Is Aaron Pryor under appreciated in general?

Where he's overrated by some is his chances against fighters like Leonard,
Hearns, Duran or any great natural welterweight.
At jr welterweight though he may have been the best ever.

 

Great piece this.

 

I think there is a tendency to overrate or underrate based on how exciting a fighter is, which is pretty natural - we all want to be entertained. That's probably the case with Pryor.

I think his win over Cervantes tends to get dismissed a bit too easily though. Sure, Cervantes was definitely past his best but Pryor annihilated him. He also gets a lot of stick for the nature of the first win over Arguello but it was a brilliant performance by him up to the point of the black bottle.

Being a Pryor fanboy I used to think he had a chance against Leonard. Honestly, I don't think that any more. But in terms of dedicated 140 pounders in the modern history of the junior welter class, he is top 3 along with Cervantes and Chavez imo (all-time you have to factor Barney Ross into that group as well). He would also have been a handful for any fighter in that weight class.

He had a good chin (a great one against Arguello in particular) but not necessarily great balance, a hard punch but his greatest asset when he could channel it was his intensity which is part of what made him so exciting. I wish we'd at least seen him against a Ray Mancini rather than a Ray Leonard - that would have been a heck of a fight. A made for TV war!

 

I think Pryor tends to get all the credit he needs, and is rated about right. I don't think he's particularly underappreciated.

Impossible to put him at the same table as the fab four simply because he didn't get himself in on any of those fights (partly bad luck, partly his own doing) and, unlike Duran, his career outside of that fab four series isn't quite in the elite category (that foursome made Hagler, Hearns and Leonard legends / all-time greats, whereas Duran already was one beforehand).

As others have said, Pryor is of course one of the absolute giants of the 140 lb division by any measurement you like - but at the same time, he's universally regarded as such, isn't he? Spoken about and watched more than the likes of Cervantes, Locche, Loi and Tszyu to boot, I'd say.

 

Very well thought out riposte John, allow me to parry then thrust.
Firstly on balance, yes I agree SRL would have been favourite, and again he prob would be the winner, but " pole axed him " not sure about that, I mean SRL " pole axed " Dave Green but... Leonard " is faster " well yes he is in the fast bracket of fighters no doubt, I mean Pryor wasnt excatly slow !! in fact I would go as far to say on actual movement whilst fighting, thier is a case to made that Pryor is the faster fighter.
Leonard " hits harder " well if we go on pure stats ( I know that isnt always the last word ) but if we do, Leonard 36 wins 25 KOs, Pryor 39 wins 35 KOs Leonard 62.5% Pryor 87% so lets settle on they both could punch.
Leonard " more skillful " yes he was a very skilled fighter no arguments from me, but being skillful comes in many guises, I mean its taken a long time I would suggest for the fight fan to realise that Duran ( and the Armstrongs, Fraziers, ) were not just walk forward sluggers, but possesed of a " skill " that was at first not noticed/appreciated, but in the fullnest of time has been. same applies to Pryor, he was a skillful fighter, on this thread there is footage of his fight with Arguello, in the first round ( and many others ) you dont see a lot of punches landed on him, for sure he gets hit ( his style dictates that ) but like the others I have mentioned, not as much as we think.
Again yes Leonard was a very durable fighter, but so was Pryor wasn,t he ?.
I will concede that Leonard would prob have beaten him, but not in the manner you describe.
Enjoyed our points of view, lets do it again soon, keep well. Mike.

 

Underrated in the history books & overrated on boxing forums.

 

I would bet the house that Mancini doesn't get out of the 3rd round against Hawk

 

I think it varies. At times he's given too much credit, which usually are an addendum to the insane argument that Leonard ducked him.

Other times (especially in the last ten years I guess) he seems to be a sort of piñata when it comes to historical importance and greatness.....

With him the sample size is kind of small, and he was really only on top for three years at the end of the day. Also in question is how much credit to give him for fighting that particularly creaky verison of Arguello. Other than that he has only a 40-year old Cervantes in his ledger, really. Not much to go on.

