Ortiz would be the Sammy Angott,only more so to Whitaker's Willie Pep...Carlos beats Whitaker in an ugly but interesting fight...interesting in terms of strategy.
Pea takes it by a couple of points...it would have been a very closely fought tactical affair without a doubt but I think Pea would be to slick. If Laguna can have that kind of success I see Pea having just as much..probably a little more because of his jab. Carlos is one of the best lightweights I have ever seen...Pea is just that little bit better.
The Laguna fight was not Ortiz at his best...I think you know that....and it was proven pretty clearly by the outcomes of their two subsequent rematches. I believe that Ortiz was far and away better than anyone else who faced the Pea...a smart, canny, ringwise pro who wasn't one dimensional or unimaginative when one particular tactic wasn't working. I think he would, as I said, have outpointed the Pea in a very close, tactical bout that may have not been a crowd pleaser, but with Ortiz providing the role of an Angott-like spoiler.
Ortiz, by the way, is one of the very few lightweights of history that had the savvy to do as I suggested against Pernell...
I think Whitaker wins quite a wide decision against Ortiz, say 9-3. Ortiz had problems with speedier boxers, Whitakers jab should control the fight and Whitaker was near impossible to hit plus even if Ortiz forces his way inside Whitaker is great on the inside
That's where the Pep-Angott / Pea-Ortiz analogy breaks down for me. Whitaker was a better inside fighter than Willie Pep, which is why he had a relatively easy time with the pre-eminent pressure fighters of his time (Nelson, Chavez) whereas Pep had trouble with the pre-eminent pressure fighters of his time (Saddler, Angott). Ortiz will give Whitaker a hard time but I struggle to see him winning more rounds...
I dont think Ive seen Pep-Angott, is it on the net anywhere? I think there is a clear size issue in that 1 too
Pea, I think Ortiz was smart enough to use his well balanced gifts: his ring smarts with an admixture of his crisp, accurate punches to not shoot for a knockout...but to present Whitaker with some problems of his own..and present a somewhat different type of challenge from what Whitaker was usually accustomed to. Ortiz was a smart, clever fighter himself..and as he twice solved the riddle of the man who took his title..Ismael Laguna...he would be effective IMO against Whitaker as well. It may not have been as allout NEGATIVE,...as in excessive holding, but just maybe a page from Angott's playbook may have found it's way into Ortiz's hands.
It isn't saying that Angott and Ortiz were very similar in ring styles...but that a smart fighter like Ortiz...I think one of the most balanced fighters as well..would have been able to some up with a novel strategy as he did against Joe Brown ...when he and his corner devised a different type of plan...to rely heavily on the left hand...as he revealed in his chapter of the Peter Heller book "In This Corner"...a ruse that proved to be very effective.
I'm not faulting you for choosing Ortiz, and in a way I understand where you're coming from. I just didn't think Ortiz would present the same problems to Whitaker than Angott did to Pep for a few reasons. For one, Angott was well bigger than Pep, and outside of Fritzie Zivic probably the most notorious spoiler and rough-houser of the era. A guy like Pep, whose game relied on using angles and deft upper body movement to avoid and counter on his opponents, was all the same always in range for bigger spoiling types like Angott and Saddler who had no qualms about simply grabbing and mauling their opponents to make them more hittable. When you add in the fact that the inside was never Pep's specialty, you have at least a recipe for success given a certain type of opponent. Larger spoilers like Saddler and Angott being two of his worst stylistic dilemmas, both because of their tactics and their size/strength advantage (particularly Angott, who was at the very least a full weight class bigger than Pep). Whitaker would fare better against those types because his style of pure boxing differed from Pep's in that he was more active and effective with the jab, boxed better off the backfoot rather than from angles, and had a better inside game. I agree with you that Ortiz had the versatility to pull off a similar gameplan (though not as dirty or out-right effective) against that type of fighter, but without the size/strength advantage they held. Not to mention he'd be in against a different type of boxer altogether from a guy like Pep in Whitaker. I doubt very strongly he'd be anywhere near as effective against Whitaker using those kinds of tactics as they were against Pep, for the reasons already stated. On the other hand, it would be stupid to count Ortiz out of any mythical Lightweight matchup. The guy was just too experienced and well balanced in the ring. On first glance though, I'd probably favor Whitaker just slightly.