Shout out to Pacquiao. He has adapted his style to overcome reach and height disadvantages. Size wise, Usyk is not small for a heavyweight. He has the clear weight disadvantage, but not so much in regards to height and reach.
Being 25 doesn´t mean that one is fully grown. Not even close. Chavez Jr. is an good example: At 25 he was a huge ass middleweight. At 28 he could no longer make 160. And now at 33, he can´t even make 168. Alvarez at 26 was able to make 154. He now has a really hard time making 160 and likely will move up in weight. And there are many more examples like that. So no, Mansour being 200lbs at 25 doesn´t mean it was his normal limit. Some guys just are big. Some are ridiculously skinny.
Other examples of moving up Pacman-Inoue-Donaire PED-fueled move up the division was on the expense of their toughness-chin. Came out good with the matchmaking, but not as dominant as the first-clas boxers [Whitaker|Locche] completely neutralized size & made bigger framed opponents look completely helpless. Ivan Calderon is an exceptional case of being a Minimumweight version of Tank Davis, if there was an 89lbs weight class he would have been able to make that weight, at 105 he was fighting bigger framed guys. Carpentier-Arizmendi were default-PED boxers who might have scaled up naturally inside their Pro-Career Roberto Duran is an exception who moved up divisions because he wanted to beat up the big-shots
Way to to go Bot, picking the Pot-Smoking loser as the example! You ignored Marvin Hagler, Bernard Hopkins & Andre Ward....Went with the Pot-Smoking snowflake Body-building is good for the general peasant-citizen population Elite Boxers take major abnormal steps to succeed...Once the frame stops growing in inches, the boxer should do everything possible to stay at that weight. Excess growth makes the boxer inferior (unless he is a 6'8"+ Heavyweight: as this division has no penalty for weight gain)
Prison time is now a negative thanks to guys like Dwight Qawi & Bernard Hopkins, thanks to prison boxing they found a means to rehabilitation. No more. Just do time and go back out & commit more crime, lose your mind, waste your time. But don't rehabilitate.
Andre Ward said he actually struggled to make 175. Hopkins is a beast. Even in his 40´s he was easily making 160. Maybe it took away a bit from his performances, but if so, then it wasn´t much. But sure, there are plenty of guys who stayed at a single weight their entire lives. But there are more who went though multiple weight classes. You brought up Hagler. So let´s look at his opponents: Leonard was basically a career welterweight. And at 30 he came back at middleweight to challenge Hagler. After that, he moved back down to 154 only once. His move up in weight seems like it was more orchestrated, but he was comfortable there. Hearns left welterweight at 22. At 27 he had his last fight at 154. At 29, he stopped competing at middleweight. Duran moved up from 135 when he was 26. And in his 30s, he was no longer competing at welterweight. The frame might stop growing, but everyone is different. With age, weight comes on naturally for some. Mansour looked perfectly fine the way he was. He wasn´t overly muscular at all. He would have been a twig at 175. What kind of an advantage would have that been? As he was short for even that weight class. That´s like saying that Pascal should have stayed at 168. Meanwhile he was having to work to even make 175.
Andre Ward will say whatever is needed to be said, to make sure he has a good size advantage... Andre Ward biggest struggle is to contain his Narcissism when on Live-TV Lots of foolish Narcissists out there, but very Narcissists who can back it up like Andre Ward, hence he earned the Respect of everybody...everybody that matters, that is... Olympic Gold Medal, Fighter of the Decade, Boxing Invincibility...
Kirkland or Amir Khan are all the matchmaker wet dream, the majority has to become prey for the Apex Predator, the easiest way to become Prey is to lose reach-height via Anabolic side-effects of PEDs, or even worse intentionally adding weight! An opponent who looks like a body-builder looks convincing enough, so its good for matchmakers...feed them a win or two, then feed them to the fellow short boxer on PEDs. The whole weak market will collapse, as soon as a promoter backs a whole line-up of Natural weight prospects...For now mediocrity & peace will serve as the grazing grounds for future prey...
Mansour was a beast, even at the age of 42... I think he would have been at least a top contender when he was in his prime. Heavy handed southpaw with very fast hands, hard to deal with. He was also robbed against both Washington and Cunningham. Fighting Hrgovic and Ajagba at his age was probably not the smartest move. I want to see him a final fight with Chris Arreola, I think that would be a great match-up .
