monzon vs hagler.....

Well Monzon was given plenty of trouble by several fighters inferior to Marvin Hagler. Emile Griffith went 29 rounds with Monzon, and although Griffith was a great and durable fighter with great ring smarts I think Hagler with those same smarts, skills and durability and being a fully fledged middle would give Monzon all of the trouble he needs.
One things for certain he's not stopping Hagler.

 

I like Marvin by decision.

 

Hagler by decision

 

Monzon had that great long jab and a killer right hand. So strong...gotta go with him by decision where his right hand does lots of damage.

 

hagler is backed up by the best chin.. and throws a constant barrage from every angle. hagler ud

 

I should go with Monzon in this.

 

i still think that this fight would not have been this war that many people think.... competitive fight yes... but in the end i think that marvin would have been another "prostitute" in the career of monzon... late stoppage by cuts

 

Hagler on points. Too versatile. Hagler would give Monzon angles all night and take the early to middle rounds. Monzon would press late but lose 9-6 in rounds over the proper championship distance. Very tough fight, though. Nobody wins it easily!

 

Hagler-Geraldo, Hagler-Antuofermo I, Hagler-Duran and Hagler-SRL are very troubling to me. This would be a huge bout, and it seemed Marv could get psyched out by situations like that, sometimes becoming overly cautious. The way he gassed a bit late in his draw with Vito is alarming, because he'd be dealing with an opponent who had the patience of Michelangelo. Griffith was a fitness maniac, somebody who actually loved the conditioning process, and Carlos got him for the stoppage in 14 when they first met in 1971. The two latest stoppages on Marv's resume are Hamsho I and Mugabe, both in 11 rounds. Carlos has three stoppages on his resume beyond that distance, and two of those victims are ATGs, the aforementioned Griff, and his rival Nino.

To the best of my knowledge, all common opponents of Hagler and Briscoe rated Bennie the harder puncher. Marv isn't taking Carlos out. Could Monzon take it downstairs? Briscoe learned the answer.

Folks, this one's going the championship distance. Hagler's record over the 15 round limit is 1-0-1. Monzon is 5-0-0 over that limit [all UDs], in addition to two championship round stoppages.

Carlos rallies to overtake Marv late for a close but unanimous decision. Too coldly steel minded, too much of a focused Terminator machine, and too good of a laser like long lead right for dealing with a southpaw, even of Hagler's caliber. I see Monzon as the ring general here, while Marv betrays his confusion by repeatedly switching between stances as he did early with Geraldo. This is a marathon chess match, and Hagler cannot be the bigger stronger man physically like he was with Duran.

Respect to those picking Marv, but for me, the numbers just don't add up. Hagler's just too human for this psycho killer. Marv had a big heart, but Monzon didn't have a heart Hagler could stake.

 

Carlos UD.

 

This is a very intelligent post ... I completely agree that deep down, somewhere , Marvin doubted himself to some degree and it showed in the bouts you mentioned , maybe his stamina over 15 ... people forget that in a very early title defense he came extremely close to punching himself out vs Fully Obel .... however, in rematches, when mentally prepared, he could crush like he did in the Vito rematch ... still, he was tentative against Vito the first time, against Duran and against Leonard, maybe afraid of punching himself out or simply wanting to look like he belonged in that class of fighter .. the only time he went balls to the wall out of the gate in a superfight was against a prime Hearns and we know how that worked out ..

Monzon was a supremely confident, killer assassin. He was hard as nails mentally and physically. I feel Marvin had the strength, the skills, the chin and the power to beat him but he would have to be at his best or he could lose a decision if his self doubt creeped in in any way ...

 

How Hagler was gulping air through his wide open mouth like a fish was even made note of in published accounts as he went for the kill in the five round rematch with the Venezuelan. I thought of Antuofermo I when reading that, and looking at how Marv was breathing hard in his corner after the third round of Obel II.

His respiration wasn't of the slow, controlled variety shared by Antuofermo and Sanchez. Hagler competed with a certain degree of negative stress, not the most relaxed customer in there. [I saw Antuofermo compete in a race around the track in a Superstars event around this time. It was a foregone conclusion that Vito would finish in a distant last place, being too short and slow to keep up with the full sized athletes running against him. Still, being a competitor, he ran at his top speed completely around the track, and did not open his mouth for additional air once.]

According to what Arcel said about a young Duran, "He would rather fight than eat!" At the very top level of most sports, there does indeed seem to be an advantage to having a positive underpinning over a negative one.

Three critical bouts of his were decided early by cuts.

Minter was doomed by his vulnerability to them, and lack of defense against them, but what happens if Alan somehow gets to the final bell as he did in Antuofermo I? No way he wins a legitimate decision over Hagler, but does Marv gas late?

