Walker always impressed me more on film compared to others. Its admittedly hard to assess him without a plethora of footage, but I doubt just any welter/middle would beat him as Whiskey suggested, and as Mister "Joe Brown was nothing special" co-signed.
I'd absolutely favour Robinson, Leonard, Hearns, Gavilan, Burley, Griffith and Rodriguez. He might be too big for Armstrong, Duran and Napoles, but I'd favour those guys too. Prime Britton should absolutely be favoured, since a past prime one actually beat him.
Walker's (no decision) victory over reigning LHW champ Mike McTigue might be the greatest ever scored by a reigning WW champ. Walker weighed only 2 pounds over the WW limit for this fight. Based on this performance, I'd say Walker should be rated no less than 50-50 vs. any WW not named Robinson. Yes, maybe Leonard, Gavilan, or some others might've been able to outspeed or outskill him, but I wouldn't back anyone as a certain favorite to do that.
McTigue was a good fighter, so that win is impressive, but it doesn't take into styles. At welter, he has a number of losses. One to an old Britton, one to Latzo, both who out-boxed him. He also a loss to Dave Shade - and should have two - another fighter who out-boxed him. Even at middleweight, Flowers shoulda beaten him. If you're so inclined (I'm not) to even look at Walker's fights above 160, you can see Loughran befuddling him and using his jab and positioning go essentially win almost every round. All of this leads to me think that Leonard, Burley and Rodriguez are safe bets to win a one off. Even if you look at how McTigue fought Walker the first time, he really troubled Walker with incessant clinchwork, but didn't have the ability to have success outside of the clinch. Somebody like Griffith, who's much better in and out of the clinch than McTigue, would have the perfect style to beat Walker. He didn't really fight anybody I know of like Hearns or the Keed, but I can't watch Walker and safely say to myself that he looks good enough to beat either at their best. Although, the argument does exist if you reverse the lense and look at who Hearns and Gavilan lost to/struggled with. Hearns' loss to Barkley is quite damaging here, since if Barkley can wail in with one of those hooks, and can beat him over the distance years later, so can Walker. I'd have that one 50/50. Gavilan had massive trouble with Carmen Basilio, who I think Walker looked a bit better than. Another fight which stylistically, is Walker's to win. I feel like he may be too big for Napoles and Armstrong, who haven't shown they can beat somebody that good, that big like Duran did. I'd pick Montréal Duran to beat Walker. Armstrong and Napoles are more close fights IMO, based on Walker's size. To me, Walker looks very good, but a notch below the very best in welterweight history.
