top of this mess of a cake is currently retired but the last man to almost globally be recognized as the best in the division or any division for that matter is Floyd Mayweather Jr. Most (including this writer) feel that he’s just waiting for the right fight to step up, come out of retirement and try and bring some order back to the division. That fight would likely be against the winner of Pacquaio/Hatton but I don’t believe for a second that he’s scared of taking on the likes of Margarito, Williams etc.
There’s no doubt about it, the Welterweight division is jam packed with fighters who all could probably have a claim to be the best. And you know what? I love it. Let’s make as many of these names fight each other as possible in the next couple of years and sit back and enjoy, because I don’t think anyone can really say who the best is quite yet.
Tags: 12 Responses to “The Welterweight Division: Confused?”
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mosley legend!! easily in the top 3 lightweights of all time
Hey ukansodoff, just a quick point about people thinking Haye is too small, its a misconception. He was a big cruiserweight and struggled to get down to 200lbs.
His natural weight is around 215-220 lbs and he’s 6″3. Around the same size as ‘BIG’ George Foreman.
and i agree welterweight is by far the best division
shane mosley is the king of the welterweight division and will be for a good while
I respect mosley and margaito because they are two of the few fighters who fight anyone ande dint go go for the easy payday.
If confused is another term for brilliant.
It is the perfect example right now of styles making fights. 1 boxer is beaten by a man who beat the man the 1st 1 beat.
Heavyweights seem to be a case of youve jsut gotta be big. People say David Haye is just too small, they may well be right, but hes 10 times the boxer Valuev is and they are both heavyweights.
You are never more than a couple of pounds difference in welterweight so its style and talent that brings you to the top.
And the thing that makes it so amazing is that you just dont quite know who can really beat who, we all have our opinions and banter but the fact were all debating proves that its not that clear just who can beat who.
^If Margarito has been doing that he should be banned from the sport the cheating scum, this sport is dangerous enough without someone using a plaster cast as a weapon. This isn’t pro wrestling after all.
I’m Calzaghe’s biggest fan but I have to admit he’s got it wrong in this case. The welterweight division right now is as exciting as any division in the history of boxing.
I’d like to see Mayweather put his money where his mouth is and stop ducking the big names from his own division like Mosley & Cotto. He needs to actually prove he is the greatest rather than pick fights with guys from lower weight divisions (Hatton, Pacquiao) and guys who are shot (De La Hoya).
First
marquez lost to many both times because he was unable to stay on his feet. Many drop him 3 times in the first fight and 1 on the second one.
Second
If margarito was cheating puting some kind of material on his gloves, he should be hardly punish. This is something that just can happen. Probably he used against cotto and cintron too.
Edgar Cintron,before you come on this site and try to school people, get your facts straight.As for your retarded statement that Cintron deserves more recognition.Cintron is great at 1 thing.That’s dodging fighters.Cintron ran like a Mexican crossing the border when he was supposed to fight Hatton and decided to fight the great boxer Mark Suarez.LMFAO!You sit and rag on Margarito about how slow he is,and then you wanna say Cintron should get more recogintion.Margarito KO’d cintron twice.Both as* whoopins.As for the Marquez and Pacquaio.Those 2 fights went the right way.A draw in the first fight,and Pacquaio won the second.There,i just told you differant.
1-Stop trying to make Margarito out to be something that he’s not and never was. He is an easy target. Slow swinger, 10 of his hits can equal to one good one and damn you can see them coming like Neo in the Matrix. All he got is a hard head but that is nothing without the body, that is where Cotto messed up at. He did not give him body blows like Mosley did. This was Mosley’s chance to get his reputation back by doing what Cotto did not do. I can guarentee you that this IS IT for Mosley, he is ALMOST washed up and on his next fight people will realize that. Please boxing fans, let us not ignore the fact that Margarito does put plaster in his gloves. It is impossible that he only tried it in the Mosley fight!!!!!!!!!!! duhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!That is dirt beyond dirt!!!!!!!!
2-Cintron and Quintana deserve more recognition…
3-Margarito will now become an easy target because the boxing commision is now up on his little dirty trick with the gloves… and boxers now know how to stop him. Although I believe it took too long.
4-Mayweather does not have the hunger anymore. This was obvious since the fight with Zab Judah.
5-Pacquaio lost twice against Marquez. Can’t tell me any different. Come on now the win between him and DeLaHoya was a fight that should not have been on pay-per-view. Juan Manuel Lopez is coming for Pacquaio and he will make him look baddd!!!!!!!!!!!
Hatton’s time has been up a long time ago… He lost that fight with Collazo and so did Berto. Why don’t they let this Puerto Rican pro get his recognition. Is it that there are too many P.R. pros?
Williams has a whole lot coming for him I give him two thumbs up…
Above all, believe it or not, hate if u want to hate….Cotto is the best out there and you will see. Stop ignoring the facts. Give him more props than that.
shut up stupid (peter) the only reason the h.w div. sucks is cuz the klitschkos are a head obove everyone else that aint there fault!! Vauev wont fight because thats the only ticket don king has to hold on to and he knows he will loose it if he fights one of them
Floyd didn’t want to face Shane before his retirement, and he won’t want to face him if he comes back. The same goes for Margarito, who Floyd always said wasn’t “high profile” enough for him to fight. So I suppose you’re right, if Floyd does come back he will skip the legitimate welters and go for the smaller guys.