Why Are The US Heavweights So Poor Now?

[RememberingC.S.]

Also swimming, i think requires some skills useful in boxing: at first, nowadays swimmer are advantaged by being giants (you don't say?) , like Michael Phelps, Ian Thorpe, etc; it requires a lot of power, muscle masses, but also stamina... and an exceptional degree of coordination and precision.

[Absolutely!]

Originally Posted by JAB5239

Since Im American I could be mistaken, but aren't most colleges tuition free in Europe? If that is the case european kids don't need to focus on a sport to help get them into a a school if they cannot afford it.

Here in the UK yearly tuition fees for Uni can cost up to about ten thousand pounds a year (average about three and a half). We don't have the sports scholarship system here. You just take out a student loan and pay it back when you can, generally a long time after you graduate.

We don't have state run boxing programs either. Never have.

[T.S.]

Originally Posted by Absolutely!

I was going to post that vid along with the sprint against that NBA guy where he came dead last, but **** it. Frazier was a fighter, not an athlete. That's something that proponents of this ridiculous argument can't understand.

Absouletly! Ask Ali or Foreman if they would be in the NBA if they were coming up today I'd bet they'd look at you like you is a fool

[On The Money]

Originally Posted by T.S.

Absouletly! Ask Ali or Foreman if they would be in the NBA if they were coming up today I'd bet they'd look at you like you is a fool

Exactly, I don't think they ever had to choose between boxing and NBA... I saw Joe Frazier once 'sprinting' in the Superstars show in the 70's, was like watching a man running through treacle, but he'd KO the whole NFL. It's as ludicrous as expecting Carl Lewis to beat Boris Becker at tennis. Elite boxers require skill, style and brawn. Skill acquired over years.

[jeffjoiner]

There's a lack of talent going into the system. There's no single problem, but a combination of factors that have combined to produce this.

Parents have been reluctant to put their kids in boxing after watching so many punch drunk ex-fighters, notably Muhammad Ali.

Neighborhoods in which kids used to fist fight are now run by gun toting gangs.

No more boxing in high school, college, or prisons.

Huge uptick in the popularity and financial rewards in other sports.

Each is a fairly significant cause, but when applied over a couple of decades, it has resulted in fewer and fewer athletes going into boxing.

[Southpaw1]

Originally Posted by T.S.

I guess if Joe Frazier were an up and comer today he'd be a power forward in the NBA

More like a goal line running back

[KidDynamite]

Would you rather get paid millions to get punched in the face or put a ball through a basket???

BTW you're chances of earning as much in a sport like boxing pales in comparison to basketball or even football. After Mayweather, the Klits and Pac, who is really making multi-millions regularly?

And good luck thriving in a post Tyson era.

[Absolutely!]

Originally Posted by Southpaw1

More like a goal line running back

Does that position involve running?

[eagleskins]

Originally Posted by One Round

They're playing NFL and Basketball, because apparently no other countries have sports other than boxing.

That is the truest thing ever spoken. It is absolutely ridiculous of this notion that all the boxers are in sports, especially the NBA which is the softest professional league in the world, over boxing. Boxing, on the elite level, pays more than any US sport.

[Butch Coolidge]

Out of sight out of mind. Boxing has been reduced to being sort of a niche sport in the USA. That is unless you watch Spanish speaking television networks then boxing is still mainstream.

[Hattons Hook]

Fat and lazy.

[dealt_with]

I think it's really simple to be honest. A poor amateur system. The decline in US amateur boxing coincided with the US not producing champions in the pros. It's not just the heavyweights either, there's not much coming through for the US in any weight division. Ward, Broner and Russell jr. have hidden that a bit but I feel like they are the last stand and in general the overall decline of US boxing is well underway. When Berto manages to become a hyped up fighter you know something is wrong.

[reed_man02]

Originally Posted by Absolutely!

Does that position involve running?

yea but u don't have to be fast. just big, strong and tough. i think frazier would have went to the nfl if he was around today. didn't the gym he used to train at go outta of business. it would have been extremely tough for frazier to get into boxing today.

[Absolutely!]

Originally Posted by eagleskins

That is the truest thing ever spoken. It is absolutely ridiculous of this notion that all the boxers are in sports, especially the NBA which is the softest professional league in the world, over boxing. Boxing, on the elite level, pays more than any US sport.

I'd like to know who initially came up with this excuse. It's just so ridiculous. There's nothing substantial to back it up, just pure speculation and the most superficial of logic. You might as well say that all professional heavyweights are practising law or becoming paramedics for all the sense it makes.

Until an ex-NBA or NFL player becomes P4P number three like former soccer player Sergio Martinez became, then the argument holds about as much water as a weight drained JCC jr.

[m8te]

well schooled american heavyweights reared from the ground up strictly within the sport of boxing is a rarity. this is why you see old guys from the early 2000's or in some cases, the 90's, still vying for contention, or big guys who started late in the sport. LITERALLY EVERY up and coming, notable american heavyweight outside of jonathon banks started their sports careers in football or basketball, and made the transition after their campaign in their initial sport fizzled out for one reason or another.

the tradition of well schooled big guys reared in boxing from a young age iis either dying or totally dead.