Duran at 135 and Napoles at 140 are the two I think of immediately. At least, the ones I’d be confident would beat him. I’d love to see Benny Leonard v Whitaker. I’ve no idea how that would play out. I think Tony Canzoneri would cause Pea some problems too.
what Im saying is if you look at mayweather jr's time from the beginning of his career until he moved up to 140 to face corley, that guy is a problem for whitaker AND any lightweight on earth. young mayweather jr who beat corrales is a serious problem for whitaker. put him in against whitaker at lightweight and he has an excellent shot to win.
Call me crazy but I also think Mayweather beats Whitaker. Sometimes it's hard for boxing fans to accept that modern era fighters could surpass old legends. Whitaker as great as he was gets a bit overrated in this forum. Floyd was a damn near perfect fighter in his prime.He had it all. At 135 he had power(before hand injuries), speed, defense, chin, thoughness, recuperative powers. I dont think anyone at 135 outboxes mayweather. His boxing iq was too high for Whitaker. It would be a chessmatch and a bit boring but Floyd would come out on top.
I think Floyd would have all kinds of problems with Whitaker’s timing, similar to how he did in spots with Corley. The counter right hook over Floyd’s left would work wonders for Whitaker, and he hits hard enough to make Floyd wary. Unless Floyd is able to physically dominate and man handle Whitaker inside, I don’t see him winning this.