Repeated head butts decided the premature conclusion of Hagler-Antuofermo II, but what if Vito's brow shaving plastic surgery had successfully stopped him from bleeding so badly the action had to be halted? Marv was indeed dominant through the four rounds it lasted, but that first nasty butt induced cut was accidentally self inflicted by Vito just 45 seconds into the first round as he bored in.

I thought referee Davey Pearl should have halted the proceedings, and declared a technical draw then and there, setting the stage for a prompt third bout before any further exertion and damage was incurred. Punching did not set the stage for the outcome in Hagler-Antuofermo II.

Cut induced stoppages allowed Hagler to dodge the stamina testing bullet in Minter and Antuofermo II. I admit to being disappointed by that, because I really wanted to see him demonstrate that quality after the Antuofermo draw.

However, the immediate outcome of Hearns was also cut related, and it backfired against Tommy. The Hit Man was toast after the opening round, when Marv indeed did go balls to the wall on the body, while Hearns broke his right hand on Hagler's skull. But after Richard Steele looked at the cut Tommy somehow managed to inflict on Marv, Hearns was a dead man. That early end may have been a career saver for the loser, ironically enough. If no blood had been spilled, Tommy, deprived of his right handed power, may have been in for a grueling career ending protracted beat down.

Bleeding does not decide Monzon-Hagler. Marv's endurance will definitely get tested here.

Hagler would be favored and expected to win. I believe this expectation would work against him. He was supposed to crush Duran, Vito and SRL the way Hearns crushed Duran, and Marv himself crushed Tommy in turn. But Monzon's intangibles were through the roof, and he would make Hagler's adrenaline work against him.

 

You may very well be right ... you're the first guy on this forum other than myself who I have read moment on the fragile nature of Marvin's psyche ...I think you're exceptionally perceptive and read it well .. Marvin was more skilled physically but Monzon had ice water for blood and that might make the difference.

 

I'm a massive Hagler fan and even I acknowledge you both make valid points. I watched Monzon manhandling Benvenuti recently and was impressed with his sheer, physical strength. Roldan gave Hagler lots of trouble and he wasn't in Monzon's league. I picked Hagler, but have no problem with your counter arguments.

 

This has been a good, thoughtful thread. I met him when he was champion, and he was then on a first name basis with my sister [a receptionist and secretary at a law firm in Boston which represented him]. I'd really like to be able to go with him in this one, but just can't for some reasons I've already expressed.

Marv wasn't as big in person as he appeared on television [of course he couldn't be wearing suits and ties] and my sister [never a sports fan] was surprised at how small he was. Regardless, I don't think he was as physically strong as his musculature would lead one to expect. Although Hamsho, Minter and Antuofermo could never match him in punching power, they seemed considerably stronger physically. However, this is boxing, not amateur wrestling.

Monzon-Benvenuti II looked like Minter-Antuofermo II, Dwight Davison [who was a high school wrestling star]-Curtis Parker [Davison-Parker looked a bit like Foreman-Frazier I would over the distance, the way Dwight was like running into a brick wall for Curtis], Hamsho-Czyz [after which Bobby explicitly stated that Mustafa's mature physical strength was the specific difference in the contest, admitting that he was still a boy to Mustafa's man], and particularly Carnera-Sharkey II [where Primo clubbed Jack all over the place from round one].

Carlos made Nino look like a small LW. I don't think Benvenuti was ever hurt, and neither of his two falls to the floor should have been ruled as knockdowns, as those blows were to the back of his head and neck. But Nino's manager Bruno Amaduzzi was shitting bricks over the way Monzon was knocking him to the floor with shots that weren't even scoring blows, throwing in the towel to the rage of Benvenuti the instant Nino was rabbit punched down the second time. In terms of sheer physical dominance, the contrast between Monzon-Benvenuti I & II was actually what I was thinking of while watching the live broadcast of Minter-Antuofermo II. [I can't recall anybody else ever throwing around Vito like that.]

And the knockdown errantly ruled by the notoriously incompetent Tony Perez in favor of Roldan just nine seconds after the opening bell was with a ducked hook to the back of the head which certainly reminded me of Monzon-Benvenuti II. [Hagler gets legitimately dropped by the fourth punch Juan throws? Yeah, right! Perez was way out of position for that one. He sucked in Ali-Frazier II, and Muhammad called him "a dirty dog" after Wepner. If he'd been on the ball for Collins, Jr.-Resto, maybe Billy would still be with us today. Screw Tony Perez!]

I'd be interested in further counterpoints supporting Hagler which address the comments favoring a Monzon win. This can be a spirited quality discussion.