The end of the year came just hours ago, and the final pound-for-pound rankings were in place. If you go by the Ring Magazine rankings (and if you don’t, why not?), Oleksandr Usyk saw out 2022 as The Man. The best. The finest all-round boxer in the world right now. Usyk, like most of the big names of the sport, fought just once last year, this his repeat win over former heavyweight champ Anthony Joshua.
But Usyk’s skills, along with his combined body of work, were enough to see him placed at the top of the pile. Maybe you agree with Usyk being ranked at number one, maybe you don’t.
Happy New Year!
Here are the full P-4-P rankings from Ring as 2022 reached its end:
1: Oleksandr Usyk
2: Naoya Inoue – bantamweight: fought twice this year, made history in becoming the first man to win all major titles in this, the four-belt era. Took out Nonito Donaire in their rematch, then caught up with and stopped Paul Butler to add the WBO belt to his three other titles.
3: Terence Crawford – welterweight: fought once this year, scoring a KO of the Year candidate with his crushing win over David Avanesyan
4: Errol Spence – welterweight: fought once this year, scoring a 10th round TKO over Yordenis Ugas to unify three of the titles at 147 pounds.
5: Canelo Alvarez – super-middleweight/light-heavyweight: fought twice this year, losing a decision to Dmitry Bivol at 175 pounds, and decisioning rival Gennady Golovkin to close out their trilogy, in so doing retaining his four 168 pound belts.
6: Dmitry Bivol – light-heavyweight: fought twice this year, upsetting Canelo to retain his WBA light-heavyweight title, and decisioning Gilberto Ramirez to retain his belt.
7: Vasiliy Lomachenko – lightweight: fought once this year, decisioning Jamaine Ortiz in a competitive fight.
8: Josh Taylor – light-welterweight: fought once this year, winning an extremely debatable and controversial decision over Jack Catterall.
9: Jermell Charlo – light-middleweight: fought once this year, scoring a 10th round stoppage over Brian Castano in their rematch, retaining his three 154 pound belts and winning the WBO title.
10: Juan Francisco Estrada – super flyweight: fought twice this year, defeating Argi Cortes to retain his Ring super flyweight title, then beating Roman Gonzalez to win their trilogy, winning the vacant WBC super fly title.
So, how do YOU rate Ring Magazine’s final pound-for-pound rankings of 2022?
Who will be the modern-day king of kings this time next year?
