Watched a few of his fights and he looks quality, obviously he had some issues, but how good was he in your eyes?
ATG, and highly underrated. Three division world champion. 3 of the four major sanctioning bodies have recognized him as champion at least once and one of his titles he defended all the way into double digits. He was terrific, but yes, he had his issues. Crazy life.
And have you seen Addie's signature picture? Tapia had an incredible chin. Here he is eating a beautiful and undoubtedly jolting combo from MAB like it's a snack. This content is protected One tough man, with underrated skills too, if you look at his better fights.
Man, how is he not an ATG? Again, defended his title in double digits, then moved up and took titles in two more weight classes. That's an incredible accomplishment. A modern era fighter, 56-5-2. Stopped only once, in his second to last fight. I think in total he won something like 20 title fights! What do you want from a guy? He was a champion in every year from 1994 to 2002. For a guy staying active like that, that's really incredible.
And he was robbed twice vs paulie ayala. I was totally disgusted after watching those fights. ATG in my book.
Sure he achieved a lot, but when stepping up to elite level (Ayala, Barrera) he was not quite good enough. He was very exciting and will certainly be in the HOF, but not an ATG in my opinion. In the same way that DLH was a great and multiple time champion, but not an ATG.
Very good fighter with underrated boxing skills,was at his best as a super flyweight its a shame we never got to see him against Mark Johnson.
The Tapia that faced Barrera was far from his prime and I disagree about Oscar also. Oscar is judged largely off of losses in very close fights to great fighters and if he weren't robbed against Trinidad, I think things would be very different for him. Which I think is insane considering what he accomplished. If you're only as good as your last win and your losses are focused on more than your wins, Duran wouldn't be an ATG either. Neither would Louis or maybe most of the ATGs. Oscar's career will be viewed very differently in time. My opinion. How can you break the record for major titles in the most weight classes, beat that many world champions, win that many title fights, fight on that high a level for that long and still be remembered for a robbery against one guy, a stupid weight draining mistake against another guy and getting stopped by a liver shot by one of the greatest middlweights of all time, in his weight class where you're not nearly at your best? Etc.
