Who was the better Boxer ..........Duran or Pryor

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Many might suggest that Meldrick Taylor was a better Boxer than Duran but Taylor clearly could not handle it against bigger guys, i know people hold the view that he was past it after the Chavez fight but he was still a very good fighter. I think the real problem for Taylor was he was too short to Box from range and he did not have enough power to command the respect of bigger guys, he could not use defence to create is offense like Maywseather because besides being inferior to Mayweather on nearly every level his defence was his offence. The reason i use him as an example is because i think its illustrates that Boxing skills does not equate to success at higher weights, so the analogy that Duran was that good of a Boxer because he went up successfully in weight does not stack up, with me at least.

I think Duran was more polished and was more technically sound than Taylor, and simply had more tools in his arsenal. Taylor had amazingly fast hands, a type of speed very few are blessed with, and terrific stamina/workrate. What I thought was giving him so much success against Chavez was not necessarily his boxing skills, but the fact that he was so fast and active. At times he did some in-and-out movement (it was hard to really use the ring that well against a good ring-cutter like JCC), but during other times he just stayed in the pocket and outworked Chavez. He left himself pretty open however.

Duran didn't have that sort of blazing handspeed, although he was pretty fast himself, but mixed offense and defense better. He kept his right glove attached to the right side of his face to fend off left hooks. He rolled with shots well, ducked and slipped effectively, and could do it while being offensive. He could be on the front foot, pressuing an opponent, attacking him, and then slipping the counter shots well, or do it while at mid or long range.

If Duran were to fight Chavez, I think he'd win, and much of it would deal with more of a intelligent skill-set than the terrific speed and workrate mix that was enabling Taylor to fight so well.