Here you'll find our Pound4Pound Top 10 list (Updated May, 08)

  
 

Written By: "K.O." Jacqui Snow
Photos: Bret "The Threat" Newton
 
1. Manny "Pac Man" Pacquiao - Pacquiao's November 2006 three-round destruction of arch-rival Erik Morales placed an exclamation point on a trilogy that's one of the greatest boxing rivalries of our time and he's also responsible for the only stoppage on Marco Antonio Barrera's resume. Pacquiao's in his prime right now at 29 and is one of the most exciting and marketable fighters in the sport. More importantly, his lightning-quick hands and devastating power, his desire to go toe-toe-toe with his opponents, and his willingness to take on the highest quality of opposition, make him an easy choice for best fighter, pound 4 pound, right now. Most recently, Pacquiao won a close split-decision against Juan Manuel Marquez, who—four years ago—came back from 3 first-round knockdowns to hold Pacquiao to a draw. Pacquiao will attempt to become the first Asian boxer to win world titles in five different weight divisions when he takes on WBC Lightweight champ David Diaz next.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 
2. "Pretty Boy" Floyd Mayweather - Mayweather is a marvelously talented boxer with blazing speed in both his hands and feet. He's beaten everyone he's faced and has held titles in five weight classes. However, he's failed to unify titles in any of those weight classes and that undefeated record has been built against questionable competition: with the exception of a post-retirement Oscar De La Hoya and an undersized Ricky Hatton, Mayweather's resume lacks a future hall-of-famer (or even a top ten pound-for-pounder). Most recently Mayweather failed to defend the WBC Light Middleweight strap which he won from De La Hoya and instead, dropped back down to Welterweight to knock out Hatton, who almost lost his only other attempt at a welterweight crown. Mayweather's refusal (so far) to face welterweight king Miguel Cotto further precludes his placement at the top of this list.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 
3. Joe Calzaghe - Calzaghe won the vacant WBO super middleweight belt in 1997 with a victory over fellow Brit Chris Eubank and defended that belt an impressive 22 times. Calzaghe's 2006 destruction of then-undefeated Jeff Lacy for the IBF strap was the most lopsided win in recent memory. Calzaghe has often been criticized for fighting contenders and fringe prospects in his native country--as an example, he initially turned down a unification bout with WBA/WBC Super Middleweight belt-holder Mikkel Kessler and instead laid a3-roundbeating on Contender series runner-up Peter Manfredo. However, Calzaghe silenced his critics in November 2007 by agreeing to fight Kessler and crafting a decisive victory over the top-ranked Dane. Calzaghe recently moved up to light-heavyweight to beat the legendary Bernard Hopkins with the Ring belt on the line.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 
4. Juan Manuel "Dinamita" Marquez - Since losing his pro debut back in1993, Marquez went undefeated until September 1999, when he fought Freddie Norwood for the WBA Featherweight title. Marquez lost that bout by unanimous decision, a result universally seen as a robbery. The third loss on Marquez's 48-3-1 record occurred in March 2006 when, as a result of five title changes involving Marquez, none of which occurred inside of the ring, he was compelled to fight Chris John in his home country of Indonesia for the WBC Featherweight title. He's since rebounded with knockout wins over Terdsak Jandaeng and Jimrex Jaca. Marquez's unanimous decision win over future hall-of-famer Marco Antonio Barrera raised hopes for a rematch against Manny Pacquiao, but those hopes were dashed when Pacquiao chose to rematch Barrera instead. Marquez's next scheduled opponent, Jorge Barrios failed the medical and his last-minute replacement was the hopelessly outclassed Rocky Juarez. The fans' patience was finally rewarded in March, when the rematch against Pacquiao finally took place, but Marquez found himself on the losing edge of a split decision that could have gone either way.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 
5. Israel Vazquez - 29 year old Vazquez, with his impressive 43-4-3record, is an exciting, crowd-pleasing fighter who caught the attention of mainstream boxing fans in his rubber-match with Oscar Larios. In their first match-up, Vazquez scored a first-round knockout, only to be knocked out in the 12th in the rematch. This time, though, with the WBC Super Bantamweight title on the line, Vazquez dropped Larios in the first round and was awarded a TKO victory when the fight was stopped in the third. Vazquez's thrilling tenth-round knockout of Jhonny Gonzales would have been a shoe-in for last year's FOTY, had it not been for the boxing fan who uploaded Sithchatchawal/Monshipour to Youtube, thus bringing it to the attention of local scribes. Vazquez has won two out of three bouts against Rafael Marquez in one of the greatest trilogies of all time.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 
6. Ivan Calderon - Standing a mere five feet tall, this tiny Puerto Rican won his first minor title (the vacant NABO WBO Minimumweight title) with a complete shutout of the much taller Lee Sandoval in November 2002. He won his first major title, the WBO Minimumweight belt, in May 2003, when he knocked out Eduardo Marquez, and he's defended that title ten times. While many of his fights take place in Puerto Rico, Calderon is quite familiar to American fans due to his television appearances on fight undercards and pay-per-views. Calderon doesn't have great knockout power (he has only six knockouts in his28wins), which is hardly surprising for a 105-pound fighter, but he makes up for it with his beautiful boxing skills and has won almost every round he's ever fought. On August 25th, Calderon stepped up to Junior Flyweight to take on Ring Magazine- and WBO champion Hugo Cazares. Despite giving up a full six inches in height and about ten pounds in weight, Calderon overcame the vast size difference, andan8th round knockdown, to outpoint Cazares for the win. Calderon made a second defense of that title against Nelson Dieppa.
_____________________________________________________________________
 
