Oh certainly, the man could fight 100%. I do wonder how things had turned out for Shu had he and Guan Yu not been killed.
Though in Zhang Feis case, it's like wondering if Lu Bu didn't burn every goddamn bridge in his wake.
Yeah, that's Challenge Level: Impossible territory right there. That said out of all the men Liu Bei managed to assemble, he sticks out like a giant, red-haired thumb.
Let's start with the undisputed top man of his Five Tiger Generals: Guan Yu, a man known equally for his righteousness and asskicking to the point he was eventually deified as
the god of war after his passing.
After than we've got Zhao Yun, who while not the equal of Guan Yu in asskicking or being a swell guy was still better than 99% of the people alive at the time in both respects.
For number three we've got Ma Chao, hotblooded, tough-as-nails Northerner and one of the few men who could come close to Zhang Fei's ass-kicking talents since not even getting whacked in the neck with a broken spear was enough to slow him down in the slightest once he recovered.
Number four is Huang Zong, oldfag and tactical mastermind with balls of steel.
Honorable callout to Zhuge Liang, who while not one of the Five Tiger Generals was equally indispensable to Liu Bei, and was a man as morally upright as Guan Yu and infamous for his unpleasant surprises to the point that all it took was him playing a musical instrument on top of a city gate for an entire army to decide to beat feet than learn first-hand what he had in store for them given his absurd bravado on display. Spoiler alert: his solo performance was all he had planned for them but he knew damn well nobody would want to risk sticking around for any potential encore.
And then that detour aside as the final Tiger General we've got... Zhang Fei, a man who felt the eternal need to apply a boot to someone's ass simply because he could, and for all parties in mere proximity to him was distressingly good at it.
