Lomachenko is on his way to become a great fighter but..

You need to go back and watch Prince's early fights. If you knew anything about that fight, you knew that he had to lose massive amounts of weight to make the weight limit for that fight and was completey drained mentally and physically.

That was by far the Prince's worst performance, I'm visualizin the early to mid 1990s version of the Prince, way before the Barrera fight, to current Lomachenko. Even the 1997 version of Prince Naseem that beat Kevin Kelley was sensational, but like I said you really need to go back and watch early Prince if you haven't. Start from his pro debut if you can. This guy was practically untouchable. If you judge him only from the Barrera fight, that would be like only watching Ali's fight vs Holmes and judging him based on that. Saying great fighters like Lomachenko would never be totally outclassed in that way, first of all as bad as he was that night vs Barrera, it still was somewhat competative. It wasn't like Ali vs Holmes or Sugar Ray Leonard's last few fights or Pernell Whitaker's last fight.

 

Excuses are for little girls, I hate excuses in boxing. Barrera would beat him every day of the week easily as he proved. It was no coincidence his 'worst performance' happened against by far the best fighter he ever faced, Barrera made him look bad that's what great fighters do. I've seen lots of Hamed and I think he was very entertaining but flawed and very overrated by some. He was still young when he stepped up to face Barrera, that was supposed to be his coming out party but it proved to be the end of him. I don't think the Kelley fight is much to boast about, Kelley was very chinny and an average fighter and Hamed went life and death with him.

 

Yeah obviously Lomachenko's been in there with better competition. But still, the Prince was way more powerful with his hands than Lomachenko is. Lomachenko is more technical, but Lomachenko can't just get a dude out of there like Naz could. Naz was simply more explosive. The level of competition had a lot to do with that, but still, he would be more of a challenge to Lomachenko than anyone currently in or near Lomachenko's weight class currently.

 

I'm not making excuses for him, I'm just explaining to you what happened. Judging him from that fight is not relevent to this comparison in my view, because first of all Lomachenko hasn't fought anyone the caliber of a prime Barrera, and not only that it was clear that Hamed was not his usual self that night. Now you can say that exposed the Prince and all that, that's fine, but it's still not the same fighter I am using as my comparison to how he would do vs Lomachenko.

Surely the version of Hamed that night would not be able to deal with current Lomachenko. But if you're talking about early to mid 1990s vs current Lomachenko, it's a very debatable comparison. It'd be like saying Tyson vs Ali who would win but then saying Tyson is levels above the Ali that fought Holmes. Obviously if you take someones worst performance late in their career your fighter is going to win that comparison.

 

But that works both ways.

The only fighter who was top level, who wasn't shot or past his prime that Hamed came up against was Barrera and he lost.

 

Yeah it's very hard to actually compare the fighters Hamed fought and rate them vs the guys that Lomachenko has fought already. No doubt about it that Lomachenko has fought good competition early in his pro career. However that doesn't prove anything concretely. You can still watch the footage, and clearly see that Hamed was more heavy handed than Lomachenko, and more dangerous.

 

I'm not disputing Hamed's power but his style worked to a certain level.

Alicea had him down, Sanchez had him down, Soto caused him problems and Barrera schooled him off the jab alone.

Lomachenko is on another galaxy to what Hamed has faced, athletically and technically.

Lomachenko beats Hamed down and takes his soul.

 

You're entitled to your opinion. I'm saying early to mid 1990s Hamed vs current Lomachenko is an unbelievable fight. We can't compare Loma in 5-10 years to Hamed, so I'm not going to take Hamed's penultimate fight, his worst performance by far, and use that as my comparison. If you put early Hamed in there with Lomachenko, Lomachenko is in for a hell of a fight.

 

Mikey Garcia is available for him. I want to see that fight.

 

He's certainly beaten better comp at the beginning of his career...But I don't think that anyone that Loma has beaten would be considered as relevant historically as a three division titleholder like Vasquez, multi-time titlist Manual Medina, or long reigning titleholders like Tom Johnson and Vuyani Bungu. Not saying that Loma's opposition can't improve- it's just doesn't equal the body of work of a guy like Hamed at present.