Top 100 Favorite Boxing Matches: Introduction
I would like to think the title is self-explanatory, though I suppose it deserves a preface. I consider myself an enthusiast of combat sports history. Seeing these competitors engage in high-stakes meetings that check the many boxes of sports entertainment is one thing, but I’ve always been drawn to how it’s simultaneously surreal to witness whilst being incredibly humanizing. That is, watching fights is to feel in awe of these people who do things that the average person struggles to fathom, yet you find yourself equally invested because, in some way, you see who they are as human beings. Even if the action has its own appeal, I want to say this is what drew me to combat sports.
Boxing is one of the more storied catalogs in that we are missing many pieces to this day. Viewing boxing matches as just fisticuffs would be reductionistic - you are looking at some of the most talented, dogged, and enduring pugilists to ever live. To me, the best thing we can do is remember them through their greatest moments - and that often is the bouts they were in that tell their own tales.
So, why make this project? To say the least, I’d like to think of myself as someone knowledgeable about historically good contests - and have attempted to put in the work to find them. I’m no historian or collector, yet I would say I am informed enough to be confident here. I also find that, despite there being an appreciation for boxing’s best nights, we also have a good number that are lost to time or undiscovered. That is, you can only see the same lists so many times with the same selections, even if many of the choices are agreeable. That’s why, one, I wanted to make this project to focus on a wider spectrum of epics that include the acclaimed and the unknown - and, subsequently, two, help draw eyes towards the latter category because there is so much that remains undervalued.
I also want to emphasize as well that, whilst I think I am confident in my views, creating an unbiased list is impossible here - and that I realized that wasn’t a negative. If anything else, if someone reads my list and disagrees, it gives them the opportunity to see what I’ve shared and perhaps make their own. I did make some attempt at asking myself if one bout was genuinely better to me than the one before it, but I can only shrug and admit it came down to preferences - and many of mine are definitely not the norm.
This will mean that there are bouts that are genuinely exceptional that I will not include out of personal discomfort due to their endings or consequences, namely Emile Griffith vs Benny Paret III or Nigel Benn vs Gerald McClellan. I can vouch for their quality, yet viewer discretion is obviously advised.
And even then, the astounding thing about boxing history is that there are a myriad of incredible fights to the point that narrowing the list to even just one-hundred means you are leaving out many. To give you some insight, here are some that didn’t make the cut that still have my highest of recommendations:
Micky Ward vs Emmanuel Augustus
Francisco Vargas vs Orlando Salido
Kusuo Eguchi vs Katsuaki Eguchi
Tyson Fury vs Deontay Wilder III
Dick Tiger vs Henry Hank
Yes, you as a reader here are dealing with A) a confirmed hipster and B) genuinely that level of depth as far as fights go.
There are some rules:
1) There must be some amount of footage available, meaning none where we don’t have footage.
2) I’ve had to watch all of these at least twice before making this list.
I also want to say, for those who’ve followed my work, namely technical breakdowns, you’re likely to not find that here. I’m also not going to be able to capture the full historical contexts, though I can only promise to try. My real purpose here is that of appreciative tribute.
Regardless though, I really do hope you take the time to watch these. If anything else, I want this to be a celebration of boxing’s history. Thank you for following along!