rigondeaux By Scott Gilfoid: IBF super bantamweight champion Carl Frampton recently said to WBA 122 pound champion Scott Quigg that he knows who the real champion is between them.

Frampton has just finished defeating an over-matched Chris Avalos by a 5th round knockout in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Frampton’s manager Barry McGuigan would go on to say that Frampton is the best fighter in boxing. This is obviously something that WBA/WBO super bantamweight champion Guillermo Rigondeaux (15-0, 10 KOs) and a ton of boxing fans would disagree with, as Frampton has yet to prove himself as being better than Rigondeaux due to him not facing the Cuban star.

Sky Sport commentator Johnny Nelson, however, sees Rigondeaux as the best of the four super bantamweight champions in the division.

“The others look at Rigondeaux thinking ‘that’s the gold standard’. Everyone who’s watched him knows that he’s the man. Once you beat him, there’s no doubt you’re the best in the world,” Nelson said via Skysports.com. “If you beat Santa Cruz you’re still looking over your shoulder at Rigondeaux.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6Q4C5IuVng

This is so true. If you beat WBC champion Leo Santa Cruz and/or WBA champion Scott Quigg, then you still have to look over your shoulder at Rigondeaux, because that’s the main guy in the division. He’s definitely the man at 122.

Frampton can defeat Quigg hundred times, and he’s still not going to be seen as the best fighter in the division. The only thing that Frampton proves by beating Quigg is that he can defeat a paper champion.

The guy that is considered far and away the best fighter in the division right now is Rigondeaux, and that’s not going to change anytime soon until he starts getting older and loses his hand speed and reflexes. I don’t expect that to happen for another 4 to 6 years.

“He [Rigondeaux] was down twice in his last fight but it’s about getting back up and winning. It shows he‘s vulnerable and can be beaten, but he’s still the best. Rigondeaux is the best of the four, then Carl Frampton – it’s very close but Rigondeaux has been there longer and boxed a better class.”

I don’t see it being close at all between Rigondeaux and Frampton. Rigondeaux is simply far and away the better fighter of the two. Yeah, Rigondeaux was knocked down twice in his last fight against Hisashi Amagasa last December, but the knockdowns were bogus in my book.

One was a flash knockdown where Amagasa hit Rigondeaux while he was off balance. The other knockdown was simply a case of Amagasa shoving Rigondeaux to the canvas and the referee calling it a knockdown. Unless boxing changes the rules to include shoving as a way of scoring a knockdown, I don’t register that as being a knockdown that Rigondeaux suffered.

I’d like to see Frampton step up to the plate and agree to fight Rigondeaux so that they could prove who the better fighter is between the two, but unfortunately Frampton is more interested in facing Scott Quigg rather than Rigondeaux. That kind of tells you something when he’s opting to face Quigg rather than Rigondeaux.