How to rate Ricardo Lopez

The pros on Ricardo Lopez: He was a phenomenally talented and skilled fighter who did fight and destroy some solid guys, and went close to a decade before facing difficulty.

The cons: He didn't seem interested in testing himself with Carbajal and Gonzalez a mere 3 pounds above him, and Too Sharp/Arbachakov 7 pounds above him.

So, where does he rank among Mexico's greatest/best and greats in general?

Greatness aside, in terms of pure quality does he stack up to guys like Chavez, Olivares, and Sanchez?

I believe Chavez was on record as saying Lopez was better than him. Someone confirm, and of course, that might just be Chavez being humble/respectful.

 

I will say that Chocolatito would be the only guy with a prayer of beating him at 105.

At 108, different story.

 

mayweather jr always had a lot of praise and admiration for the ability of lopez.

 

Floyd also rates Pryor as the 5th greatest fighter of all time .

But what did Floyd say about him?

 

To make matters worse, he ultimately did move up to 108 only to face more of the same

 

So. What is the significance of that? Just as it would be meaningless if Chavez claimed he were better, it's meaningless for him to say Lopez is better.

 

I was just noting it, Doub. I didn't say it had any bearing on his standing.

 

I get it.

 

Hard to tell. He looked great against the dirt farmers he primarily faced, but not so great against the only semi-elite fighter he was ever in with. Perhaps he was starting to physically decline by then, but it wasn’t very noticeable before that fight. It’s not as if he’d accumulated much wear and tear over the years, either. So I’d call it a gradual decline, the effects of which were still fairly minor at that point.

I suppose it depends on how you rate Alvarez.

 

I rate Alvarez very highly, as probably the 3rd greatest Nicaraguan fighter of all time behind Arguello and Chocolatito.

How do you figure Lopez does against the following?

Carbajal
Chuquita
Chang
Zapata
Yuh
Gushiken

 

I’d probably favor him over all but Chang. He could very well lose to Chiquita, Bujia, and Yoko, though.

 

I see him beating Carbajal, Chiquita, and Yoko, and losing to Chang and Zapata.

Not sure how to call Lopez vs Yuh.

Yuh is very underrated, and if forced to choose I'd actually pick him over Lopez.

 

I don’t think I’d favor Yuh over any elite fighter. He was taken to the brink far too often against too many different lower quality guys.

 

He ranks on the lower side of Mexico's ATG fighters IMO. Finito is one of my personal favorite fighters but I'm also realistic as well. Love his beautiful boxing style and clean fighting but his resume reeks of mediocrity when put in perspective. He had every chance and reason to move up in weight and challenge himself against much better opposition just a few pounds up since he had the body frame to do so. Instead he decided to move up very late in his career and continued to fight unknown fighters. Guys like Saman, Alvarez, Ohashi, Sanchez, Vorapin are good wins but I wouldn't call them great fighters.

I still get irked whenever people call Finito Lopez this "perfect, unbeatable fighter". He was far from being perfect and he was definitely not unbeatable. I see a good amount of great fighters around his weight class that would have beaten him convincingly.

To me Finito reminds me of GGG in a way, where he decided to stay in one division for far too long and rarely tested himself. Although GGG did end up fighting fighters with a pulse such as Canelo and Jacobs.

 

Good post, Flo.

Which guys would you favor over Finito?

 

A handful of fighters. I'm sure you've seen my old thread on ESB years ago where I made a thread about fighters who could have beaten Lopez.

To me I think guys around 105-115 lbs such as Chocolatito, Zapata, Chang, Canto, Arbachakov, Too Sharp, Inoue would have beaten Finito clearly.

 

Yeah, I somewhat do remember those threads, but I'd have to dig em up to really remember what you said as my memory is for shit sometimes .

I agree on every single one of those guys beating Finito.

The best guys I would pick Lopez over are Carbajal and Gushiken.

 

Who could have beaten Ricardo Lopez?

Just to refresh your memory.
And yeah I favor Lopez over Carbajal, Gushiken, Yuh, Calderon.

Fighting Harada and Jimmy Wilde are other fighters that I would favor over Lopez.

 

Harada would run Lopez out the ring in a non-competitive fight.

