Breaking Down Each Boxing Weight Class | News, Scores, Highlights, Stats, and Rumors

Boxing's 17 total weight classes span all the way from the diminutive 105-pound dynamos to the 200-, 300-pound heavyweight monsters. Designed to limit the number of mismatches between opponents of different sizes, over the years the number of weight classes has grown from the original eight divisions (flyweight, bantamweight, featherweight, lightweight, welterweight, middleweight, junior middleweight and heavyweight) to the 17 divisions used today.

In theory, this creates a safer environment for competitive boxing matches and offers a chance for fighters who would otherwise be a tad too small or a tad too large for one of the original divisions to become champions.

Here, Bleacher Report breaks down each weight class as it stands today, noting the historically great fighters who are lauded by historians as the division's best ever as well as the news-making fighters competing there today.