7. Miguel Cotto - Miguel Cotto, a Puerto Rican fighter with heavy hands and a fan-friendly style, won his first major title in 2004 by dropping Kelson Pinto three times en route to a 6th round TKO to claim the WBO strap. He's made six defenses of that title and recently won the vacant WBA title with a thrashing of Carlos Quintana, who quit after the 4th round. Only 5 of Cotto's 30 bouts have gone the distance. His victory over former world champion Zab Judah at a sold-out Madison Square Garden this year elevated him to the status of superstar. Cotto won his WBA/WBC unification bout against the resurgent Shane Mosley last year and—with Floyd Mayweather thus far still refusing to fight him—knocked out popular but underpowered Contender Alfonso Gomez next.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 
8. Ricky Hatton - Hatton's signature moment was his 2005 knockout of seemingly-unbeatable Kostya Tszyu, who quit in his corner in the11thrather than face any more of Hatton's abuse. Following a move up in weight class, which resulted in some scary moments and a close call against supposedly safe WBA welterweight champ Luis Collazo inMay2006, Hatton moved back to the 140 pound division to take the IBF strap from Juan Urango with a dominant, albeit boring, unanimous decision win. Hatton looked much more impressive against the usually granite-chinned Mexican veteran Jose Luis Castillo, whom he knocked out in the 4th round. Hatton faced by far the biggest challenge of his career when he moved back up to welterweight to earn a large payday against pound for pound stalwart Floyd Mayweather and was, predictably, knocked out. Hatton's next fight will be back at 140pounds against Juan Lazcano.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 
9.  Rafael Marquez - For a fighter of such small stature, former IBF and IBO Bantamweight champion Marquez has a great deal of power: an astonishing 33 of his 37 wins have come by way of knockout. That power made Marquez a formidable opponent at 118 pounds. He recently decided to move up to the more talent-rich Super Bantamweight division to take on hard-hitting Israel Vazquez for the WBC title, a move which represented quite a step up in both size and quality of opposition. Marquez rose to the challenge and proved that he's equally dangerous at the higher weight when he badly broke Vazquez's nose, winning by knockout when his opponent quit after the 7th round. Vazquez redeemed himself in the rematch by scoring a 6th round TKO of Marquez. Most recently, Marquez lost a hard-fought split-decision in the thrilling rubber match (a bout that's an early candidate for 2008's Fight Of The Year).  
_____________________________________________________________________
 
10. Kelly Pavlik - "The Ghost" had already developed a small cult following before his 2005 television debut, when he knocked out prospect Fulgencio Zuniga in the 9th. His subsequent televised stoppages of rugged veteran Bronco McKart and Jose Luis Zertuche, the2000 Mexican Olympian, started to generate excitement among the hardcore fans. Pavlik then exploded onto the mainstream boxing scene with his stunning knockout of top contender Edison Miranda in May,2007. That victory earned him the title shot he'd been demanding against undefeated, undisputed champ Jermain Taylor. TheSeptember,2007 bout was a thriller, with Pavlik overcoming a 2nd round knockdown to stop Taylor in the 7th and claim the Ring magazine middleweight title. Pavlik successfully defended that title in the rematch. Pavlik will fight Joe Calzaghe's stable-mate Gary Lockett next.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 