 

I think the Mancini of 82 gives the Pryor of 82 all he can handle.

 

No, but he was special his own right. IDK how well 47 would have fit him. They say he did exchange KDs with Leonard in sparring. If that is true I would guess he could kick much ass. Ray wasnt going down much those days.

IMO
He gets too much criticism from the Blackbottle. I doubt he would lower himself in that way.

 

I can't blame Leonard for not fighting Pryor. I want to. Blaming Ray is fun cause 99% your gonna hit paydirt. This is an exception.
If a guy walks into a crack house undefeated champion on top of the world. He said 'I'll be right 5 min." 3 years later he's still there. What can you do? You cant follow him in.

 

This threat prompted me to go back and rewatch Pryor vs. Cervantes.

Pambele sure didn’t look ‘way past it’ in that fight — he kept his cool and countered smartly and nailed Aaron many times (one resulting in an off-balance knockdown).

Put Pryor was a force of nature. He just overwhelmed and swallowed Cervantes in the end. The defending champ couldn’t keep him off and couldn’t dissuade him in any way. The Hawk is a handful for anyone at 140 ever.

 

Great stuff.
Though I never thought Pryor had any real chance against prime Leonard, or any of the true great welterweights , a fight against Mancini would've been great...... For all of about 5rds....Pryor would win by ko after a blistering war.
He also beats Chavez and Ross .
I haven't seen the Jr.welter I'd pick against prime Pryor. Only a few lightweights I'd pick against him.

 

Pryor was a fine Fighter but not close to the Fab 4. His swift self destruction denied him the big, career defining fight.
I'm afraid I for one can't separate him from the shadow of Panama Lewis.

 

Firstly thanks for the time and effort Mike. Allow me to break your post down into pieces so the flow is easy to follow.

You probably have me there in that pole axe is a strong description. In my defense pole axe obviously wasn't meant to insinuate an easy and one sided smashing as i noted it would probably be competitive for a short spell. The pole axe was used (probably incorrectly) more of how i see the fights ending which is with Pryor counted out of more likely saved by the ref after a heck of a beating in the final stage.

Allow me to expand. Pryor doesn't do things in half measures in there and he would be absolutely be the type to go out on his shield. He's got plenty of kamikaze in him and loads of heart. He's not the type who would shy away when SRL got the better of it and things got tough. He wouldn't ease off and this could well be the difference between hearing the final bell or being quite brutally stopped.

Pryor isn't slow but Ray is one of the all time speed demons and personally i cannot see any sort of case that can be made for Pryor being near his equal let alone faster.

Leonard punched hard at 147. He has two stoppages over ATG's who had never been stopped and he had other brutal stoppages at 147 as well. I believe Leonard's second tier (i.e. not Benitez, Duran and Hearns) resume at 147 is very underrated due to the glitter and magnitude of those on the top tier. He also showed he carried some nice pop even when he moved up.

Aaron has a fine punch but again in no way can he match Ray imo. This would be compounded by the fact Aaron would fight Ray at 147 and his punches would certainly have less effect on guys at 147 than those at 140.

I wouldn't put Pryor in the bracket of some of them when talking subtle skills. I would totally agree he has more skill than many realize and he didn't particularly try to utilize at various times. He was quite reckless overall and often got caught off balance. Regardless have a look at Ray's supreme performance against the master boxer in Wilfred Benitez. Then there's Hagler, Duran II etc etc. I stand by my assertion Ray is more skilled.

Pryor was durable for sure. We never did see him overly tested against top tier guys and bigger ones like we did Leonard. Again, remember he would be up a weight and taking punches off a fully fledged 147 pounder who had proven pop. Aaron biggest chin check was against an ATG multiple divisions up from his greatest. Having said that i believe Arguello still packed one heckuva punch at 140. I'd say Pryor has a fantastic chin at 140.

I'd feel very confident. I think all hell would break loose early and Pryor would be a handful for a while. I think however Ray's size, greatness and all round absurdity would shoot down the Hawk around the 5th.

Enjoyed yours too Mike, you are a gentleman and a fine poster mate.

Cheers