Boxing Pound-for-Pound list: Nakatani hits the top 10, Tank Davis out

March 2024

The voters: Scott Christ, Wil Esco, John Hansen, Patrick Stumberg, and Lewis Watson

Dropped Out: Gervonta “Tank” Davis (10)
Others Receiving Votes: Jaron “Boots” Ennis 5, David Benavidez 2, Geronta “Tank” Davis 1

Scott Christ

(1) Naoya Inoue, (2) Terence Crawford, (3) Oleksandr Usyk, (4) Dmitry Bivol, (5) Artur Beterbiev, (6) Devin Haney, (7) Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez, (8) Junto Nakatani, (9) Kenshiro Teraji, (10) Canelo Alvarez

I’ve had some changes in heart the last couple months. Last month, I dropped Tank Davis a few spots. This month, Tank Davis is out. My issue is split. One thing is Tank just isn’t doing anything, and frankly shows no ambition to go after the best fights he can. Hey, that’s his prerogative, and if this were the dollar-for-dollar list, he’s top tier. But it isn’t. Enough coverage of boxing is forced to be about the short-sighted carny business aspect.

For once, I just want to talk about what’s happening in the ring.

And that’s where you get to the other stuff: Guys like Bam Rodriguez, Junto Nakatani, and Kenshiro Teraji are just going out there and doing it. You could argue Canelo Alvarez is slipping into the current Tank territory, but Canelo has far greater history and accomplishments, too, and that’s what keeps him hanging on at No. 10 for me, for now.

But Canelo’s on relatively thin ice, too. I think Tank is a tremendous talent, I think Canelo is still an outstanding fighter, but there are other people out there who are raising their stock while these guys sit stagnant.

This is also why Terence Crawford has slipped to No. 2 for me. I kind of had (and have) Inoue and Crawford as 1A and 1B in my mind, because I think Crawford is genuinely great. But so is Inoue, and Inoue is the guy out there fighting. Inoue will fight again on May 6, making it three fights since last July, the last time Crawford fought, and the only time he fought in 2023. So if one or the other deserves a tiebreaker, I’m going with Inoue at this point.

Nakatani comes in for me, winning world titles in three divisions the way he has is genuinely impressive and he’s a terrific fighter.

Wil Esco

(1) Terence Crawford, (2) Naoya Inoue, (3) Oleksandr Usyk, (4) Dmitry Bivol, (5) Artur Beterbiev, (6) Jaron “Boots” Ennis, (7) Canelo Alvarez, (8) Devin Haney, (9) Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez, (10) Kenshiro Teraji

Been giving this some thought and while I do think Gervonta Davis is an extremely talented fighter, I just can’t continually give him a pass considering his general level of opposition, with no real desire to even contend for the major world titles which would entail the biggest threats to him. He drops off and Kenshiro Teraji is in.

John Hansen

(1) Naoya Inoue, (2) Terence Crawford, (3) Oleksandr Usyk, (4) Dmitry Bivol, (5) Artur Beterbiev, (6) Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez, (7) Devin Haney, (8) Kenshiro Teraji, (9) David Benavidez, (10) Junto Nakatani

Real bummer losing Usyk vs Fury from the February calendar. Not a lot else to shake up the standings this month. Nakatani looked good, but I moved him in last month to look clever before the other guys did, but still hopefully early enough that people won’t remember Stumberg did it first out of us all.

So, no changes for me, but I’m curious to see how many colleagues keep Canelo in their top 10 this month. Justice for David Benavidez!

Patrick Stumberg

(1) Naoya Inoue, (2) Terence Crawford, (3) Oleksandr Usyk, (4) Canelo Alvarez, (5) Dmitry Bivol, (6) Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez, (7) Artur Beterbiev, (8) Junto Nakatani, (9) Devin Haney, (10) Kenshiro Teraji

What did I say? What did I say about Junto Nakatani?

In all seriousness, torching Santiago like that went above even my expectations. There’s no doubt in my mind that, given the opportunity, Nakatani will run roughshod over all his fellow bantamweight champs.

As for the rest, we’re probably not going to see much movement for the next couple of months unless Ryan Garcia somehow flips the script on Devin Haney in April. Kosei Tanaka’s getting close to the fringe, but he’ll need a few more good wins before I’m ready to rank him with his countrymen.

Lewis Watson

(1) Naoya Inoue, (2) Terence Crawford, (3) Oleksandr Usyk, (4) Devin Haney, (5) Artur Beterbiev, (6) Dmitry Bivol, (7) Canelo Alvarez, (8) Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez, (9) Kenshiro Teraji, (10) Gervonta Davis

No movement in February in the month that we should have seen Fury vs Usyk. Nakatani was the star of the month and is the closest to breaking into the top 10. Junto looks a special fighter, underlining that in his pummeling of Santiago last week and at 26 has the world at his feet.