Ranking Ricardo?

Inspired by a recent thread on 'great uppercuts' and the subsequent mentions for Ricardo Lopez, I was wondering where you good people think he should rank in terms of all time greats? I am a huge fan of 'El Finito', and sometimes feel that he slips under the radar in terms of what he achieved in the context of other more 'celebrated' recipients of legendary status. Hopefully I can put forward a decent enough argument to persuade a few people that he belongs much higher up any all time great lists than perhaps he currently occupies.

So first to the numbers, and how does Lopez stack up here? Well, pretty successfully I would suggest. The obvious numerical statistic is his undefeated status. There are not many that enjoy that accolade, and it is a incredible achievement for anyone, especially those that fought at the highest level and reached world championship status. Lopez, who fought professionally for 16 years, compiled a record of 52-0-1 (38), a ledger that includes victories over 12 people who either held, or subsequently went on to hold, a world title. Five of these victims were multiple title holders of some description. Lopez had 21 successful defences of his WBC strawweight title, with 17 of these victories coming by knockout. Although he never held the IBF strawweight title, he did hold or win the WBO, WBC and WBA titles and was obviously considered the 'champion' in boxing's lightest division before stepping up a weight and winning the IBF light-flyweight title. In all, Lopez had 26 world title fights, with 25 victories and only a technical draw blotting his copybook. The overall win-loss-draw total for opponents faced over Finito's career reads 621-183-29. He had world title fights in Mexico, the US, Japan and Thailand, often travelling to his opponents home country for title fights. Ricardo certainly can't be accused of being a 'stay at home' fighter.

Now I realise that numbers and statistics alone can be mis-leading and mis-interpreted so in the interest of balance, I should say I fully appreciate how diluted the talent pool is at the lighter end of the weight divisions. Indeed, there almost certainly isn't a need for two weight classes below flyweight, and there are only a limited percentage of people who can even make that kind of weight. I am no evolutionary scientist, but my understanding is that human beings have been getting bigger over the years, which obviously has an impact on the extreme lighter weights. The nature of this means that people can get title shots in a much quicker fashion than other weights due to the lack of quality fighters available. It is a boxing truism that the lighter the fighter, the earlier they tend to peak, with very few 'light' boxers fighting on into their 30's with much success. Lopez clearly bucks this trend having finished his career at 35 and still winning title fights. With all this in mind, how much does it detract from his achievements? The numbers are fantastic, and there for everyone to see, but how big an asterix do we apply knowing that the weight divisions he competed in can be a sparse place in terms of talent depth?

Maybe Lopez didn't have the depth of talent to test himself against, but, in the time honoured fashion of boxing fans, can we make a decent case for him in head to heads against some of the light weight legends and some of his recent contemporaries? The best opponent that Lopez faced was unquestionably Rosendo Alvarez, the Nicaraguan 'Buffalo'. He was a fearsome and skilful operator who fought Lopez twice in 1998, with the first fight ending in a technical draw following a clash of heads. One judge had Alvarez ahead, another scored it for Lopez, with the third judge calling it even. It was a tough night for both fighters, but having watched it a couple of times, it seemed to me that El Finito was starting to turn the screw and looked to be the man in the ascendance. They fought later in the same year, with Alvarez failing to make weight and losing his WBA title on the scales. Lopez was basically spotting Alvarez two weight classes on the night, but in a cracking fight, he pulled out a deserved, in my opinion, points decision. Although Alvarez was plagued by ill discipline in and out of the ring around this time, he still went on to win a world title at light-flyweight after losing to Lopez. He was no busted flush, that is for certain.

