Was Whitaker the naturally bigger fighter than Chavez when they fought?

No surprise that Mante agrees, he has, after all, seen the fights in question. :good

 

Young Duran WAS polished. He got better with age but so what? I'd take that Duran to beat Chavez at 130, any time you like.

The fight was a good competitive fight for 10 rounds, then Marcel precedrd to beat the prime out of Shibata with a horrible beatdown. He was never the same fighter after this fight. And again, if you have seen the fight and seen him preceding this fight and him after it, you would agree with me.

Having seen Serrano fight and seen Marcel fight, the best explanation is that there was a Puerto Rican judge in Panama that had the fight for Serrano, being biased as Puerto Rican judges often are. Can't say for sure, not having seen the fight, but there is a clear gap in class between the two fighters, and that can be seen from having seen both fight.

 

You haven't even seen him beyond the Duran and Arguello fights which I'm guessing you MIGHT have seen. In fact, I doubt even that since you're questioning his fight with Duran.

And as for the newspapers of the day, which ones are we talking about specifically? What reports are you referring to? I'm guessing most newspapers of the day hadn't even seen the guy fight.

 

I haven't seen the fight, but when I put it in the context of other fights with Venezuelan judges of the time that I HAVE seen, its easy to see how he could lose to Hernandez in Venezuela.

Marcel put one of the worst beatings I have ever seen in the ring on Antonio Gomez and came away with a MD. Again, all I can stress is if you had seen the fight, you would not have ridiculously mentioned it here, and shown your ignorance by so doing.

Miguel Canto put on one of the best boxing displays ever against Betulio Gonzalez in their rematch and that clown Rafael Cartaya scored the fight for Betulio! Again in the third fight, a clear Canto win, again a Venezuelan judge gives it to Betulio.

The Venezuelan judges ask us to believe that little featherweight Antonio Gomez got the better of Antonio Cervantes there. Yeah I'd like to see how that happened. I'd like to see how he got the better of Esteban DeJesus too mind you. (Gomez was a fine fighter though, no discredit to him, but I put serious questions marks next to this one).

Knowing Leonel Hernandez and knowing Ernesto Marcel, I would easily surmise that something was amiss in their fight.

 

Georges Caprpentier turned pro as flyweight. He was NOT naturally smaller than Gene Tunney.

What is instructive when talking about who is naturally bigger is talking about what weight they peaked at physically. For both Chavez and Whitaker that is 135 pounds.

Not quite 70%? Please.

Why Ali is generally rated over Frazier is that he generally, er, got the better of their series - as well as having a superior resume to Frazier in every sense of the word and beating guys Frazier couldn't.

No. Holyfield's peak was at cruiser. Spinks' was at light heavy. The analogy therefore breaks down.

Holyfield was able to get much bigger than normal cruisers because he took the gear, but he was still a natural cruiserweight.

 

I could see a prime gomez outhustling a greenish De Jesus as I reckon Esteban wouldnt enjoy his physicality...I struggle to see how he beats Cervantes though.

 

Perhaps, but when you consider that Gomez himself was starting to slow down around the time, and that Dejesus was advanced enough to beat Roberto Duran about a year later, it becomes hard to believe.

Mantequilla has made a good point in the past, that Gomez could live with the pace that DeJesus liked to fight at, but as you say, as far as physicality goes, DeJesus would enjoy an advantage.

 

Whitaker was the more natural fighter in the higher weight. Yes.