I'd favor my man Jeff, very narrowly. He was quite fresh and inexperienced at Bantamweight and i do believe he got better as he piled on the weight and went to Jr Feather and Feather. I do believe he was already having to go extremely hard to make the weight at 118. Pintor is a teeny bit of an unknown quality when fighting the best fighters in history and i say this in a positive sense. He received a gift against Zarate but after that became a great fighter imo. His win over Davila was a fine one. I thought he was sensational against Gomez when moving up in weight, and the only difference between them in the end was Gomez being naturally bigger. Pintor was not as good a fighter anytime after that tho he did manage to win the 122 title over Juan Meza, a fine effort. I wouldn't be surprised if Pintor matched up really well across history, perhaps better than many would think. The politics of the time stopped what would have been a mouth watering unification between he and Jeff Chandler, another great fighter imo. It hurt one of them immensely as the winner would gained a fantastic notch in their belt and with it the extra acclaim. They would be talked about a heckuva lot more than either are imo.
At 118, I think Pintor by decision. He did more than Fenech at that weight. Fenech 's best notch at 118 was Jerome Coffee, who was light hitting and not physically strong. Also, Pintor was very physically strong at that weight. So Fenech wouldn't have much if any advantage in strength. At 122, Fenech used his strength advantage as one of his if not biggest assets. At 122, Fenech by late round tko.
What a great match up. I'll go with Fenech in a narrow points win...Jeff forces the inside fight and Pintor obliges...
For all his underrated ability, Pintor needed a bit of room to punch; he wasn't strictly a phonebooth type of guy. Fenech would do well to muscle in and use his advantages inside to take the play away from the slower-starting Mexican. If Fenech allows space and wants to get too brave and start trading at distance it could get dicey for him, but otherwise I like him by decision.
