Vasiliy Lomachenko Threepeats As The BWAA’s Pound-For-Pound King

For the third-straight time, Vasiliy Lomachenko is the BWAA’s pound-for-pound king. This time, however, Lomachenko just barely remained on top, separated by three points from Terence Crawford, who held the No. 1 position for the first two BWAA’s pound-for-pound polls, which are selected by BWAA members from respected news outlets and is broken down based on a descending points system, with a first-place vote receiving 10 points, a second-place vote receiving nine points and so on. Ties go to the fighter with the most votes.

The Boxing Writers Association of America will be listing on a bi-monthly basis its top-10 pound-for-pound fighters in the world. All BWAA members, full and auxiliary, can send their top-10 pound-for-pound votes in by the first Monday of each even month to JSantoliquitoBWAA@yahoo.com. The next deadline will be Monday, October 1, 2018, with the results posted the first week of that month.

The response to this poll was overwhelming. We received more participants for this poll than in any of our previous polls.

Lomachenko, the BWAA’s 2017 Fighter of the Year, received an equal amount of first-place votes as Crawford. The very slight difference came in some voters placing Crawford third in their responses, most of them behind Lomachenko and Gennady Golovkin.

While the top three of Lomachenko, Crawford and Golovkin remain the same, there was a major shakeup in the order, with two fighters, Sergey Kovalev and Keith Thurman, being ousted of the top 10, making room for the debuts of undisputed cruiserweight world champion Oleksandr Usyk, at No. 8, and IBF/WBA/WBO heavyweight champ Anthony Joshua, at No. 10, respectively.

Another major move comes at No. 4, where Mikey Garcia switches places with Errol Spence Jr., who drops to No. 5. WBO junior bantamweight champ Naoya Inoue surges from No. 9 to No. 6, while Srisaket Sor Rungvisai drops from No. 6 to No. 7. Another major change comes at No. 8 where Usyk replaces Canelo Alvarez, who falls from No. 8 to No. 9, and Joshua comes in at 10, replacing Thurman. In the last two polls, Canelo Alvarez has tumbled from No. 4 to No. 9.

Kovalev, after his seventh-round knockout loss to Eleider Alvarez on August 4, drops out of the ratings, while his conqueror, Eleider Alvarez, enters the also-receiving-votes category.

Worth noting is of the 25 fighters receiving votes, four were on every ballot—Lomachenko, Crawford, Golovkin and Garcia.

1. Vasiliy Lomachenko (216 points)

Lightweight

11-1-0 (9 KOs)

2. Terence Crawford (213)

Jr. Welterweight

33-0-0 (24 KOs)

3. Gennady Golovkin (181)

Middleweight

38-0-1 (34 KOs)

4. Mikey Garcia (160)

Lightweight

39-0-0 (30 KOs)

5. Errol Spence Jr. (131)

Welterweight

24-0-0 (21 KOs)

6. Naoya Inoue (106)

Jr. Bantamweight

16-0-0 (14 KOs)

7. Srisaket Sor Rungvisai (105)

Junior Bantamweight

46-4-1 (41 KOs)

8. Oleksandr Usyk (98)

Cruiserweight

15-0-0 (11 KOs)

9. Canelo Alvarez (87)

Middleweight

49-1-2 (34 KOs)

10. Anthony Joshua (70)

Heavyweight

21-0-0 (20 KOs)

Also receiving votes: Deontay Wilder (55 points), Keith Thurman (52), Leo Santa Cruz (49), Manny Pacquiao (48), Erislany Lara (45), Dmitriy Bivol (44), Eleider Alvarez (44), Shawn Porter (43), Donnie Nietes (43), Danny Garcia (43), Regis Prograis (43), Jarrett Hurd (42), Jermall Charlo (42), Jermell Charlo (41), Danny Jacobs (41).