Longest Primes?

While he slowed down, I think his brain improved over time and his shot selection got even better.

 

Absolutely. I heard opinions that decision in first fight with Betulio was controversial

 

I catagorise Louis as doing well past his prime, and arguably before, more than having a super long one. Though it was a respectable length

 

Monzon matches this or maybe even better depending on how early one was comfortable to take him. It's a little blurry. At the very least you could take him from the first Benvenuti all the way thru to his career finish. His last two efforts in repelling Valdes are imo good enough to be called the tail of his prime. He still looked extremely good.

 

Anyone want to take a punt trying to decipher the prime of Sandy Saddler?

 

How about Emile? He had a long prime for sure.

 

When looking at fighters with longevity a lot of things have to be in place. They have to have the backing and matchmaking to enable them to maintain a decent level too.. wear and tear needs to be minimised and that isn’t always down to the fighter himself becoming economically efficient, so a lot of the credit must go to management selection and being able to make the right kind of fights.

 

I'd say he was definitely prime from around the first Rodriguez fight, to the late 60s. It should speak volumes about the wins he had after this period, though.

I think finding his absolute peak would be a real challenge, as his fights are more or less unwatchable in bulk, and he had so many ups and downs.

 

I wouldn't argue too much against that. As you suggest, it's difficult to know when Monzon's prime began.
For mine, however, the Valdez bouts were more akin to 'Old Master' than 'in Prime' efforts from Monzon - particularly, their second encounter.

 

I would say that Roberto had n't quite reached his prime by the time of the first De Jesus fight.

 

Wladimir Klitschko entered his prime around 2000, with the first win against Byrd in October of that year.
... and looked pretty much prime at least until the Haye fight in July 2011.
That's at least 10 1/2 years of prime.

Lennox Lewis has prime performances against Ruddock in October 1992
... and against Rahman in November 2001
That's a 9 year stretch of prime.

 

I could see how you might think that, but the Buchanan fight was before that, which is one of Duran's best wins.

 

Agreed, this debate has been bought on another post, some saying he was, most saying he wasn't.

 

Watched Hagler - Sibson today. Hagler was pretty perfect in that fight, made a good young hard punching challenger in to nothing.
His movement was excellent at this point in his career, along with everything else.

 

Yeah absolutely. I'll take it even further as he looked slower and more hittable against Roldan. I seem to remember Merchant making a comment about the beginning of Hagler's decline.