How Impressive Would Monzon look, Against Hagler s Title Opponents?

I dunno, it's pretty hard to express I think. A lot of what impresses me so much about Monzon are his intangibles. He had incredible patience in the ring, always keeping his calm and always very cold and collected. Take a look at the KO of Benvenuti in the first fight for an example of this, Monzon rocks Nino on one side of the ring, Nino stumbles backwards into an opposite corner and Monzon patiently follows him, measures him with the jab, then blast him with a precise right hand. Most other fighters would be jumping at Nino and throwing the kitchen sink at him, but Monzon was more controlled and patient, so simply follows Nino into the corner to wait for the perfect punch to reveal itself. He was a very cerebral fighter and everything he did had a reason to it. He had this aura as an unflappable ring general. His ability to control the distance and render his opponent ineffective is remarkable I think. His use of the jab to set up his punches, measure the distance, and maintain the distance he was most comfortable at all was a way for him to exert enormous control over his opponent in nearly every fight. He was also an extremely versatile fighter, in the Bricoe fight he boxed, for Benvenuti he fought, and for Moyer he brawled, and he countered well in all his fights. As well, he was economical with his movements, especially his footwork. Just compare how Monzon approached Briscoe to how Hagler approached him and the amount of energy each expends (and their effectiveness) are night and day. Hagler bounces around a lot, moves a lot, runs a fair bit, gets out of stance a lot, whereas Monzon keeps his balance much better, uses short shuffles, and keeps his feet planted to ensure he's not expending as much energy. He could change and adapt whenever he pleased and he switched seamlessly from boxing to fighting. Monzon stands out as a highly intelligent fighter for me, he's not very flashy, doesn't punch all that hard, but he was very well-rounded and exemplified the heart of how to win a boxing match which is, as Lee Wylie once said, "to take the initiative and impose your will on an opponent". Yes, his defence is pretty leaky though. His best performances are Griffith 1 and Napoles I think if you want to see him at his best.

 

I can't quite take all the credit for that phrase actually. A Fight City article which mentions Zarate vs Pintor describes the fight as a Rorschach test for how boxing fans score fights and whether they value clean punching or aggression more (https://www.thefightcity.com/top-12...io-cesar-chavez-carlos-zarate-ruben-olivares/). I think it sums up Monzon just as well though.

 

It really does!

 

Try Scypion and Sibson for starters.

 

Yes, totally dominated two of the top contenders. You could add the Hamsho fights too, but I think the two you mentioned are peak MMH.

 

He goes 12-0 just like Hagler, possibly 11-1 (Hearns). I don't think he stops everyone Hagler stopped though. I don't think Monzon would stop Hamsho, Roldan or Obelmejas or for instance.

 

Absolutely.