Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow - Mexico by Eric Armit Jan 28th 2008

In the latest part of his fascinating series, Eric Armit casts his eye over Mexico and chooses his stars of yesterday, today and (perhaps) tomorrow. Viva Mexico Yesterday Salvador Sanchez A pro at 16, a world champion at 19 and dead at the age of 23. That is the amazing timeline for one of the greatest featherweights of all time, Salvador Sanchez.  Born in the small Mexican farming town of Santiago Tianguistenco on January 26 1959 and one of a family of 11 children Salvador was born to fight. He showed such immediate talent that he turned pro in May 1975 at the age of 16 after only a handful of amateur fights and went on to win 18 in a row, 17 inside the distance in the space of 25 months. He met his first and only defeat in September 1977 losing a disputed points verdict to Antonio Becerra for the vacant Mexican bantamweight title in Becerra's home town. He had his first fight in the United States in April 1978 but had to climb off the floor, for the first and only time in his career, to get a draw with Juan Escobar. From then on it was onwards and upwards to superstar status. A run of thirteen wins, including good quality names such as James Martinez, Salvador Torres, Felix Trinidad Snr and Richie Rozelle, took him to a shot at the WBC title in February 1982 which was then in the hands of Danny Lopez. It was the ninth defence for “Little Red“. He had a 42-3 record and was heavily favoured to beat the relatively unknown 19-year-old Mexican. However Salvador slowly ground Danny down and finished him in the 13th round with volley after volley of crushing combinations. Two months later, Salvador struggled a bit in defending his title with a unanimous verdict over Ruben Castillo and then gave Lopez a return in June 1982 and again bettered Danny to defeat, this time ending it in round 14. He kept active but looked less than sensational in defeating previously unbeaten Pat Ford on a majority verdict in September and then showed his class with a wide points verdict over future champion Juan Laporte. His fifth defence was against the top European Roberto Castanon who had a record of 43 wins against a title challenge loss to Danny Lopez and again Salvador produced a class display to halt the Spaniard in the tenth round. He filled in time with a non-title points win over Nicky Perez in July (who had a 50-3 record) and then came a fight which made him the hero of all Mexico. He faced Puerto Rican great Wilfredo Gomez in defence of his WBC title. After drawing his first fight, Gomez won his next 32 fights by stoppage or kayo. He had won the WBC super-bantamweight title and made 13 defences including a stoppage of the great Carlos Zarate, snapping Zarate's winning steak at 52 bouts. Gomez thought this would be an easy night but from round one Salvador had too much hand speed and movement for him and in a display of total self-confidence finally stood toe-to-toe with the hardest pound-for-pound puncher in the world and crushed him with a barrage of lightning combinations in the eighth round. In December 1981 in his fourth defence of the year Salvador he had real problems with Pat Cowdell's clever movement and although two of the officials had him six points ahead one had Pat a point up so Salvador had to settle for a split decision. In defence number eight in May 1982 he outclassed Rocky Garcia winning a wide points verdict. Defence nine saw future star Azumah Nelson step in as a late substitute and give Salvador a scare until the champion ended it with his trademark volley of explosive combinations in the 15th round. That was the last view of Salvador in the ring. On August 12 1982 he died in a road accident after driving his new Porsche head on in to another vehicle. His record was 44-1-1 with 32 wins inside the distance and apart from his other defences his wins over Lopez and Gomez earned him a place in the Boxing Hall of Fame. He was a tall slim figure with a lantern, but iron chin. He had good movement, great hand speed, real power and incredible stamina. It was claimed that his recovery time was so fast that no matter how hard the three minutes he had gone through his pulse rate was back to normal by the end of the one minute rest as if he had never even been extended. All of this before his 24th birthday, arguably before he even reached his peak. A great fighter who was on the way to even greater things. Today Juan Manuel Marquez Current WBC super-featherweight champion and former IBF and WBA featherweight champion. Born in Mexico City on August 23 1973 and one of eight children of a family that is steeped in boxing. His father was a pro and had 35 fights and Juan's younger brother Rafael is the former IBF bantamweight and WBC super-bantamweight champion. He was in the gym at the age of eight and fighting in amateur bouts at the age 13. He won some local golden gloves titles, before turning professional in Mexico City in May 1993 at the age of 19 claiming a 33-1 record as an amateur. His first paid fight lasted less than three minutes, but Juan was on the wrong end of a disqualification verdict. It would be over six years and 29 fight before he lost again. Good wins over Julio Gervacio, Freddy Cruz and Wilfredo Vargas earned him a title shot but when efforts to lure Prince Naseem Hamed into a defence failed Juan took a shot at crafty southpaw Freddy Norwood for the WBA featherweight title. Juan lacked the experience to deal with the awkward champion in their September 1999 fight and was floored on the way to a unanimous points loss.` After another eight wins Juan won big as he halted Australian Robbie Peden in March 2002 to land a shot at the vacant IBF title against the experienced Manuel Medina . The fight took place in February 2003 and Juan took his chance with both hands flooring the elusive Medina twice and halting him in seven rounds. In November 2003 he added the WBA title with a seventh round technical decision over a running scared Derrick Gainer which set up a huge match with the scourge of Mexican fighters Manny Pacquiao. The fight lived up to all expectations as incredibly Juan survived three knockdowns in the first round to battle back to not only survive but prosper. At the end the officials were split with one voting for each fighter and one for a draw. A great, great fight. Juan then beat Orlando Salido and Victor Polo on points in defence of his titles but then fell foul of some stupid boxing politics which saw him lose both his IBF and WBA titles outside the ring. In March 2006 after ten months of frustrating inactivity he tried to regain the WBA featherweight title but put in a below-par performance and lost on points to the unbeaten Indonesian Chris John on John home territory. Three months later he collected the vacant WBO interim title with a stoppage of Thai Terdsak Jandaeng and kayoed Filipino Jimrex Jaca in a defence whilst waiting for Scott Harrison to settle his many troubles. Finally in March last year he moved up to super-featherweight and collected the WBC title and the bragging rights for Mexican super stars with a unanimous verdict over Marco Antonio Barrera. A wide points victory over Rocky Juarez in November takes Juan's record to 48-3-1 with 35 inside the distance and brings us up to date. Already a certain future Hall of Fame fighter, he faces a career defining rematch with Pacquiao in March. Tomorrow Abner Mares Unlike Sanchez and Marquez, Mares came into the professionals already a star, and again unlike the other two was raised in the USA. Although born in Guadalajara on November 28 1985, he moved to Los Angeles when only six years old and is the fourth eldest of 11 children. He started going to the gym at the age of seven and had his first fight when 13. In 2002 he won a gold medal in the World Cadet championships and in the same year also won gold medals in the Mexican championships, Central American and Caribbean championships and Jose Aponte tournament. In 2003 he toured Europe getting a silver in the Spanish Box Am tournament and a bronze in the Acropolis Cup and then took the silver medal in the Pan-American Games/Olympic Qualifiers, losing to Cuban Guillermo Rigondeaux. In 2004, his last as an amateur, the Hungarian Zsolt Bedak had his number and he lost to Bedak three times, the last in the first series of the Athens Olympics, but an earlier silver medal in the World Juniors was some consolation. He reportedly turned down an offer of $500,000 to turn pro when 18 but made the move in 2005 and ran up seven wins in that year and another three in 2006. Last year he registered five more, taking his total to 15, including impressive inside the distance wins over former WBC interim title challenger Angel Priollo and former WBO flyweight champion Isidro Garcia. Fighting at bantam and super-bantam he has shown increased maturity but it is too early to say how far he can go.

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