By Scott Gilfoid: With his victory over Willie Monroe Jr. (19-2, 6 KOs) last Saturday night, IBO/WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin (33-0, 30 KOs) is now ranked #4 in Ring Magazine’s pound-for-pound list. He’s below #1. Floyd Mayweather Jr., #2. Roman Gonzalez. And #3. Wladimir Klitschko.
In what is kind of strange about the Ring’s rankings is that Golovkin is ranked above WBC middleweight champion Miguel Cotto in the pound-for-pound list, yet Cotto is the Ring Magazine middleweight champion.
If Golovkin is rated above Cotto in the pound-for-pound ratings, wouldn’t you think that Golovkin would also be ranked above Cotto in Ring Magazine’s middleweight rankings as well? I’m just saying.
The Ring ratings are pretty confusing to look at and I don’t agree with any of them except for having Mayweather as No.1. The remainder of the rankings make little sense to me, and it looks more like a ranking stuck in the past rather than what’s happening with these fighters at the present time.
Here is the Ring Magazine pound-for-pound rankings:
1. Floyd Mayweather Jr.
2. Roman Gonzalez
3. Wladimir Klitschko
4. Gennady Golovkin
5. Guillermo Rigondeaux
6. Manny Pacquiao
7. Carl Froch
8. Sergey Kovalev
9. Terence Crawford
10. Shinsuke Yamanaka
I don’t see Wladimir as deserving as being in the top 10 in the pound-for-pound list any longer based on his last performance against Bryant Jennings. To me, Wladimir is starting to look like a shot fighter, and I don’t think shot fighters should be in the pound-for-pound list, but, hey, that’s me.
For that matter, I don’t see Carl Froch as being a top pound-for-pound fighter given that he hasn’t fought in one year, and he hasn’t faced a talented fighter since 2011 when he was whipped by Andre Ward. Froch doesn’t make my list.
Manny Pacquiao is starting to look shot too, and his injury excuse was incredibly poor for his last fight. I hate to do it but Pacquiao is out of the top 10 pound-for-pound list. I’m not familiar with Yamanaka, but the fights I’ve seen of him haven’t impressed me. He’s out of the list as well. Crawford is kind of dull for me to watch, so he’s out.
Here’s my top 10 pound-for-pound list:
1. Floyd Mayweather Jr.
2. Gennady Golovkin
3. Roman Gonzalez
4. Guillermo Rigondeaux
5. Danny Garcia
6. Andre Dirrell
7. Gary Russell Jr.
8. Naoya Inoue
9. Donnie Nietes
10. Takashi Uchiyama
I included Andre Dirrell to the list based on predictions of future success this Saturday in his fight against James DeGale rather than what he’s done lately. Dirrell arguably is still an unbeaten fighter at this point, as his only defeat was a controversial one to Carl Froch in 2009. For that reason, I still see Dirrell has undefeated and I don’t penalize him the way I would other fighters who have taken losses in their career.
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