Obviously in the absence of any other standout names, we have to speculate how Lopez would have fared against some other standout names around his divisions. Probably the two biggest names he could feasiblely have met were Michael Carbajal and Humberto 'Chiquita' Gonzalez. Lopez must have watched on in envy as those pair fought for a million dollar purse and a cracking trilogy. Although Carbajal and Gonzalez were fine fighters in their own right, I would have Lopez as a red-hot favourite over both. Neither of them could be considered elusive and this would be a disaster against Lopez who would have no trouble unloading his blistering combinations on either of them. I can only see a late stoppage or wide decision in El Finito's favour. One of the recent greats of the strawweight and light-flyweight divisions, Ivan Calderon is another fighter who could have given Lopez a test if their careers had crossed. Calderon was a hugely skilled and talented fighter who, from a technical viewpoint, could cross swords with any fighter you choose to mention. But, he lacked any power at all, and this would place him under huge pressure against a guy like Lopez who also had all the skills in the book. Calderon may be able to frustrate Lopez and even bank a good few rounds, but surely Ricardo would catch up with him at some point, confident in the knowledge that he would be able to walk through Ivan's best shots. Although the Giovani Segura (another cracking little fighter) bouts came at the end of his career, they showed that Calderon, if caught, could be hurt. I would back Lopez to catch him and force a stoppage late in a fight. Another great Mexican flyweight, Miguel Canto, could be placed in the same bracket as Calderon. A beautiful boxer and technically gifted, but couldn't hurt anyone. Not enough to keep Lopez honest anyway. Another late stoppage or points win I would suggest. There are other guys like the underrated Mark 'too sharp' Johnson who would have been a great test for Lopez, but again, a guy I would fancy El Finito to wear down and beat over 12 rounds, particularly if his withering left hook to the body could land with any frequency.

How would Lopez have got on against a couple of the true metaphorical giants of the lighter weights? Step forward Jimmy Wilde and Pancho Villa. It is always difficult, as we well know, to compare guys from such vastly different era's but does it require too much imagination to say that Lopez would have held his own with these guys? I would give that question an emphatic 'no'. Wilde was a phenom, barely weighing more than the modern light-flyweight limit but regularly knocking out bigger men and is one of the hardest punching pound for pound fighters ever. He is probably undisputed as the greatest ever at flyweight. He certainly had the power and tenacity to beat anyone of any era, and I am reluctant to say Lopez would be his equal, but he certainly wouldn't be disgraced and would hold his own. Pancho Villa would be a tough prospect for anyone. He wasn't a truly destructive puncher in the Jimmy Wilde sense, but was a tenacious and aggressive fighter could hit hard enough to get anyone's attention. Who knows how good he would have been had his life not been tragically cut short, but Lopez was skilled enough, hard enough and brave enough to be a tough opponent for Villa. We could go on comparing Lopez against the greats, but the arguments sometimes become repetitive, I just picked Wilde and Villa as they seem consensus picks as 2 of the top 3 flyweights of all time. Would everyone agree that El Finito's skillset is enough to at least keep him in the discussion for all time great flyweight lists?

So how does he match up in terms of technique? Well, there are numerous people on here better placed than me to sum how good the guy was from a technical viewpoint, but to the eyes of someone who started watching boxing in 1986 and has watched and read about a fair bit of the sport over the years, the guy could do the lot. He had great footwork, blurring hand speed, devastating one-punch knockout power and brilliant defence. He could unleash a withering body attack, could head-hunt, had a rapier like jab and an intimidating presence, without the snarling and trash talking, that only very few fighters attain. He had height, reach (all things relative, of course!) could box on the front foot or pick you apart from the outside. In short, there was pretty much nothing the guy couldn't do. Just re-visit some of his fights on youtube and remind yourself just how great a fighter this guy was.

So where should he rank? In my eyes, he is the third best Mexican fighter ever, only behind the great Julio Cesar Chavez and Salvador Sanchez, both of whom would figure in a top 30, guys? Lopez doesn't have the résumé of JCC and Sanchez, but how big a leap of faith is it to say he would have been highly competitive in any era? Not a huge leap for me. The statistics are in his favour, as is longevity, multiple titles and two weight divisions conquered. I would have him safely between top 30 and top 50 of all time, only kept out of a top 30 due to his lack of stellar names. He ticks every other box. What does anyone else think? Convince me he should be higher or lower than this?

All in all, a fabulous fighter and a real gem of the modern age.

Superb article Tina, great stuff.

I'd have El Finito on the very outside of a top 50, personally. I believe as you do that the weight he operated at is a very different animal than say the "middle" weights. I have no doubt he was phenomenal in terms of at the weight, but compare him to guys who did step up considerably like Wilde and Villa and you'll notice that they were considerably more talented both by their P4P moving up and the opposition they faced.

