At super fly. Thinking Tapia of '96/97 and Gonzalez right when he made the jump. More interested in how their styles pan out. Thoughts? Result?
Chocolatito, Tapia is tailor made for him Mi vida loca makes it to the end tho I share a birthday with Tapia
Aha! I think Johnny is a far better boxer than given credit for. When disciplined inside the ring, he was pretty water tight. And when Roman went up to 115, his aura started to fade quickly. This would be something of a crossroads bout.
Chocolatito wins this in a war. Tapia has speed in his advantage but he gets too easily drawn into a brawl which will favor Chocolatito. Terrific match up.
Gonzalez takes down the stretch after a decent start from Tapia. Gonzalez had excellent stamina and was able to keep up a set pace, combinations/punch selection, brilliant at closing off the ring, had an underrated jab at closing the distance, and could get punches off from any position and always felt like he was on balance. You had to be able to put a dent in him to keep him off, otherwise he’d surely break you down on route to either taking it down the stretch and winning on points, or stopping you late, and I just don’t think Tapia had wha it takes to keep him off, despite being skilled with fast hands, but I do believe he starts well, landing fast combinations, but Gonzalez would make him work more than he wants to, and would inevitable slow him down and he’d become more hittable, then Gonzalez goes through the gears.
Remember kids, this is at 115 lbs, Tapia's best weight and certainly not Chocolatito's best weight. I'm going with prime Tapia to Dec. Gonzalez.
Agreed with this, Seamus. I'm surprised at all the Choco picks here. Choco wasn't quite the same terminator at 115 as he was at 108 and 112. Neither did he have the power. A disciplined Tapia outboxes him 8-4 imo. He's one of the few that can outwork Choco whilst also having the superior reflexes and foot speed. Also note that Tapia dealt with big punchers at even higher weights e.g. Konadu. Choco won't bother him with single shots, and will struggle to flow his combinations here against the quickness and rhythm changes of Tapia. Tapia at his best is, for me, one of the premier 115 talents alongside Watanabe and Gilberto Roman. Awesome, awesome ability at his best.
He was so good when he was on. That's how I like to remember him. One of my faves from back in the day.
Yeah, he was amazing. I loved how he could go from classic upright boxing into unorthodox brawling, all whilst keeping up his activity and defensive reflexes. People picking Choco should go over the Cuadras bout again and see how Choco struggled there. Cuadras had a somewhat similar reflexive style but Tapia at his best was far, far superior to Cuadras in ability and technical schooling.
You know that is an excellent point, while I'd still go with Choco I do that with little confidence and have no problem with those picking Tapia to win .
