Naoya Inoue Is The Best Fighter In Boxing.

[BenjaminLinus]

I'm quite an Inoue fan (to say it very mildly) but I am fully willing to accept that people have their own definition of "best" and there isn't always an obvious right or wrong when it comes to P4P discussions. However, one thing I'm quite confident to say is that out of the top P4P guys, Inoue by far is the most active, constantly willing to take on big fights even for his first fight going up, and is willing to fight anyone with a belt involved.

Of the guys that get mentioned in top ten P4P talks, off the top of my head:

• Crawford FINALLY fought a guy who was in the same weight class for SIX YEARS for the undisputed. He's probably not fighting again until sometime middle of next year.
• Usyk MIGHT fight Fury next year after Fury's joke of an exhibition match is over and he's not too tired from it according to his promoter, which I have a below zero confidence that it will actually occur until after the match actually occurs and ends with an actual result (granted that is more of Fury's fault and not Usyk).
• Canelo most recently fought a guy who moved up from 154 at 168, and still hasn't fought Benavidez who is considered the second best guy in his current division. Doesn't seem like he is going to rematch Bivol in 168 or 175, nor challenge Beterbiev in 175 any time soon.
• Beterbiev/Bivol also has outside factor hurting the situation, but seems like neither is eagerly begging to get that undisputed unification against each other. Fights about once a year with luck.
• Spence just got OWNED by Crawford in his only weight class he's ever been in. Should be moving up to 154 but who knows what is going on with him.
• Everyone knows that Tank Davis is not fighting anyone who has more than a 10% chance of winning against him it seems, and will have a full year break since last fight at this rate. Still "real" beltless at 135 (not really a believer of "Regular" when someone already has the "Super" above you).
• Shakur is atleast TRYING to fight top names, but misjudging his own worth or putting other agendas above creating legacy too much. Still think he should've considered the big picture and accepted the crummy "offer" from Haney and taken his undisputed lightweight belts when he had the chance, would've been much easier to find opponents in the long run.
• Haney was very lucky to even been the undisputed lightweight champion. Going up to 140 without fighting Tank and Shakur and Teo (when he was at 135), and dodged Teo again for his first fight at 140 to go for the guy that looked the worst in his last match as the "best guy".

By comparison, Inoue has:

• Fought in a world title match against a champion (not sliding into a vacant hole) and won at his 6th match as a pro, when he was 20 years old
• Jumped up two divisions from 108 to 115 and fought a champion for his first fight and won (his 8th match as a pro)
• Couldn't get an unification match scheduled at 115 due to various unfortunate circumstances, so after 7 defenses just jumped up to 118 and fought "Regular" champ to win a belt so he can join WBSS to beat the other champions
• Won the WBSS Bantamweight
• Fought against 4 different champions all himself (5 including "Regular" belt) to go undisputed in 118 before going up to 122
• Fought the No. 1 ranked undefeated unified champion of 122 for his first match going up and destroyed him instead of looking for an easy tune-up match
• Since his first world title match at 6th match, he has had 20 straight world title matches (will be 21 including the Tapales) of which he fought 8 world champions at the time of the match (9 with Tapales)
• Random trivia, but of the current 118 champions that won after he moved up, two he defeated while Inoue was at bantam (Rodriguez/Moloney) and another is his younger brother who he (probably) defeated multiple times since his childhood.

He's by and far the most dominant fighter in boxing as well going 10 years and 146 rounds only to lose a handful of close and competitive ones.

[-Kev-]

What about when Inoue beats Tapales? Will that push him over Crawford?

Why would beating Tapales put him over Crawford? In his last 5 fights, he’s 4-1 with a TKO loss, his second stoppage loss. Never avenged any of his losses.

Is Tapales supposed to be a career defining win?

[hugh grant]

Why would beating Tapales put him over Crawford? In his last 5 fights, he’s 4-1 with a TKO loss, his second stoppage loss. Never avenged any of his losses.

Is Tapales supposed to be a career defining win?

Bud needs to best Tim/charlo to be in discussion with inoue Its like bud fans don't think bud can do it? If you think he can, be patient, bu d can be a genuine pfp no1 in near future. People want instant gratification nowadays. A spence win isn't worth 2 weight classes of credit in the real world
Wouldn't you rather it be a genuine claim to be no1 , rather than a reaching for a guy claim?

[Elheath]

Also, Inoue's time in 115 where he missed out on the notable names were a result of various unfortunate circumstances occurring in succession, and just simply the timing not working out. In the approximately three years Inoue was at 115, his timeline was like this:

• Dec 30th, 2014 Went up to 115 for a chance to challenge WBO champ Omar Narvaez for his first fight. Dropped him in R1 then knocked him out in R2 to win his second belt, but had injured his hand in the process, sidelining him for a while.
• While Inoue was injured, WBO had Warlito Parrenas and David Carmona have an eliminator fight to see who gets to fight Inoue for the belt when he returns. The match was a draw, so Inoue decided to fight them both for his next two matches anyway.
• Dec 29, 2025 defeated Warlito Parrenas.
• May 8, 2016 defeated David Carmona.
• Inoue wanted to fight Chocolatito when he came up to 115 during the second half of 2016, but Chocolatito refused because "the money wasn't good as Inoue was unknown in the US" and chose to fight Carlos Cuadras for his WBC belt instead.
• Sep 4, 2016 defeated Petchbarngborn Kokietgym, bluntly put it was a placeholder match because he couldn't score a fight with Chocolatito.
• Estrada moved up to 115 in October, will fight a few non-title matches as a tune up.
• Dec 30, 2016 defeated Kohei Kono in the usual end of year boxing party. Minor trivia, but his brother Takuma was scheduled to fight none other than Marlon Tapales that night for his title but withdrew due to injury.
• Chocolatito lost his title in March of 2017 against Sor Rungvisai. The dream for an unification match against Chocolatito later that year sidelined.
• May 21, 2017 Ricardo Rodriguez because he wanted to fight someone. Has his US debut scheduled and hopes it leads to chances for an unification fight in the future.
• Sep 9 2017 fought Antonio Nieves for his US debut as an undercard of Chocolatito-Sor Rungvisai rematch. Estrada-Cuadras eliminator match was also at same undercard. Had Chocolatito won the rematch, Inoue might have been able to slide in an unification with him for his next match, but Chocolatito lost the rematch.
• Dec 30, 2017 defeated Yoan Boyeaux because Inoue's one last attempt to get a unification match with the other champions or a fight scheduled with Chocolatito failed. Estrada and Sor Rungvisai were already occupied for a clash in February of 2018 (which Estrada lost)
• Minor note, Estrada lost the challenge for the title against Sor Rungvisai on February 2018.
• May 25, 2018 Went up to 118 to defeat Jamie McDonnell, so he can gain a belt and fight in the WBSS later in the year and the rest is history. COVID effed his plans by like a year or two, but still managed to go undisputed albeit a few good opponents missed out. In 122, all his work finally is paying off and as the biggest money guy in the lower weights, he can get other champions to easily accept a fight by the power of the purse. Trying to finally tie up some of the loose ends like Nery and Casimero before going up to 126.

[-Kev-]

Bud needs to best Tim/charlo to be in discussion with inoue Its like bud fans don't think bud can do it? If you think he can, be patient, bu d can be a genuine pfp no1 in near future. People want instant gratification nowadays. A spence win isn't worth 2 weight classes of credit in the real world
Wouldn't you rather it be a genuine claim to be no1 , rather than a reaching for a guy claim?

I’m not a Crawford fan. Quite the opposite, i’m one of his very vocal haters on here.

So you’ll need to ask this question to his fans.