Ah crap, i'm not very good at using this whole "quote" business. Jinzin, I'd like to break each bit of what you said down and reply individually, but am not sure how to do this. When i try to "quote" your post, it puts it all in one block. Gee, serves me right for not using this site for several months.
Anyway, no probs, i enjoy debating most things Cyclops related. I have no problems admitting a bias to the guy seeing as he is my favourite comic character, but i'll try my best not to let that influence my arguments. And i noticed i have been spelling Sabretooth wrong all this time. My bad.
I don't know if it's entirely fair of you to say that Cyclops doesn't have an impressive record against Victor. Let's take a look at what has been committed to paper (and add in any other issues you know about):
1. In The Red Zone: probably the most recent time these two have fought? One occasion is the appartment. Cyke has his glasses and i agree with you, he attacks Sabretooth while Vic has his back on him (i think he's attacking Iceman). Sabes manages to dodge enough to:
a) Only get a minor hit to himself
b) Close the distance and grab Scott by the face: i completely agree - if not for Iceman, Scott is probably going to be little pieces of flesh on the walls.
Confounding Factors:
- Scott is wearing his glasses and so lacks control and speed of attack (he is now limited to how quickly he can bring his hand to his face)
- I agree with Raoul: he won't be going all out in this room because he might blow Iceman away in the process. Scott has to shut his eyes to stop the beams and a wide angled blast will likely take out Bobby and part of the building. Hence he will be "blind" for a brief moment, that will give Victor an edge. With a visor, Cyclops has no disabilities, as it will shut instantly, allowing to keep his eyes open constantly. In character, Scott will always show restraint like this: a regard for his surroundings.
- Sabes has already been through several hours of chase, fights with Caliban and Psylocke, so it's possible he is less "fresh" as he would be in a first off fight. I'd like to think his HF would compensate for this though.
- Sabes has had upgrades since this fight, so who knows if Scott would damage him now --> i guess i'll try and answer this later. That's gonna be fun to debate (!).
OUTCOME? I give this one to Victor, but only because of the circumstances mentioned above. If they are set out like this, i think yes, Victor could dodge the blasts and close the distance.
The next part of this issue is the brief skirmish on the tube. In summary, Scott tags Victor (who is likely distracted by his fight with Beast), ribs are broken, Vic gets up next panel and escapes.
Again, we can debate the relative power of the blast vs. Sabretooth's durability later. All this shows is that Cyclops hit Sabes, and then he gets up and escapes. You mentioned that Cyclops might have been going all out when he hit Vic with this blast. And you give some examples as to why this might be (eg. Scott's knowledge of Victor, telling him he was "beyond help"😉. As you said yourself...."speculation". It's still perfectly reasonable to assume Scott WOULD hold back due to his concern of hitting Beast (damn those peky X-Men getting in the way again!!) and the possibility of collateral damage. So in that respect, i think we agree again - we CAN only speculate the intention of Scott's blast intensity.
What i would say though is that in a forum fight, there is a MUCH bigger difference between Scott's normal attack intentions and his all out ones. His preoccupation with how he could harm someone with his blasts is well documented in the comics. I don't think we've seen bloodlusted Cyke too often on paper. With Sabretooth, i'd be inclined to say there is a far smaller discrepancy and his bloodlust is turned on a lot. When he is fighting in comics, he aims to maim and kill (with some taunting along the way). He won't be too much different in a forum fight. Agree on this one?
OUTCOME? Stalemate. No big advantage for either participant in this skirmish.
Finally, there is the scene at the end. Actually, i can't remember how it fully goes....but i guess it was Jean had broken Sabes' legs, he tried to attack her and then Scott blew him out of the window. When Scott looked out, he got attacked again, which set up the scene where Sabretooth was on top of him and then got blasted away. Is this right?
So i guess they both score brownie points here. Sabes for getting the drop on Cyke and recovering pretty quickly to attack through the window. Scott for managing to blast him off before he gets gutted. And there are once again confounding factors for both incidents. Scott could arguably have hit Victor harder when he blew him out of the window (he's not bloodlusted), and Sabes could have dispensed with the talking and proceeded straight to gutting (he's closer to bloodlust but probably not fully). Would Cyclops have been quick enough to knock Sabretooth away if there was no taunting? Would Victor have enough strength to get up and attack had Scott him harder in the first place? Nobody knows...
OUTCOME? I think it's not a poor showing for Scott....probably another stalemate in this context.
Phew. That's just one comic!
I can't think of too many other issues where these two fight. The other two issues i mentioned before:
2. X-Factor issue 10. Sabes is KO'd by a blast. A few panels or pages later, he is up again, but he is out for some duration.
OUTCOME? Probably in Cyke's favour. Similar to what i mentioned with the appartment scene though - there are plenty of confounding factors. Like i am pretty sure Sabes was attacking someone else at the time.
3. X-Men Vol.2....maybe issue 7-8 ish? The scene where Victor is blown out horizontally though a window by Scott. Once again, loadsa confounders here.....pretty much the whole Blue Team are at hand, and we have no idea what happens before this shot. All it does demonstrate is that Scott does have enough juice in him to do what he did.
OUTCOME? Not enough evidence to say. All we can say is that Scott is standing....and Sabretooth is flying 🙂
And that's it....i don't know of any other fights these two have had in the comics. Let me know if you can think of any others. And the outcomes are very similar....and IMO, certainly do not show Cyclops to have a poor record of showings against Sabretooth, as you have said....