Think you make a persuasive case for a wonderful little fighter, Tino. To carp just a little, I don't think that he was anything like as effective at light-flyweight as he had been at the minimum weight, so I don't necessarily accept that he would easily have accounted for Gonzalez and Carbajal, although he would have deserved to start favourite. Alvarez, with whom Finito struggled mightily towards the end of his career would not have been at their kind of level.

Overall, though, I agree with what you're saying. Third best Mexican? Yes, definitely, and a place in the top 50 all-time greats isn't unreasonable at all. Great to see you shining a bit more light on a fighter who is overlooked by some only because of his weight.

captain carrantuohil wrote:Think you make a persuasive case for a wonderful little fighter, Tino. To carp just a little, I don't think that he was anything like as effective at light-flyweight as he had been at the minimum weight, so I don't necessarily accept that he would easily have accounted for Gonzalez and Carbajal, although he would have deserved to start favourite. Alvarez, with whom Finito struggled mightily towards the end of his career would not have been at their kind of level.

Overall, though, I agree with what you're saying. Third best Mexican? Yes, definitely, and a place in the top 50 all-time greats isn't unreasonable at all. Great to see you shining a bit more light on a fighter who is overlooked by some only because of his weight.

Thanks captain, JM.

Az, cutting insight. As ever.

captain, maybe I was a little too effusive with matching Lopez against Carbajal and Gonzalez, but I would still fancy him to find them both easy enough to hit and in Carbajals case especially, easy enough to genuinely hurt, to have him has a heavy favourite. Red-hot? Maybe that is too far, but certainly the bookies favourite against both.

JM, I have never been too sure what prevented Lopez from stepping up earlier for bigger fights. Maybe it was politics, maybe opponents asked for too much money to face a nightmare of a fighter. There were certainly fights there for him, against Carbajal, Gonzalez or Johnson for example. I can't believe he was reluctant to fight them, but you never know!

Great article, Tino.

It's been largely on the back of your protests that I've taken a much deeper look at Lopez over the past twelve months or so, and I'm glad I did. I always considered him great, of course, but he's been steadily moving up my list of the all-time great Mexicans, to the point where I'm in agreement with you that only JC Superstar and Sal deserve to be above him.

Some of the doubts cast over the depth of the Strawweight division he dominated for so long are valid enough, but at the same time there were still some fine operators about, all of whom Lopez dealt with. Outside of Latin America and the Orient, there was precious little interest in the 105 lb weight class but Lopez did at least box around the globe as he compiled his superb record.

Besides, from a techical point of view, Lopez was absolutely brilliant anyway. He had the lot. I took another look at that brilliant first fight between Carbajal and Gonzalez again recently and, fantastic scrap though it was, I think it also contains plenty of evidence suggesting that a peak Lopez could box rings around the pair of them, particularly Carbajal.

Great fighter, supremely consistent, brilliant all-rounder. Has to be in the top thirty-five or so, for me.

Great stuff Tino.

That he was defending his World Title against opponents with records such as 9-3, 7-3, 6-0 and even 4-0 does emphasise your point about the lack of depth in the division, but on the other hand you can only beat what is put in front of you, and if that is the best the division could throw at him that is hardly his fault.

His impressive KO% of nearly 75% is almost unheard of amongst the tiddly men and is testament to his power, whilst keeping that '0' also marks him out as a special fighter.

Ricardo Lopez is of course available to view in the Career In Video archive.

Thanks Chris.

Yep, I think Carbajal was made for Lopez and I can't see any way in which he wins the fight with both at their peak. Gonzalez was a much more canny operator but even he would struggle with the footwork of Lopez.

Of recent vintages, I always tend to think of Calderon against these kind of guys as some sort of benchmark for El Finito. Calderon would have the potential to absolutely box the ears off Carbajal and/or Gonzalez, but you would always give those two a chance as they would be able to walk forward without fear of getting hurt. Embarrassed? Quite possibly, but not hurt. The same can't be said for Lopez who hit like a mule. Anyone that can knock someone out with a lead left uppercut deserves serious respect.

Ironically, I always felt Mark Johnson would have been a real tough prospect for Finito. He hit hard enough to get his respect and was a real slippery operator. Lopez would have to have been at his best, but I would fancy him to get the job done.

Top 35 for you? I am chuffed to bits with that!

Union Cane wrote:Great stuff Tino.

