BoxRec

This fight was heavily hyped up by HBO crew, after Margarito took out Andrew Lewis on the Shane Mosley-Raul Marquez undercard, just a week after Mayorga's gargantuan upset of Vernon Forrest.

Let's say, Forrest passes on Mayorga rematch and we get Mayorga vs Margarito in July of 2003 in Vegas (instead of Mayorga-Forrest 2).

Mayorga was the RING/WBC/WBA champ. Margarito held the WBO belt, which wasn't as major as it is nowadays.

Who would've won this firefight?

Margarito
Conditioning is better

2128778 wrote: ↑24 Sep 2025, 09:40 This fight was heavily hyped up by HBO crew, after Margarito took out Andrew Lewis on the Shane Mosley-Raul Marquez undercard, just a week after Mayorga's gargantuan upset of Vernon Forrest.

Let's say, Forrest passes on Mayorga rematch and we get Mayorga vs Margarito in July of 2003 in Vegas (instead of Mayorga-Forrest 2).

Mayorga was the RING/WBC/WBA champ. Margarito held the WBO belt, which wasn't as major as it is nowadays.

Who would've won this firefight?

With or without the casting on the knuckles, Antonio Margarita was better.

This was one of my dream fights back in the day. Along with Rafael Marquez vs Jhonny Gonzalez. I love matchups that are guaranteed slugfests. The promoters almost never do 'em anymore, probably for the health of the fighters

But yeah this would've been wild. I think Margarito would've stopped Mayorga in the 7th or 8th round.

Back in the day I thought it would've been a back and forth slugfest with each man going down, and it may have been (That Bantamweight dream fight I mentioned up there would've been almost certainly)

Knockdowns or not though. Lots of punches. Lots of action. It'd be great, and I'd favor Margarito.

gilgamesh wrote: ↑24 Sep 2025, 12:33 This was one of my dream fights back in the day. Along with Rafael Marquez vs Jhonny Gonzalez. I love matchups that are guaranteed slugfests. The promoters almost never do 'em anymore, probably for the health of the fighters

But yeah this would've been wild. I think Margarito would've stopped Mayorga in the 7th or 8th round.

Back in the day I thought it would've been a back and forth slugfest with each man going down, and it may have been (That Bantamweight dream fight I mentioned up there would've been almost certainly)

Knockdowns or not though. Lots of punches. Lots of action. It'd be great, and I'd favor Margarito.

Yeah, I think I would've picked Margarito as well.

As I'm thinking of it... Had this fight really happened as HBO guys wanted and if Margarito would've won, he could've potentially gotten on a badass win streak.

If he beats Mayorga and unifies RING/WBC/WBA/WBO, he probably goes on to either fight Forrest or then-IBF champ Spinks (for Undisputed status). I think, there's a good chance that Margarito outworks both at that stage. Then, let's say he goes the same route as Spinks and fights Judah. IMO, Marg would've overwhelmed Zab too.

Mandatories against likes of Cintron and Baldomir? Marg beat Cintron twice and likely would've handled Baldomir.

If all goes according to this scenario - Margarito's resume would've been truly stellar. His fight against Mayweather becomes inevitable. And how big it would've been!