Unpopular Opinion: Canelo beats Prime Hagler

[dporcer0]

You can really tell who doesn't know about boxing when they stylistically relegate Hagler to a brawler/inside fighter. The guy was one of the smoothest out-fighters/counter-punchers ever at middleweight, with an absolute ******* of a right jab. It's really embarrassing the lack of knowledge many newer boxing fans have, but then again, boxing doesn't exactly attract the sharpest tools of our society.

[KillaMane26]

Love how people keep saying Canelo too slick or fast when Hagler unofficially beat SRL

[Roadblock]

Its a great fight and I could not call a winner with confidence Id pull up a seat and enjoy two ATGs going at .

[pesticid]

James Toney also loved gym wars, and coming into fights in a horrible horrible shape.

His defense was better than Canelos, but he was also willing to mix it up, and was a much more fluid combination puncher.

Once again... Canelo's defense has looked good against guys with slow hands, or that lacked timing or were only willing to throw a shot at a time.

He does have excellent head movement, don't get me wrong, but his feet would be a liability in any discussion about him fighting true ATG fighters. Maybe he could pull one over on James Toney, as Toney didn't like to move his feet much either, but against some of the great fighters that did move their feet, its a big nope.

We have seen how Canelo does against guys with movement, and its not well.

Canelo is fight a very specific kind of fighter these days. Guys that go to the ropes, or guys that slowly plod forward at him. He avoids anyone that sticks and moves like Lara did, or Floyd.

So historical matchups against guys with legendary feet, like Roy Jones, or Tommy Hearns, or a Marvin Hagler, are just extremely difficult matchups for him.

One of the reasons GGG was such a hard fight for him, is because GGG has great footwork, and Canelo still needs to plant his feet to throw.

Can anyone actually see him beating a Bernard Hopkins?

James Toney lost twice to Montel Griffin. He fought an old McCallum 3 times. He lost every round of every minute against Roy Jones. He got beat to a pulp by Dave Tibery yet he was given the decision. He lost bad again against Drake Thadzi. James Toney had cement feet and his balance was awful. James Toney's stand out wins are against Michael Nunn and Vasiliy Jirov, and nobody, I repeat nobody was gun shy when they fought Toney. Nowadays, you can't pay fighters enough to throw punches at Canelo. I love Lara but Lara was running for dear life and Lara is a volume puncher, that should tell you smth. Canelo was green back then too. Lara trying to run right now from Canelo, he'll be put in a coffin. Canelo right now has the best defense and balance in all of boxing.

[!! Shawn]

James Toney lost twice to Montel Griffin. He fought an old McCallum 3 times. He lost every round of every minute against Roy Jones. He got beat to a pulp by Dave Tibery yet he was given the decision. He lost bad again against Drake Thadzi. James Toney had cement feet and his balance was awful. James Toney's stand out wins are against Michael Nunn and Vasiliy Jirov, and nobody, I repeat nobody was gun shy when they fought Toney. Nowadays, you can't pay fighters enough to throw punches at Canelo. I love Lara but Lara was running for dear life and Lara is a volume puncher, that should tell you smth. Canelo was green back then too. Lara trying to run right now from Canelo, he'll be put in a coffin. Canelo right now has the best defense and balance in all of boxing.

Did you just call Lara a volume puncher? HAHAHAHAHA. Okay. You should actually watch boxing my friend.

[pesticid]

Did you just call Lara a volume puncher? HAHAHAHAHA. Okay. You should actually watch boxing my friend.

Yeah, volume puncher was a stretch but he's always thrown at around 500 punches per fight, against Castano he threw almost 900 punches. Even against a real volume puncher in Hurd he threw like 600 punches. Against Angulo, 520 punches. Paul Williams who is the king of volume, Lara threw like 500 punches.
Against Canelo though, 386 punches. There is a reason people don't throw as much against Canelo or when they do throw they throw like pitty pat punches like Kova and Smith did.

[buddyr]

these threads are getting dumber by the day. Canelo doesn't possess the power of Hearns or Mugabi and hagler walked thru what they had. Canelo gets beat the **** the down if he decides to stand and trade. Stop these silly threads!!!!

[!! Shawn]

Yeah, volume puncher was a stretch but he's always thrown at around 500 punches per fight, against Castano he threw almost 900 punches. Even against a real volume puncher in Hurd he threw like 600 punches. Against Angulo, 520 punches. Paul Williams who is the king of volume, Lara threw like 500 punches.
Against Canelo though, 386 punches. There is a reason people don't throw as much against Canelo or when they do throw they throw like pitty pat punches like Kova and Smith did.

If you are honest though, how many of those punches are throw away punches and range finder jabs?

Lara is not a fighter that throws a lot of meaningful shots in a fight, he throws lots of range finders, and throw away shots to bait a counter out of you Cuban style.

Even looking at the punch stats vs Canelo, you can see how much of it was just range finder jabs, and throw away punches to control Canelo, and stop canelo from planting his feet and throwing.

Its arguable Lara won that fight also, so its not the best example.

Lara fought his typical style. He didn't fight particularly different against Canelo. He came in with a game plan, executed it to a T, wasn't given credit for his boxing, even though he outlanded Canelo. And the only real punches of significance Canelo landed were body shots trying to get Lara to stop moving. Which didn't get Lara to stop moving at all. Lara was the only one to land anything of any significance upstairs as well.

Lara really made Canelo look limited that night. Could he have thrown more punches? Yes... Could he have engaged more? Yes... did he outbox Canelo without doing so? Yes... Did Canelo have any answers? No.

Lara picked when they were going to engage, and he won almost every exchange.

I give Canelo a huge amount of credit for taking that fight. It was a bad style matchup for him. Lara was incredibly slick and talented and nobody was itching to get in the ring with him.

[JimRaynor]

It would be a good competitive fight where Canelo could very well win. We need to stop idolizing fighters of the past with this hero sort of worship like they were unstoppable and no one after them is as good.


The truth is plenty of fighters of today would whoop the greats of the 70’s 80’s and 90’s.

[The plunger man]

Hagler , leonard , Jones and maybe hearns all would have beat canelo.....hagler was a brilliant counter puncher and was accurate as well could cut you to ribbons.....the 1983 version that beat Tony sibson beats canelo.....leonard and Jones would outbox him and maybe Hearns could stop him
Calum smith let’s not forget got beat by John Ryder lol.....movement will always beat canelo and we saw that with mayweather and Lara