That he was defending his World Title against opponents with records such as 9-3, 7-3, 6-0 and even 4-0 does emphasise your point about the lack of depth in the division, but on the other hand you can only beat what is put in front of you, and if that is the best the division could throw at him that is hardly his fault.

His impressive KO% of nearly 75% is almost unheard of amongst the tiddly men and is testament to his power, whilst keeping that '0' also marks him out as a special fighter.

Ricardo Lopez is of course available to view in the Career In Video archive.

Cheers Union.

I deliberately left out the records of some of his challengers in the hope that no-one would research them that much. I should have known you would...!

But you're right, of course, he beat who he had to beat and almost exclusively in impressive fashion. It does require some imagination to pick him in head to heads with other greats, but not that much.

Good shout on the Career in Video section. No excuses for anyone not to watch him now.

I have struggled to rate him. Never really got a handle on the kind of opposition he was facing and the division he existed in I think is one that only a very small percentage of people can make given how light it is and how there is any number of divisions and titles available above just a couple of pounds away.

Why didnt he move up in weights sooner? To spend almost an entire career in a division like straweight in the era of 17 divisions strikes me as a little wasteful.

I think 'wasteful' is maybe a touch harsh, manos. Looking back at his career with hindsight, it is easy to say he could have moved up, but he was incredibly successful at what he was doing, probably making very decent money and appearing on big Don King cards in Vegas, all as a result of being 'the man' down at his weight. For his legacy, then yes, moving up in weight would have been beneficial but for his career at the time who knows.

I alluded to it earlier, but I don't know the reasons why he didn't land bigger fights and I would concede that there should have been opportunities for him with guys like Carbajal, Gonzalez or Johnson but maybe they didn't want the fights? Gonzalez and Carbajal were making huge money fighting each other with the very real possibility of beating each other. Why risk it for a fight with Lopez who would have surely started as favourite over both of them. There is, of course, the possibility that Lopez didn't want the fights/asked for too much, but a guy who was that much in control of his skills must have fancied his chances against either of them.

I tried to balance the article by highlighting the lack of depth in the extreme lighter weights, but if we only ever assess fighters on their CV's, it becomes a pretty dry exercise. There isn't a record out there that can't be pulled apart to some degree, and I think we have to just use our eyes and imagination in many cases. I don't find that either counter-productive or hard with a guy like Lopez.

Maybe it was just boxing politics that kept Lopez doing what he was doing at strawweight for so long, but I wouldn't say his career was wasteful.

alma wrote:I'm no expert, but 38 KOs from 50 odd fights unbeaten at minimumweight is pretty impressive.

Agreed, I know very little of this guy but enjoyed the article and insight of someone who seems to be laregly overlooked by the masses.

I think there is a touch of Eder Jofre about Ricardo Lopez in some ways. Jofre regularly makes people's all-time top twenties, even their top tens now and then, despite a (seemingly) threadbare win column in comparison to some other pound for pound greats. However, much of his lure is a result of his fantastic skill set, dominance of his peers when at his peak and longevity, all of which Lopez has in boat loads.

For a man to reign as THE top man in any division at all (rather than just being a mere 'titlist') for as long as Lopez did is pretty rare, even if it is a division which doesn't grab many headlines. And as others have alluded to, regardless of the level of competition their facing, for a fighter to be stopping three quarters of the opponents they come across in a long career anywhere below Featherweight is pretty rare, too.

However, much of his lure is a result of his fantastic skill set, dominance of his peers when at his peak and longevity, all of which Lopez has in boat loads.

... and you can add to that the fact that, for the most part, he barely broke sweat in establishing his dominance. As Tina mentioned in the other article, Lopez barely had to get out of second gear against most of his opponents but still looked brilliant and was very rarely in any sort of trouble.

There have to be some question marks over the level of some of his opponents and also if he would have been as succesful had he done some weight hopping, but I think a place somewhere in the lower reaches of the top 50 seems about right.

Great article mate, watching boxing from a young age from about 7 year old I've seen some fantastic fighters Tyson,Whitaker,Jones Jnr,Chavez,Mayweather and Pacquaio.

Id say Lopez is cut from the same cloth, question subpar opposition all you like, Lopez was a magician and one of the best aggressive defensive fighters (if that makes sense) I've witnessed.

Cheers Rodders