20 James Toney
THIS hugely gifted American was one of the best fighters in the 1990s and the naughties. The slick, shoulder-rolling Michigan man was a brilliant middleweight who drew with and then defeated Mike McCallum, while also defeating Michael Nunn, Reggie Johnson, Iran Barkley and Tony Thornton. In 2003 he lit up the cruiserweight division with a win over Vassily Jirov for the IBF title and destroyed Holyfield at heavyweight.
19 Vitali Klitshcko
CRUDER and more durable than brother Wladimir, Vitali lost just twice, when tearing his rotator cuff against Chris Byrd and when badly cut by Lennox Lewis. Aside from that, he was a dominant force who stopped an astonishing 41 of 45 victims but unfortunately was plagued by injuries later in his career.
18 Michael Carbajal
CARBAJAL’S career spanned from 1989-1999 and all of his top work was done in the last 25 years. A first-ballot Hall-of-Famer, the little man from Phoenix, dubbed “Little Hands of Stone” won the IBF light-flyweight title in 1990, and beat Humberto Gonzalez in a 1993 unification. He went out on a high, beating the up-and-coming Jorge Arce for the WBO belt in 1999.
17 Wladimir Klitshcko
HOW a fighter returns from a setback is often the mark of his championship pedigree. After defeats to Lamon Brewster and Corrie Sanders he subsequently dominated at heavyweight. He has arguably not had a defining fight but landslides over David Haye, Alexander Povetkin, Kubrat Pulev, Sam Peter, Tony Thompson and Hasim Rahman exhibited his vast qualities.
16 Oscar De La Hoya
PERHAPS no other boxer better represented the ‘90s than De La Hoya but the criticism of the East LA icon will always be that he lost the big ones. Some of those losses were controversial, though. Turn the close defeat to Felix Trinidad around, reverse the second loss to Shane Mosley, and say he managed to hang on for a draw against Floyd Mayweather and you have a much-enhanced résumé compared to the one he retired with.