P4P + 10

11. Bernard "The Executioner" Hopkins - Before the two controversial losses to Jermain Taylor, Bernard Hopkins held all the major championship belts in the middleweight division, including the Ring Magazine belt. Hopkins, who's best known for his crafty boxing skills and impenetrable defense, showed that he also has knockout power when his thundering blow to the liver of Oscar De La Hoya stopped the Golden Boy for the only time in his career. While he's always been recognized as an all-time great, Hopkins demonstrated that he's still a pound-for-pound fighter when he came back from retirement in top-notch condition to systematically dismantle Antonio Tarver. Hopkins defeated Winky Wright with the Ring Magazine Light Heavyweight belt on the line, but lost that belt to Joe Calzaghe in April.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 
12. Ronald "Winky" Wright - Wright's defensive counter-punching style will probably never find favor with casual (or some serious) boxing fans but it makes him one of the toughest opponents to beat, or even look good against. As a result, nobody wanted to fight him and his brilliance was overlooked during the early part of his career. That changed with his two victories in 2004 over future hall-of-famer Shane Mosley, which earned him the WBC, WBA and IBF Light Middleweight title. Wright followed those wins with an outright destruction of the heavily favored veteran champion Felix Trinidad in a WBC Middleweight Title Eliminator. In June 2006, Wright fought undisputed middleweight champ Jermain Taylor to a controversial draw in a bout many observers felt he should have won. In December 2006, he scored a unanimous decision win over Ike Quartey and most recently, he fought at 170pounds for the first time, losing a decision to the much bigger Bernard Hopkins.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 
13. "The Baby Faced Assassin" Marco Antonio Barrera - Barrera's won titles in three weight divisions and thrilled the fans with his tough-nosed brawling style. His fights with Erik Morales were out-and-out wars with Barrera winning two of three. He's fought all comers and never ducked anybody. Barrera fueled speculation that his best days were behind him when he beat Rocky Juarez in May 2006 by the narrowest of split decisions, but he gave Juarez a surprising and uncharacteristic boxing lesson four months later to win the rematch by easy decision. Earlier this year, Barrera returned to his former brawling style to go toe-to-toe with Juan Manuel Marquez, who beat him by unanimous decision. Recently, Barrera lost a unanimous decision in the long-awaited rematch with the only guy to ever knock him out, Manny Pacquiao.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 
14. "Sugar" Shane Mosley - Mosley's held world titles in three weight classes and the four losses on his record came as a result of his willingness to twice face Winky Wright and Vernon Forrest, two fighters whom most A-listers avoided. Mosley's combination of hand speed, sturdy chin and knockout power make him tough to beat, which is reflected in his 44 wins over elite competition, 37 by knockout. His two knockout wins over Fernando Vargas last year and his lopsided victory over the hopelessly outclassed Luis Collazo on February 10thprove that, at 35, he's still a force to be reckoned with. The fight with Collazo was for the WBC Welterweight interim title, but Mosley's status changed to that of champion when Mayweather vacated to fight DeLaHoya at 154 pounds. Mosley continued to demonstrate a willingness to fight the best by taking on hard-hitting Miguel Cotto next, but lost a unanimous decision. Mosley was scheduled to fight former champ Zab Judah next, but an injury forced Judah to back out.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 
15. Jermain "Bad Intentions" Taylor - While Taylor's victories over Bernard Hopkins were tainted by controversy, the fact remains that Hopkins had held the IBF Middleweight title for ten years and was the undisputed middleweight champion before Taylor snatched his belts in July 2005, then immediately defended them in a rematch. He followed those wins by agreeing to face the oft-avoided Winky Wright, whom he held to a draw in another disputed decision in June 2006. Since those fights, the level (or at least, size) of his competition dropped: he was awarded a unanimous decision over the much smaller Kassim Ouma in December 2006 and most recently, scored a spiritless split-decision win against former welterweight Cory Spinks. In a move that marked are turn to his former ways, Taylor faced top contender Kelly Pavlik, who knocked Taylor out and then beat him by decision in the rematch. Taylor will probably move up in weight class for his next fight.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 
16. Pongsaklek Wonjongkam - Thailand's Wonjongkam is only 29, but he's fought an astonishing 71 times, with 67 wins. He won the WBC Flyweight Title in March 2001 by knocking out Malcolm Tunacao in the first round, dropping him three times in the process and has since made 17successful defenses, a flyweight division record. While he's certainly demonstrated that he's strong for a flyweight and definitely has knockout power, Wonjongkam is also a highly skilled boxer. In his fourth title defense, Wonjongkam also set the division record for fastest knockout in flyweight history by dispensing with Japan's Daisuke Naito in just 34 seconds, then knocked him out in the 7thround of their rematch. However, Naito pulled off a stunning upset in July 2007 when he outworked Wonjongkam to win a unanimous decision. The pair's fourth fight in March ended, unbelievably, in a draw.
_____________________________________________________________________
 
