Tough to say. Choco never faced an opponent as good as Yuri at flyweight, but Gonzalez did seem like the more special talent. I'd take Chocolatito in a competitive fight.
Very tough fight to call. Gonzalez was greater but Yuri might be the better of the two by a small margin and neither faced anyone quite as good as the other with both of them having attributes that bothered one another. I think a lot would hinge on whether or not Arbachakov could dictate the pace and prevent Roman from imposing his will. He sometimes struggled a bit to do so despite having a vast armoury as a boxer-puncher and not being vulnerable to any one style per se. Gonzalez is gonna push him like no other in that regard, subjecting him to a heavy skilled pressure that he never faced. Somewhat unusually for a top Eastern European amateur, Arbachakov integrated his defence and offense pretty well and was a good counter puncher. Very good at ditching the first punch and quickly firing back, especially with his right. He was a sublime judge and controller of distance too and had superb footwork. Had that Robinsonesque ability to counter on the move and set his feet in an instant to catch people coming in with full force, a crucial tool against Gonzalez. He'd need to do it at a high pace though and follow up consistently with his full range of punches in combination to keep Gonzalez shelled up and not gaining forward momentum where he was at his best. Estrada mixed up leading and countering on Gonzalez with furious workrate to keep Gonzalez guessing but had to go to the brink to do so, and it still wasn't quite enough. Arbachakov was a better fighter than Estrada imo but didn't have his mindset or determination, being content to just do enough and not make full use of his arsenal, especially his left hook. He has the tools to drive Gonzalez back but I'm not sure he would. A **** or get off the pot scenario really. I'd love to see the battle for control with Arbachakov's footwork and distance control vs Gonzalez's smoothz accurate pressure cutting off the ring btw. I do think though that Arbachakov is the puncher of the two at fly, which might swing things when coupled with his accuracy to maybe compensate for his one pacedness a bit. Gonzalez was more of an attritional puncher above light fly and had to work much harder to impose himself. He managed to by being such a special fighter but Arbachakov had an iron chin. I still can't choose tbh. **** it, they'd split a series.
Great Post again tin ribs. Going with my gut, I think I'd actually pick Roman. I think he'd just force it a bit more than Yuri would wanna force back, if you know what i mean. As you said, Yuri could be complacent with his arsenal.
