Best H2H fighter in his prime: ¿Chavez Sr. or Salvador Sanchez?

Chavez.

 

Sanchez didn't live long enough to reach his physical prime.

 

I’d have to respectfully disagree there. When you start your pro career at 15, the idea of a “physical prime“ becomes a bit skewed. I’ve always held the belief that one has a set number of years as a pro before they start sliding, that number varying here and there of course. He’d been a professional fighter for eight years already at that point. He might well have been headed OUT of his prime.

 

How many, if any, boxers in history reached their prime at 23? Hell,even in another sport?

Can't agree with you on this one, amigo.

 

Benitez and Cuevas, off the top of my head. O’Grady……..the one thing they all had in common was turning pro in their mid-teens.

 

I don't think the 'physical prime' has much to do with the prime years of a fighter's career, especially if the fighter started very young. It is very likely, in a case like that, that a fighter can hit his peak as a fighter in his early 20s and be washed up by 27.
However you look at it, Chavez would have stopped Sanchez.

 

Chavez IMO

 

Chavez.

 

C H A V E Z

 

It's in fact probably the norm for the lower weight greats to reach their physical primes by 23. For instance, the two best Asian boxer pre-Manny are probably Fighting Harada and Jung-koo Chang. Harada was likely his best by the Jofre fights, and he had just turned 23 by the second Jofre tilt; likewise, the last time we saw anything resembling the prime Chang was in the third Torres fight, when he had just turned 23. Sanchez is a bit bigger than those two, but he's much closer to them than he is to, say, Usyk. Also, you have to remember fighters in those days fought and even sparred more often, against better opposition.

 

All good points. Lower weight classes definitely reach a peak at much younger ages than heavier weights.

 

Sanchez as I feel his ability to adjust would be the difference.
It would be a very close bout.

 

I do think it's possible though. Morales, Canelo and Barrera started at 15 and didn't decline so young - Chavez iirc was 16 or 17 and the same for him. Something those Mexicans put in their water is potent. Or beef in the case of Canelo and Morales.

I don't doubt that it's impossible to know how Sanchez would've turned out and I've always heard that cracks were beginning to appear, but really, I just don't know. He could've been champ for 10 more years, he could've been champ for 10 more months.

 

Chavez …but I’m admittedly biased