Salvador Sanchez.

[Boxing Bob]

Sanchez would have met his match against JLR.

Not in a million years! Ramirez was one hell of a fighter, but Sanchez was a level above

[bravestone]

Sanchez would've smashed Ramirez.

Caught this on twitter the other day, a new top 100 is floating about

#62 Salvador Sanchez (44-1)

There is a mutter, sometimes, when discussing the career of Salvador Sanchez and the mutter mutters that we need to be careful about overrating him due to his early and tragic death, which cannot be counted in his favor—his potential is meaningless, it is what he achieved that counts. Firstly, only in the midst of the vagaries of an all-time great list can concerns about somebody dying “being held in their favor” come up naturally as a part of the discussion and secondly, Sanchez does not need to be propped up by sentimentality and sensationalism—he boxed a career before his death at the tender age of just twenty-three.

Consider: Sanchez has as many wins as Wilfredo Gomez, fewer losses than Wilfredo Gomez, and like Gomez he never lost his (featherweight) title in the ring. He boasts more defenses of his title than Vicente Saldivar, and, as we shall see, his level of competition is comparable. It is not for the sake of tender feeling or a dwindled sense of what could have been that he is ranked a hair’s breadth in front of his fellow Latin American compeers but rather the overall sense that he combines the best of what makes them both great.

Sanchez won sixteen of his first seventeen fights by knockout and then dropped a split decision to Antonio Beccera down at bantamweight before stepping up to complete what would be perhaps the second most celebrated run ever at featherweight (the first is locked down by a fighter very near the top of this list, and if you don’t know who that is, you will by the end of the series). It would last from late 1977 until summer of 1982 and included the deeply unpleasant job of picking up the featherweight title from Danny Lopez, likely the hardest hitter ever at the weight.

Sanchez looked sensational in the first round of their February 1980 contest, a jab that came all the way from his toes and a hook that looked like it might be a jab until it landed, a shucking, sliding style that did not compromise his offense and, given that he was only twenty-one years old, an almost offensive confidence bordering on smugness putting him firmly in control. His confidence was justified as over and over again he slipped the Lopez jab and found a punch.

It was not abnormal for Lopez to have a bad first round, but it was abnormal for such an aggressive showing to bring such roaring success. Sanchez was able to box-punch Lopez in range without allowing him to get his offense going and when in the eighth round he felt that Lopez had become worn, he initiated bruising exchanges, coming out almost exclusively ahead. When the champion finally cracked in the thirteenth, awash in his own blood, it was only after several rounds equally awash with a sense of inevitability.

After beating the superb Ruben Castillo (47-1, and the “1” came against Alexis Arguello) in his first defense, Sanchez rematched Lopez and showed him a subtle difference—boxing more—and although it produced an almost identical result, it was telling. Sanchez was a thinking fighter; wary of showing a top-class opponent the same thing twice he re-developed the same strategy to present new problems. It was this kind of astonishing tactical awareness that brought him wins over Juan LaPorte, Wilfredo Gomez, Pat Cowdell and Azumah Nelson.

Who knows what we in boxing lost when we lost Sanchez? He consistently showed the understanding and awareness of a veteran in his early twenties, a testimony perhaps to the number of fights and defenses he crammed into his short career. As a veteran, he might have attained the rare heights of strategic genius reserved for the likes of Archie Moore and Bernard Hopkins.