Kostya Tszyu-where does he rank?

[wladavit]

Kostya Tszyu was one of my favorites and had a stellar career. One of the few champions in the last twenty years to be undisputed. Where would he be in the all time 63 Kg rankings?

I have him just below Chavez and above Pryor at number 2.

[Scott9945]

Kostya Tszyu was one of my favorites and had a stellar career. One of the few champions in the last twenty years to be undisputed. Where would he be in the all time 63 Kg rankings?

I have him just below Chavez and above Pryor at number 2.

You could find some fighters who stopped at 140 briefly (DLH, Mayweather, etc.) who I might pick H2H over Tszyu, but it is rare that a top fighter spend his entire career at 140 like KT did. He was a hard puncher who was also very skilled. Not unbeatable, but he has to rate very high if you restrict the focus to strictly junior welterweights.

[BennyST]

I think I'd have him top five, but not top three. Chavez, Cervantes, Locche, there are a lot of great guys at 140.

However, he fought a lot of champions, and had some big fights against what was excellent opposition overall, but never truly great. I think he is now underrated. At his very best, he was a very difficult man to fight at 140 and Id pick him over most fighters in history there apart from a choice few.

At his best, he was a good mix of speed, underrated defense and head movement, underrated movement all around actually, and boxing skill. His biggest asset was obviously his power, but he was rarely ever outboxed or out thought. He wasn't just a **** em out power puncher. His biggest problem, apart from some lack of training discipline in a few of his fights and a tendency to train himself, was his gradual move to an over reliance on power punching. It was understandable late in his career when he was getting older and couldn't keep up the movement and combination punching as much, but he had incredible skill, speed and great boxing technique that got hugely under-utilised as his career wore on.

Great fighter that was truly one of the last of his kind ever. A true undisputed king of one division that ruled it entirely and stayed there for his whole career.

Check it out!

[Sugar Adam Ali]

To me, he is one of the most overrated fighters of the past 25 years..

Look at his resume, he doesn't have any historical wins except for maybe Judah..

Dude was a longtime champ in a super weak division..

Stopping ancient Chavez, jake Rodriguez, and shambra mithchell doesn't make you great..


Dude is seriously overrated and shouldn't be top 100


He had skills, no doubt, but would have been smoked by de la Hoya had they fought

[Anthony342]

You could find some fighters who stopped at 140 briefly (DLH, Mayweather, etc.) who I might pick H2H over Tszyu, but it is rare that a top fighter spend his entire career at 140 like KT did. He was a hard puncher who was also very skilled. Not unbeatable, but he has to rate very high if you restrict the focus to strictly junior welterweights.

Nice AJ Lee avatar. Hadn't pegged you as a WWE fan.

[Scott9945]

To me, he is one of the most overrated fighters of the past 25 years..

Look at his resume, he doesn't have any historical wins except for maybe Judah..

Dude was a longtime champ in a super weak division..

Stopping ancient Chavez, jake Rodriguez, and shambra mithchell doesn't make you great..


Dude is seriously overrated and shouldn't be top 100


He had skills, no doubt, but would have been smoked by de la Hoya had they fought

DLH might have beaten KT, but it wouldn't have been an easy fight at all. Tszyu certainly looked better against Miguel Angel Gonzalez.

[Scott9945]

Nice AJ Lee avatar. Hadn't pegged you as a WWE fan.

Had to celebrate her return and title win.

[King of Sting]

Dude is seriously overrated and shouldn't be top 100


He had skills, no doubt, but would have been smoked by de la Hoya had they fought[/QUOTE] If anything you are severely underrating him. I would have picked De La Joto had they fought and I base that on how Kostya looked against Judah prior to the "Chicken Dance". But, De La Joto had his own set of weaknesses that bodes well for they type of fighter Tsyzu was.

[Ray Corso]

Why bring Oscar in to compare, Oscar was a welterweight. Just because someone stops at a weight class for a while doesn't mean he needs to considered there forever. Floyd is a welter now even though in history he will show better at 140 or less against the all time greats at welter.
Tsyzu was a solid contender in history and a modern day champion and a guy who could fight in any era and be respectable. I don't rate him as an ATG and doubt he's in the top fifteen at 140 but that doesn't mean he wasn't a worthy fighter and a crowd pleaser.
I enjoyed his efforts and his style was unique to him. Ray.

[Suckmedry]

I think Kostya gets underrated a bit here. He had fight ending power and a very well developed skill set. I don't really make lists but I'd say he did enough to be a top5 junior welter. He unified the division and had some dominating performances. Didn't beat any greats though, besides ancient Chavez, which holds him back a bit.

Head to head I think he matches up very well at 140. He had superb footwork to cut the ring off and limit space for movers, which is what I think would have made a Floyd fight so interesting. Floyd would have had to deal with his power at some point.