The Golden Ages By Division 105-130

**Julius Rain** · 05-22-2011 05:03 AM

How great are Pancho and Sanchez really? Both died at 23? Can we really call them greatest from their division?

We can add Isreal, Gonzalez, Larios, Marquez for batamweight of 2000's.

**marbleheadmaui** · 05-22-2011 08:05 AM

Originally Posted by Julius Rain

How great are Pancho and Sanchez really? Both died at 23? Can we really call them greatest from their division?

We can add Isreal, Gonzalez, Larios, Marquez for batamweight of 2000's.

Villa died at 23 with 90+ wins, multiple wins over HOFers and champions. It seemed only Frankie Genaro had his number. How tough a guy was Genaro? A very close friend of mine used to drink in Genaro's bar in NYC when he was starting out as a cop. One day he was there and two guys with bats came in for Genaro, then 60+ years old. All 5'2, 120 pounds of Frankie Genaro leaped the bar punched the lead guy, took his bat, hit the second guy with it and chased both guys out of the bar. Losing to Frankie Genaro was no crime.

Sanchez was an absolute wonder. He came out of nowhere and DESTROYED HOFer Little Red Lopez twice. He damn near killed ATG Bazooka Gomez when Gomez was thought to be unbeatable. He stopped a young and gallant Azumah Nelson. But he also beat a group of featherweights (they'd be bantams today) that would school guys like Vic Darchynian. Patrick Ford, Ruben Castillo and Juan Laporte were great fighters in a brutally competitive era.