How good was Hozumi Hasegawa? Obviously good. All I know of him is that he is the first Japanese to win titles in three divisions (though it should be Harada), and that he had an exciting, awkward style. How does he stack up historically? H2H? Etc.
He really had some momentum going when he was upset by Fernando Montiel. Montiel busted his jaw in the first round apparently but didn't finish the fight until the 4th, when he ended things with a gorgeous combo on the ropes. After that Hasegawa jumped up two weight classes and won the WBC 126 lbs. title by outpointing Burgos. I'm curious if Hasegawa was struggling with the weight at 118 or he just wanted a fresh start. Either way, winning a title two weights up after being violently stopped in your previous bout earns some big points in my book. That takes stones. No shame in losing to Montiel either. Montiel's record is deceptive, in that his tendancy to be very hot and cold meant that he had a lot of off-nights in the ring. But his talent was incredible. I always wondered what would have happened if we got a match between Hasegawa and Toshiaki Nishioka. Nishioka went winless in a four fight series with Veerapol Saharom, who went on to go winless against Hasegawa. But that was before Nishioka really hit his stride. Nishioka went on to beat Genaro Garcia, Rafa Marquez, and Ivan Hernandez. He also iced Jhonny Gonzalez, who had previously iced Hasegawa.
I liked him at the time and rated him highly, though so did many on here. Very fast, rangy and aggressive dynamic southpaw boxer-puncher. Excellent combination puncher with good feet and a decent punch once he hit his stride and sorted out what appeared to be ropey balance. For all his strong fundamentals offensively though he was defensively naive and had a below average chin. Poor at handling hard shots that he didn't see coming and was thus undone by good sneaky punching from Montiel and Gonzalez, both fighters he should really have beaten. I don't recall him being much of a counter puncher tbh, more a guy who liked to get off first with sharp, fast blows. Nice wins over Sahaprom although Veeraphol was very faded and looking old and past it. A fight with Donaire at the time was eagerly awaited iirc but Montiel upset the apple cart rather Tbh I think he was more talented than Inoue though Inoue will probably go down as the better fighter historically.