 

I love watching Finito, and I agree with the general sentiment here. His opposition was shit but he looked fantastic, had he stepped up, he'd have likely had mixed-to-positive results.

I think technically, he was among the best ever. Beautiful fundamentals and structure, with some extremely advanced uses of footwork and stances. I love his long-range uppercuts. His only weakness seemed to be his lack of an inside game, but he could light you up so bad on the way in that it kind of negated that. And that uppercut at mid and long range made it very hard to actually get up close consistently with a crouch.

I'd pick him to lose to Bujia, Chiquita, Chang, Chocolatito, Gushiken and Inoue. I'd pick him over Yuh (barely, that's a great match up) and Carbajal. I haven't watched enough of Baby Jake to make my mind up on that match up.

 

I remember reading the interview when Chavez said that. He was asked about being the #1 p4p fighter in the world and he replied that he wasn't even the best fighter in Mexico. The interviewer thought Chavez was joking but Chavez said that he was serious, that Lopez would knock him out.

As to fighting Carbajal and Gonzalez, my understanding is that it was a question of loyalty and boxing politics. There was an adviser or manager in the Lopez camp that Lopez was very loyal to and that individual was on the outs with some powerful people. They didn't want him to get a payday and made him becoming uninvolved a condition to the fights being made. The person that told me that told me that Lopez himself told him that story.

 

I've got mixed feelings on this. On one hand i like when fighters stay in a division and dominate it for a long time. Whether an era is considered weak or strong a long reigning champion will naturally fight their share of mandatory challengers and such that often don't belong there. You still have to go out and take care of business as fights aren't won on paper. Bernard Hopkins had some laughable challenges during his reign but that's rarely held against him today.

On the other hand if the division is basically a wasteland it's incumbent on that fighter to seek out some new challenges. Maybe they won't be effective but they at least tried. You can always move back down. If we use Hopkins again as an example i don't think if he lost to Tarver people would question his greatness as much as if he continued adding titles defenses against no hopers.

 

TBH, I don't mind the odd dreary, piss poor title defence if it's wedged between a bunch of top opponents. I feel like there's a distinct difference between staying at your weight because it suits you and you'd be hopeless at the weight above, and so you make the best of what you can by dominating what's in front of you, and by using a shit division as an excuse to not fight the best when you would have absolutely no issues with the weight transition. Especially if you later make it and prove that it was a piece of piss.

Kinda like Canelo with Canelo-weight, rather than just fighting at 160.

 

Fighters don't always have the luxury of fighting top-tier opponents in between defenses, especially if they are staying in one division. Beyond just the politics of making big fights happen climbing in weight is almost always going to be harder for fighters in their late late thirties. Every boxer cuts weight, but if you're 35 and been in a division for a decade doing 2-3 bouts a year you probably area a "natural" in that division. Now factor in trying to go back down if it doesn't work out.

 

To be fair to Finito, he was beating up better guys during his prime than Golovkin was.

Saman alone was better than any Golovkin victim. Ohashi as well.

I'm critical of Lopez, but the Golovkin comparison is kind of a low blow. Finito was the much much greater fighter.

 

I rate Finito as the far greater fighter myself, I just figured him and GGG had a somewhat similar career in terms of dominating one division against no-hopers in their prime.

 

Its valid.

Only thing I would add is, Golovkin BLATANTLY ducked Ward. Almost like he had no shame in avoiding that fight.

There's no proof of Finito flat out blatantly ducking Carbajal/Chiquita like we have of Golov.

 

Yeah, GGG avoiding Ward was embarrassing. Although, TBF, it would've just as embarrassing for GGG if they did fight. There's no way he'd have this 'killer' reputation like he does now.

 

I was a Golovkin fan at the time, and even I said he had no chance.

He had a few delusional fanboys who said he could beat Ward, but most ppl realized Ward would have been too much for him.

Then of course, you had the forum's loyal genius, Slystaff, who around that time was calling Golovkin even money with a prime Hagler.

 

I've unironically seen people pick GGG to KO Monzon, Hagler, Robinson Hopkins and Jones in a round robin.

It's ridiculous how overrated he was, and to some degree, still is.