There’s assured, after which there’s cocky, the previous being anticipated of any prizefighter with the center to step into the ring, however the latter taking confidence and turning it right into a spectacle, a show of verbal boldness or dramatic brassiness designed to impress and intimidate. Listed here are the twelve most smug boxers, the pugilists whose demonstrations of disdain for his or her opponents, or overbearing presumption concerning their very own skills, set them aside from their merely assured rivals.
12. Benny Leonard: “The Ghetto Wizard” was an early practitioner of the cleverest psychological ploys and projecting an aura of supreme confidence was one in every of them. His followers cheered with glee when, simply earlier than exiting the ring after one other victory, Leonard smoothed a hand over his undisturbed hairstyle, cockily exhibiting for all to see that his vanquished opponent couldn’t even muss up his hair.
11. Pernell Whitaker: “Candy Pea,” one of many biggest boxers of the final thirty years or extra, and one of many highest southpaws of all time, knew precisely how good he was and didn’t shrink back from letting individuals know. Rightfully pleased with his defensive prowess, he as soon as boasted that if he “didn’t need God to hit [him], He wouldn’t.”
10. Ricardo Mayorga: Whether or not or not “El Matador” had the talents to compete with the perfect didn’t stop him from displaying conceitedness match for a boxing king. Displaying nothing however contempt for his opponents, Mayorga would provide essentially the most vile insults between puffs on a cigarette, his smoking an illustration of his full lack of respect. His cockiness expressed itself within the ring through a wanton disregard for his personal security as he routinely dropped his palms and purposely let fighters corresponding to Vernon Forrest and Felix Trinidad tag him at will.
9. Wilfred Benitez: In his prime this Puerto Rican phenom, dubbed “The Bible of Boxing,” absolutely embodied Latin conceitedness, his haughty demeanor and sneers of contempt, to not point out some all-time nice stare-downs, working to both enrage his opponents or unsettle their nerves. Such was his cockiness, he hardly ever deigned to coach severely, concerning such strenuous exercise as fully pointless. Amazingly, throughout his finest years, he was normally appropriate.
8. Roberto Duran: For years the very picture of Latin machismo and cockiness, Duran preferred to boast of how he couldn’t solely defeat his rivals, but additionally put them within the morgue. His contemptuous sneer turned as a lot part of his ring arsenal as his blistering proper hand, and as soon as he had mastered his opponents, he loved taunting them, as he did Sugar Ray Leonard of their first combat, pointing at his chin and daring Ray to hit him.
7. Roy Jones Jr. From taking part in aggressive basketball on the identical day he defended a world title, to recording his personal rap songs celebrating his pugilistic feats, to verbally dismissing all opponents, Jones was nothing if not the cockiest dude round within the Nineteen Nineties. And for therefore lengthy, he might again his brashness up with one lopsided win after one other.
6. Hector Camacho: Within the early years, “Macho” Camacho developed an unequalled knack for the preening and posturing of a most cocky younger fighter. Along with his loopy costumes, flamboyant type, and shouts of “It’s Macho Time!” the younger Camacho displayed a definite model of Puerto Rican cockiness. He turned a bit extra humble after Edwin Rosario and Julio Cesar Chavez bought completed with him, however by then he had earned his spot on this checklist.
5. Floyd Mayweather Jr. “Cash Mayweather” took the artwork of overbearing conceitedness to new lows together with his Youtube rants, burning cash in public, race-baiting and homophobic feedback, to not point out his flouting of the foundations of the game together with his low-cost pictures of Gatti and Ortiz. After which instantly after his ring performances we bought his trash-talk interviews the place he mocked everybody, verbally abused 80-year-old males, and declared himself the best fighter of all time. Elegant? No. Cocky? You wager.
4. Naseem Hamed: From his unequalled ring entrances, to his tiger-stripe or leopard-spot trunks, to his gyrating hips, to his penchant for speaking of himself within the third individual, the profession of “The Prince” depended as a lot on his cocky, strutting type because it did on his crushing punching energy. A lot so, that after he suffered his first loss, a one-sided drubbing courtesy of Marco Antonio Barrera, he was completed as a prizefighter, his provide of cocky confidence gone for good, alongside together with his profession.
3. John L. Sullivan: The final heavyweight champion of bare-knuckle boxing and the primary of the gloved period, Sullivan epitomized boxing cockiness together with his well-known boast: “I can lick any sonofabitch in the home!” The primary nice American sports activities hero, for a decade he dominated with impunity and his success bred a particular model of cockiness that added to his larger-than-life persona.
2. Jack Johnson: “The Galveston Big” turned the primary black heavyweight champion of the world and maybe no different man had the required nerve to imagine such a conspicuous place and endure all of the hatred and ill-will directed his means by a whole nation. Johnson’s unshakable perception in his personal skills allowed him to reach the face of such animosity, simply as his verbal eloquence and sarcastic mocking of his opponents drove his legion of detractors loopy.
1. Muhammad Ali: No boxer, earlier than or since, elevated so dramatically the entire concept of being cocky. Whether or not, as Cassius Clay, accurately predicting the spherical he would cease an opponent, or as Ali, proudly proclaiming himself “the best of all occasions,” and verbally demolishing his competitors within the build-up to a combat, “The Louisville Lip” personified cockiness and within the course of made himself the largest attraction in boxing.
Honorable Mentions: James J. Corbett, Sam Langford, Jorge Paez, Tyson Fury, Adrien Broner, James Toney, Bernard Hopkins, Andre Ward, Aaron Pryor, Joe Grim, Vinny Pazienza, Sugar Ray Leonard, Tony Galento, Paulie Malignaggi, Mike Tyson, Adonis Stevenson, Battling Siki, Chris Eubank Sr.
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