The two are study in contrast: Canelo is being brought along quite slowly against top opposition by his camp while Vargas was immediately thrown into fray against an array of champion and rated fighters at a very young age. Canelo already has more than 40 bouts but it was only in the last few fights that he got to meet stronger foes like Shane Mosley and Austin Trout. On the other hand, Vargas was already fighting the likes of Yori Boy Campas, Winky Wright, Raul Martinez, and Ike Quartey before his 2oth bout., Canelo is still unbeaten while El Feroz would suffer his first defeat by TKO against Tito Trindad in his 21st bout, suffer another TKO loss to Oscar de la Hoya three fights later and would wind up his boxing career with only a total of 31 bouts, losing his last three fights, two to Mosley by TKO.

Canelo could be likened to a comet and Vargas to a shooting star.

But I would favor the young Vargas of 1997-2000 over any version of Canelo, including the present. Vargas had Trinidad in trouble and hurt in the early rounds of their bout but his impetuousness got the better of him and his inexperience allowed Tito to ride the storm and eventually wear him down for that TKO.

Canelo would not enjoy the same vast advantage in experience that allowed Trinidad, ODLH, Mosley and Ric Mayorga to beat Vargas.

Vargas by close decision, probably split or majority over Alvarez

Canelo's biggest win as of yet was Trout. Vargas had in his resume' Quartey who gave Oscar tough night and Vargas pulverized him. You add Winky and now the young Fernando Vargas will have full advantage over Saul. Canelo went the distance against light punching Matthew HAtton and HAtton even had some moments there where he stunned Alvarez. If that was VArgas, its game over for Canelo. I had this in the bag for also the undefeated Vargas in his 22nd year via TKO past 6 ronde

tough one. in hindsight its easier to assess vargas now that his careers over and we seen that he lost most of the big ones, but its easy to forget that before canelo he was still the divisions youngest champ and a great fighter. for me canelo still has it all to prove. i guess we will see how good he really is soon so just now i would pick vargas. both him and canelo don't have the best stamina but i think he has too much speed and would throw too many punches to steal most the early rounds and win a close decision.

Canelo alvarez, pure brute strength and power too much for vargas to handle. 4th round stoppage