Pernell Whittaker - How do you beat him.

I respect your open-mindedness, SP. This fight would be anything but one-sided...

It may well be the kind of fight that spawns decades of debate depending on whether you like "defense" or "effective aggression" and whether the judges got it right.

 

Nice avatar, SH. What did you make of Gatti as a fighter?

 

Gatti? Heart and soul. Graziano's grandson. Mancini-mold. He gave us several magnificent demonstrations of the force of will and later on some respectable demonstrations of skill, but it is the former that we are all indebted to him for. Gatti is a fan-multiplier -he breeds fans for the Greatest Sport of All because of the suspense and shock & awe style that he brought to the ring.

I loved his humility and his honesty just as much.

 

fantastic post on all fronts :good

 

Thank you!

 

i have however changed my stance back to a draw. i don't believe duran could stop pea. he lived with murderous punchers past prime and out of his best weight. i think duran might squeek out a decision.....nah i don't know to be honest. i'm starting to think ortiz's more varied approach in terms of pace might favour him. i almost feel duran assaulting pea fast may make him easier to turn. ortiz would constantly be changing,shifting up, down, up, down. as would pea though which makes this fight as difficult to pick :rofl

 

Wow, take a break Flea, you need a holiday or something, (and you said i was losing it)

Haha, kidding, a stoppage seems hard to imagine doesn't it though?

 

aaron pryor his ass.....keep swinging, somethings gotta land. pryor might look like a sloppy mess but he COULD get to him (maybe).

 

of course. just been watching duran lately and forget how destructive he was. got so used to telling noobs 'he wasn't just a whirlwind' i forgot how brutal and powerful ,and fast he could be. add that to his timing, speed, accuracy , variety......i could go on.

 

pryor at 140 is another close pick. i think he was good on the back foot too, although i think there's a distinct possibility of a draw, over (also pryor's preference) 12 rounds i go for pryor to get frustrated as the fight goes on and for pea to take the last two rounds, 115-113 pea

 

Stonehands, i wasn't disagreeing with you on the outcome though. I was making a case for Duran winning, i just actually went against the grain in why. I used to consider the line of thinking which is yours more so, but i think that at this weight Pernell Whitaker's pop is not too bad, though your reasoning is probably all as respectable as mine, my open-mindedness enables me to clearly see that. I just think that Duran can actually do the scoring, i find it hard to believe that there's only myself that has mentioned Duran's hugely successful tool in rapidly closing distance, the right hand (and against the southpaw stylist?), and then is when that scoring of points comes into effect, before Whitaker attempts to get back out of range.

Of course i can see your reasoning in that Whitaker doesn't have the firepower to keep an all swarming force of nature-esque type Duran off him as well, but i just think that Whitaker is still given more opportunities to counter that man (which would be a Buchanan version). Anyway, we are in agreement that Duran can win it, i wasn't making the case for Whitaker outright with my point about power. More that i was giving Duran even more credit by saying he could win on skillset even though Whitkaer's lack of power might not be massive.

 

Yeah i completely understand man! Telling newbies how much he wasn't just raw aggression, you forget (without seeing him for a while) just how big for him that raw aggression was. And that skillset is something esle isn't it.

 

I used to pick Mayweather...because he matches Whitaker more or less for speed, might hit a little harder at the weight, has an excellent and very accurate right hand and is defensively prefocient enough to make it the kind of fight where each round is determined by maybe one or two clean punches.

But, after rewatching Whitaker's early career, I remembered that he could certainly apply the type of calculated pressure and move forward behind a stiff speedy southpaw jab that would be sure to trouble him.

So, I'm not completely certain about that pick anymore, although I wouldn't rule Mayweather out completely.

I think someone like a young Shane Mosely could give Whitaker hell, because he could work the body, jab a bit, move a bit, and turn it into the type of fight where every round would be close to call.

Henry Armstrong could close the distance fast enough to turn it into the type of inside battle that might favor him. Plus he did pretty well against slick, quick-fisted fighters like Sarron and Ross.

As a complete dark horse pick, I could maybe see a situation where Edwin Rosario pulls something out of the fire like he did against Davis, where he spent most of the fight getting outbopxed, but managed to box well enugh to gain a few rounds, and scored a couple of knockdowns to gain the points needed to win a controversial decision. Ain't likely, but the way Chapo punched you could never rule out something like this.

 

I cannot actually think of a more interesting matchup in all the divisions of boxing throughout its history! High,high quality matchup and a brilliant clash of styles!