WAYS OF RANKING FIGHTERS

This is a never ending question of mine. It seems to me, at least today, that the objective tools one has to work with are (in no order)

-lineal/Ring titles
-alphabet belts
-Ring rankings of fighters fought and beaten. Not that Ring is objective, but that it seems like the most useful ranking source to use repeatedly in analysis
-Record-again, not truly objective in judged fights, but if we throw out the record book the whole think kind falls apart
-HOFers fought and beaten-Again, not truly objective but it can be consistently applied anyway. Tougher for active fighters.

Those are the things I rely on at the moment with HOFers and ranked guys and lineal titles being given the most weight.

But there are other possible tools

-Using one's eyes, who do you think could beat who?
-Ranking Eras rather than accepting all eras as equal
-Relying on authorities like IBRO/Bert Sugar/Ring Magazine
-Ranking fighting styles

Right now I think the first is sheer guesswork, the second is just too hard, relying on authorities is just no fun and ranking styles seems to me like arguing what flavor of ice cream is best.

But I am here to be educated! What am I missing? Where am I wrong? What tools do you use that I may have left out?

I honestly go by my own eyes

I normally think the Ring is the best way to go

but there are times when I disagree

for instance I had a beef with when Nate Campbell won what the IBF, WBC, and WBO titles from Juan Diaz, 5 years prior that would have made him Ring champ, but since they already got invested in the Joel Casamayor game, they were stuck

I personally recognized Nate Campbell as the legit Lightweight Champ of the world

I also think Vitali Klitschko is the best heavyweight, and I thought Shane Mosley was the Welter champ after beating Margarito

i think that sometimes we dont rank through ours eyes enough. all of your points are valid and true though. i think that since if we are actually ranking its all opinion anyways, thats what we should be judging off of.

How about performances and bad decisions ?