Sugar Ray Robinson Went 91 Fights Without a Loss

Sugar Ray Robinson went 91 consecutive fights over nine years without being beaten, taking his record to 128-1-2. He finished 173-19-6 with 109 knockouts, and held world titles at welterweight and five separate times at middleweight.

The phrase pound for pound was invented to describe him, because sportswriters needed a way to say he was the best fighter alive regardless of what he weighed. He turned professional in 1940 and fought until 1965, taking on all comers at a rate modern fighters do not approach: in some years he fought more times than a current champion fights in five.

The 91-fight streak is the statistic that has no modern parallel. Nine years, against the deepest talent pool the welterweight and middleweight divisions have ever had, without a single defeat. His one loss in that stretch of his career came from Jake LaMotta in 1943, and Robinson then beat LaMotta in each of their next four meetings, finishing the series 5-1.

The last of those, in 1951, is known as the St. Valentine Day Massacre. LaMotta was a middleweight champion famous for never having been knocked down, and Robinson beat him so comprehensively in the later rounds that the referee stopped it with LaMotta still upright on the ropes, refusing to fall.

What makes him the reference point rather than merely a great champion is the absence of a weakness. Speed, power in both hands, footwork, defense, and the ability to finish: every other all-time fighter has an attribute they were merely very good at. Floyd Mayweather retired 50-0 and was the finest defensive technician of the modern era, though against a thinner field and at a much lower fight frequency. Willie Pep won 229 fights and was close to unhittable. Henry Armstrong held three world titles simultaneously.

Mayweather has the unbeaten record and the argument that Robinson's 19 defeats would end a modern career. But most of those losses came after 40, in an era when fighters kept going, and no one has ever assembled Robinson's combination of skills in one person.

The verdict: Sugar Ray Robinson. The standard every other fighter is measured against.