Oscar would be live in this fight. His left hook could knock Hearns out and it's not like he's a poor boxer either.
It’s hard for me to picture Oscar stopping Hearns. At 147, he couldn’t stop Trinidad, Whitaker, Quartey, or Mosley. His power is based on his 12th round rally against Quartey (In a fight he clearly lost) and his stoppage of Vargas, whereas it took Leonard 13 rounds to finally get to Hearns and stop him. Plus, I’m not sure Oscar would have the guts to go after Hearns like that. He ran away from Trinidad yet he’s going after Hearns??? Highly doubt it.
Oscar grew steadily as a fighter- replacing Alcazar with Jesus Rivero was a genius move. Rivero understood the fighter and was creating a masterpiece. In the most stupid move of his career Oscar fired Rivero. And he almost instantaneously regressed dramatically. This coincided with his move to welterweight. The versions of Oscar trained by Steward and Clancy couldn't beat Tommy Hearns if he had a tag team partner.
147 is the only weight even worth discussing here. 154 is a mismatch. There are FAR lesser junior middleweights in history besides Hearns who would thrash Oscar. Oscar has like a 10% chance at 147, and 0 chance at 154.
Oscar's skill peak was the first Chavez fight and the MAG fight. He did indeed steadily regress at 147. Oscar just didn't have the ability to properly integrate defense and offense. When he was in kill mode, he was awesome, but very hittable. When he was being elusive, he wasn't much effective on offense. That first Chavez fight was the only fight in his career when he incorporated both.
In my opinion, that is what Rivero was teaching him. Rivero understood the fighter and taught to his strengths. The guys that came were trying to create something that wasn't in line with the qualities of the fighter.
I remember that Manny Steward was showing him a lot of film of Robinson. Thats all well and good, but no one can be Ray Robinson. As you said, they should have worked to his strengths.
