Arguello at Featherweight and Lightweight

Definitely not. He didn't do enough and wasn't good enough at either weight IMO. He was a very raw fighter at 126, very left-hook happy, one-handed almost. Olivares was out-boxing him, I felt, basically because he was intelligent enough to stay away from the left hook, Arguello just kept swinging away and the first one that landed was enough to take Olivares out. That Arguello would be outboxed by most of the greats at 126, I feel, especially with his defensive liabilities. He was a much more developed ring general later on in his career after moving up and getting the experience at 130/135, and much more defensively solid where before he was about as difficult to hit as a cow's arse. I have no idea why Mante thinks he was a better fighter at 126.

However, he does have a shot against literally anyone H2H at 126-130 purely because he did have that kind of intolerable, show-stopping power which would have been enough to put pretty much anyone away.

 

Look at Arguello here. Look how green he is. Look how he virtually only uses one arm, how ponderous his feet are, how easily he gets countered. He was a far cry from the fighter that was duelling Pryor at a ferocious pace and high operating level in 1982.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NDdVlkK6XqA[/ame]

 

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-v8OWuq0FsQ[/ame]


Arguello's last fight at 126 lbs.

 

That was against Olivares, one of the best fighters of the era. Here are some other fights of his at Featherweight. FYI, his feet were a lot more ponderous at higher weights, so I don't really understand why you'd bring that into the equation. He was mostly always a flat-footed fighter, outside of his Featherweight days, really.

He doesn't look very green here, just a year after the Olivares bout. In fact he looks about as good as I've ever seen him, especially with those so-called "ponderous feet".

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@ him being a better fighter against Pryor at 140.

 

That doesn't excuse a lot of the flaws I pointed out. I guess you'd probably say he was in his prime against Marcel as well?

I'm aware of these fights. I'd agree that he improved considerably post-Olivares, but he still wasn't prime there. I'd say his absolute walloping of Rey Tam was probably a better performance of the kind he put in against Kobayashi - better co-ordinated punching and he hardly gets hit back IIRC. It doesn't appear to be on YouTube. Perhaps I shall upload it.

I'm not trying to claim he was up and jiving in the higher weights. I was referring to such habits as of falling in after throwing a shot and failing to position himself correctly. Again, that was something he improved upon later in his career.

So you think he was better against Olivares than against Pryor?

Obviously 140 wasn't Arguello's best weight; he lost power, weight, size and other advantages. What I'm claiming is that he had a better skillset at that stage of his career than he did at 126.

 

No doubt. Add his skills to these and you get a great fighter.

Well, I could probably count on my right hand the number of those he threw. He had a good, strong left hand, no doubt, but throwing it constantly (even when it's not on) does make you a little predictable. It wasn't the sharp display of punching he put on in the middle rounds of Escalera II or vs. Rey Tam.

I'd agree. In fact, I think that Olivares layed the blueprint for everyone else to follow: Pretty much every challenger of Arguello's - even fighters who were usually on the front foot - spent most of their time circling because of his reputation.

Yeah, but Arguello was doing a lot of missing with his power shots until the 13th. I was a little surprised about the way Olivares went down, to be honest. He certainly didn't have Escalera's guts.

Yes.

Right, but the question is whether he got any better after that. I think he did.

I'd agree there also, although his defence obviously improved too. He was getting hit by just about everything early in his career, whereas could pick most things off with his guard later on.

 

I've got to go now so I'll reply to this tomorrow. Mental note: Vilomar Fernandez fight

 

Yes.

 

GP, only really just got the chance to get back to you.

Well I guess I just disagree with you on that one, then. Like I said, the fact that he only really threw the left hook, slow getting off and spotting opportunities, made a lot of technical mistakes in getting out of position etc. - all indicates to me that he was as green as I've seen an ATG fighter. He got much better after Olivares, even if he didn't hit his peak at FW.

Well, to an extent I think that's a natural talent, though he certainly looked better there in terms of punch variety and accuracy which was my main complaint. The other aspects of him being green though - learning where to the opportunities were for his counters, setting up shots - I don't think he'd quite mastered them at that stage, that came later into his career at 130.

I haven't seen much of either of them. Kobayashi may be the more effective fighter but he definitely falls short of the mark technically for me.

Some of them, yeah, but he was still learning at 130 IMO. He was totally outmanoeuvred by Vilomar Fernandez of all people - a good fighter who had beaten other good fighters like Ray Lampkin, but not Floyd Mayweather by any means. I think he learned certain things in that fight, and certainly looked to me to be a more intelligent fighter afterwards. Again, maybe you disagree.

Well, things like handspeed and spotting opportunities are roughly constant across opponents. He faced faster attacks from Escalera and Pryor much later on and dealt with them better.

Vilomar Fernandez totally out-boxed him with that strategy. Granted it probably wasn't the best version of Arguello, but he said he'd trained determinedly and still was beaten to the punch and turned on his axis.

Compare how Duran handled Fernandez - the guy hardly got a look in, despite running enough to make the fight ugly, IIRC.

I never said Olivares doesn't have guts, obviously he was a tough cookie. But he certainly wasn't stretched out by punishment in the way most of Arguello's KO victims were. Escalera, for instance, took an obscene amount of punishment, and came out looking like he'd shoved his head through a meat grinder, to which his only response was to step up the aggression and throw more punches.

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Yeah. It's an important improvement.

The Olivares fight shows him being very weak defensively. I would say he was better defensively in his later title defences at 130 and above the weight, and he probably started to drop off a bit once he fought Pryor, though that's being very picky. Like you said, he was never particularly difficult to hit, but he was worryingly easy to hit vs. Olivares.

 

You seem to base your entire perception of his Featherweight career on the Olivares fight, Itry. Give the Leonel Hernandez fight a watch as well, when you get the chance, to see how matured he had already become at the weight.