I'd agree with all your points, in particular the formidable nature of Vasquez, who was utterly dominant at his peak. Only fighters Napoles lost to, like Monzon, would crush him. Julio would walk over his welterweight opposition, huge, skilled, and a puncher. I rank Whitaker's work at 147 highly because he was a lightweight fighting up. He never really put on the weight, and he never had the size; He's a good deal smaller than Pacquiao. Still, he moved up to weight classes he had no business fighting at, barely trained for fights, and still tooled larger champions. He also went and grabbed a legitimate belt at 154; Vasquez was the fighting, defending champion up there. Manny Pacquiao was GIFTED a light middleweight title facing a guy who was not a champion, Whitaker earned his. And yes, Cotto was drained, you can see it in his legs and you can see it in his arms. If you've boxed, you know when a guy is laboring just by looking at him. I don't think Cotto beats Pacquiao peak, but he was drained in that fight, just like Oscar was. I won't slander Pacquiao as a cherry picker, because he went even higher to fight Margarito at a weight Antonio was comfortable at, but it doesn't change that DLH and Cotto were drawn to fight where they would be drawn. Why fight Clottey at 147 and not Cotto? Never did make sense to me.
Whitaker broke his hand and probably still won every other round. And lost every other round. He lost 3 or 4, maybe 5 rounds in the first fight when whitaker again broke his hand. He lost 4 or 5 exchanges in the second fight. Pendleton did alright. You could give him a couple of rounds if you were looking to give him rounds. 2 or 3 rounds. Got embarassed in all the others though. Jorge won 3 or so rounds. Pernell hardly tried in that fight though. First fight was really close, second fight was pretty much a white wash bar for the flash knockdown. 3 or 4 rounds for Julio. Competitive fight though. First fight could have gone either way. Whitaker was sober for the rematch and won at least 8 rounds. Whitaker was losing this one narrowly for me before the stoppage. Yep. Especially when there's an argument that he didn't lose to DLH. Trinidad beat the **** out of him, but it was still kinda competitive.
Whitaker-Ramirez II is one of the most one sided fights of all time. Freddie Pendleton got schooled. Rivera was exceptionally competitive in the first fight, but he got blown out in the rematch. Dropped heavily and soundly beaten, Whitaker won 9-10 rounds. We have rematches for a reason, I always count the final result as the greater of the two. Same exact logic with McGirt. He gave Pea trouble, and couldn't replicate that success, proving who was the far better fighter. The Paez fight was a sparring session, two fighters having fun, and Whitaker still damn near shut him out. Chavez fight was competitive, not close. 116-112 or 117-111 Whitaker. To have it closer, you need to not have Pea whitewashing the middle rounds, which, to me, is indicative of a flawed ability to score a fight.
I don't like 'Cotto would beat Nelson H2H' 'If they were the same size' arguments **** me off. But there's no doubt in my mind that Nelson was a far superior fighter to Cotto. The versions Pea and Manny respectively beat? Different argument, but what exactly is Cotto better at than Nelson? It certainly isn't blending offence and defence, which Miguel has tried really hard to implement from the late rounds of Mosley onwards and has been busted up a few times. Back him up he falls apart. Nelson in the 2nd fight with Fenech? Same position as first fight, blew him away anyway. I'm not a massive fan of The Little Professor by the way but Cotto? A slight notch below IMO. I rate the Cotto win very highly for Manny BTW because of the manner of victory. Incredible. Yes, Curtis Cokes was brilliant IMO.
Yeah...Nelson was the better fighter. Cotto is bit too paint-by numbers. He isn't versatile at all. He's even predictable when he's trying to be unpredictable, which is why Mosley started ripping him up late.
To be fair to McGirt i think he was on borrowed time by that rematch with Pea.His legs had gone.He wasn't the fighter that had fought Brown and Pea the first time. I do think that first fight was made closer than it needed to be by Whitaker doing Duran-Leonard 1 and taking his foot from the gas late, mind you.
Definitely. And more so with Ramirez the second time round. He was slow at the best of times, but he did a pretty poor impression of frankenstein as he stumbled his way through the rematch.
Floyd is slowing down. Cotto was all over him. I give Floyd a ton of credit for literally fighting him off when the boxing wasn't working, but it was troublesome and a definite sign of aging that he couldn't stay away in the first place. Cotto's attack is VERY basic. Simple footwork, not terribly fast, and similar combinations and patterns reused repeatedly. And still, Floyd was bothered. He's nearing the end.
Yeah... He can probably ride his career out for a few more years stage-managing it ala Hopkins, but if he fights a quick, rangy fighter with a decent skill set, or a very solid Castillo like welterweight, he'll be in trouble.
All things considered, it always looked like he was in control. It did get tight on the scorecards before the last couple rounds for me though.
It seems to me like he's waiting for Canelo to explode to fight him, and this is, to me, a mistake. If you want Alvarez, take him now. Don't meet him when he's two years better and you're two years worse. I also think a Martinez fight, which Floyd is considering, is simply not winnable for him anymore.