17. Jorge Arce - At a prime 27 years of age, Arce has already built an impressive 46-4-1 record, winning his first major title, the WBO Light Flyweight belt, in 1998 and defending it twice before losing by 11thround TKO to hall-of famer Michael Carbajal, who was way down on the scorecards. Arce handily out pointed Juanito Rubillar in October 2001to claim the WBC Light Flyweight title, which he defended eight times before stepping up in weight class to beat Hussein Hussein for the WBC Flyweight Interim title. He made four defenses of that "title" before stepping up to Super Flyweight in September 2006 and fighting two WBC title eliminators at that weight. On April 14th, 2007, he challenged WBC Super Flyweight champion Cristian Mijares, but lost by a wide margin. Arce's moved up in weight class and won both of those fights by knockout.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 
18. Juan "The Baby Bull" Diaz - Juan Diaz's mother Olivia is a fixture at ringside, shedding copious tears for her pugnacious son, but she should more correctly be weeping for his victims--33 of them so far,17 by knockout. The undefeated Diaz is a relentless pressure fighter whose strength and high volume of punches make him a force to be reckoned with in the lightweight division. His swarming attacks proved too much for Acelino Freitas and Julio Diaz, both of whom quit against him. Diaz, however, has shown disdain for 135-pound Ring magazine champion Joel Casamayor, stating that he wants to fight younger men than the 36 year old Casamayor. It's likely, though, that his specific choice—130-pound kingpin Manny Pacquiao—was selected for his lucrative ness, not his youth. Most recently, Diaz fell victim to a badly swollen and cut eye, dropping a 12 round decision to upset-minded Nate Campbell in Cancun.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 
19. Mikkel Kessler - Kessler, a Danish fighter with devastating knockout power, fought for his first major belt, the WBA Super Middleweight title, in November 2004 on short notice when title holder Manny Siaca's original opponent was injured. Kessler got the upset win when Siaca, who was making his first title defense, quit in his corner at the end of the 7th. Kessler defended his title twice, then scored a brutal third round knockout of German veteran Markus Beyer to take the WBC belt also. Kessler immediately challenged WBO and IBF title holder Joe Calzaghe to a unification bout, but Calzaghe chose to fight Peter Manfredo instead. Kessler made his American television debut against "Bash Brother" Librado Andrade, sweeping all 12 rounds on all the scorecards. The anticipated unification bout against Calzaghe took place in November 2007, with Kessler losing the decision.
_____________________________________________________________________
 
20. Joel "El Cepillo" Casamayor - Casamayor is a quick and crafty southpaw who's fought top-notch opposition and held championship belts at both Super Featherweight and Lightweight divisions. He's 34-3-1 and has been at the losing end of some close--possibly controversial--decision losses in title bouts against Diego Corrales, Acelino Freitas and Jose Luis Castillo, resulting in the three losses on his record. Recently, though, in October 2006, he was awarded a close split decision in the rubber match of his trilogy with Diego Corrales to claim the WBC Lightweight championship. The WBC stripped Casamayor of that belt when they learned that he planned to fight Acelino Freitas instead of mandatory challenger David Diaz; however, Freitas fought Juan Diaz, not Casamayor. Casamayor's management is considering legal action against the sanctioning body. Casamayor's most recent victory was a stunning knockout of Michael Katsidis, a hard-hitting, albeit technically flawed fighter from Australia.  
_____________________________________________________________________
 

Email Jacqui Snow
http://www.myspace.com/jacquis

Other Questions or Comments? Email Us Here