The Welterweights and Light Middleweights of the late 90's and early 00's

After the retirements of both Mosley and Wright I noticed that they were both described as over rated, which I think is a very harsh assessment of two very fine yet very different talents. The mid to late 1990's was a very strong time in the welterweight division with most of the talent moving up to 154lbs at the turn of the century. We had great fights by the bucketload with many big punchers going toe to toe, my question to you though is how do we see fights going that didn't happen.

I'll give a small pool of fighters and I must have missed some;

Oscar De La Hoya
Shane Mosley
Felix Trinidad
Ike Quartey
Pernell Whitaker
Vernon Forrest
Oba Carr
Fernando Vargas
Ricardo Mayorga
Winky Wright
Javier Castillejo
Yory Boy Campas

I'll start with Mosley against Trinidad where I see Tito taking it on points having been floored early on, the first 8 rounds are fairly even but at this point he starts to dominant with his right hand coming into play increasingly as the fight progresses.

Good article, Ghosty.

I've often pondered Mosley-Trinidad myself, as it goes. At Light-Middleweight I'd make 'Tito' the definite favourite; Mosley just never looked the same to me at 154 lb. A touch slower and a little sluggish at times, I can't really think of any distinguished performances he had at Light-Middle. Very lucky second time out against Oscar I thought, and absolutely awful for long periods against Mayorga before finding that last gasp KO. I think the scorecards, which had him ahead at that point, were a bit too generous to him.

At Welter, however, I feel that if there is a slight favourite, it may be Shane. Trinidad was incredibly hit and miss, and as you say he also had a tendancy to be decked early doors; Lueshing, Campas, Carr etc. Mosley was still one hell of a finisher at 147 lb and, if Trinidad gets himself in trouble as he was prone to doing, I'm not so sure Mosley would let him off the hook.

Tito absolutely hated not getting to people, too, and became a little left hook happy and clumsy when being outboxed or forced to chase. Mosley had the hand speed and the intelligence (as well as the better chin if all else fails) and I'm not sure I can see a way for Trinidad to beat him at 147 lb here.

That said, the window for that fight at Welterweight was very, very small, so might have to stick with my Light-Middleweight analysis.

You know, I've often wondered with a Forrest/Trinidad fight at WW with who would come out on top. Forrest is one of those dodgy ones where it's hard to truly say how good he is at 147lbs. Embarassingly beaten by Mayorga in the first, then just poor against Mayorga again in the rematch, but against a fantastic boxer in Shane Mosley he bossed him first time out then although laboured slightly more than some people seem to remember in the rematch won relatively convincingly. Real hard to assess and could have just been a nightmare for certain fighters with a more boxing than brawling style at 147, as he never really seemed to carry anything huge up at 154lbs.

Bazooka vs Tito at welter would have been fun, also Tito vs Trinidad. Also, it would have been hilarious watching Sweetpea making a fool out of Mayorga. Swing, miss, slug, miss, charge, miss, get angry, miss, get more angry, miss...get disqualified!!

Tito trying to beat himself up would be fun.

In Quartey you're talking about a fighter who was massively under rated but his liking for the canvas would be his undoing against Trinidad, he would keep getting up but in a close fight against a power puncher the knockdowns would prove pivotal.

good post by the way

Interesting take on a potential Mosley and Trinidad fight Chris, have long believed that Trinidad had that added something to get the better of Sugar, he seemed to dominate his opposition which was of a higher class easier than Mosley. We talk about the history of the sport a lot but I think it's a period that is often overlooked despite being stacked with varying talent.

Mosely v Trinidad would be a great fight. Mosely would know that Tito had a dodgy chin but a howitzer of a punch. If the fight goes the distance I can see Tito winning a clear UD similarly to the Forrest/Mosely fight. But if Tito goes down, Mosely was a tremendous finisher and would close the show. But Tito had very good powers of recovery and if late in the round could see out the round, come out fresher in the nest round fighting behind his jab.

At a push I'd go for Tito via UD.

Easy to see how someone as good as De La Hoya can pick up some losses along the way when you look at a list of talent like that and realise he fought just about everyone on there. If De La Hoya had gotten the decisions he deserved against Mosely and Tito then retired before heading up to middleweight he really would have an impressive looking record.

Back to the article I think Wright vs De La Hoya is the fight I'd really be interested in and would make Wright a favourite going in to it.