Why are modern heavyweights so old

No big money in the HW divison today.

 

Edward, old men dominating today's heavyweights is an indication of the quality of today's heavyweights ,just as surely as a 46 year old Bernard Hopkins dominating today's lightheavyweights, points to the lack of quality in today's boxing scene. When I as an example ,hark back to the rich
talent-wise 1940s-50s, I''m typed an old fuddy duddy. But I'm expressing the truth, not sentiment...Sorry to say I agree with you,about the terrible decline of boxing, as I once witnessed it...Cheers.

 

Yeah, definitely indicates a lack of young talent.
But also the best fighters out there can maintain their prime years longer when they can fight far fewer tough fights, and fight less often when they reach contender status.

Old-timers desperately had to fight often for a living, even when they were ranked fighters. They had to step up and fight, usually against a tough hungry opponent, and didn't get several weeks and months to prepare for hand-picked opponents. These days you'll see a dozen or more heavyweights who had their careers planned and sponsored from day one. If you put them in 1930s schedule and conditions they might well crash and burn within 12 or 18 months.

 

I agree.

A deeper division typically has young hungry fighters that make for intriguing match ups. This new crop of heavyweights is disappointing that even the Eastern Euros that are on the scene are barely fighting each other.

 

Gotta believe some of it has to do with the majority of the athletic heavyweights going into sports like football and basketball

 

I think a well conditioned man can last into his 40's as he picks up the experience. There were examples years ago but a lot of fighters made themselves older in order to fight pro, Archie Moore was actually 6 years younger according to his mother and a ton of guys back in the day made themselves older when they started so they were really younger but Archie Moore fought at championship level in his 50's.

I think guys like B-Hop did not really have many wars early on and took care of there body's , also 12 rds is better than 15...

JJ Walcott was 38 when he fought Marciano but hard to find a better conditioned athlete. Moore actually went on to fight to a 38-4-2 record after Marciano and 2 of those loses were to Patterson and then Ali, 8 years later. Marciano fight took its toll on Floyd but he used his experience and power to score quite a few wins.

Holyfield stays in shape and Toney was doing well in the heavyweight ranks at 38 years old and at 5"10 in a era of giants, too bad he was not dedicated for condition.

I think there were always old guys around that maintained great condition its just after guys like Foreman at 44 and B-Hop at 46 and Glen Johnson in his 40's it raises the bar for what an older man can do.

 

A combination of the following:

• 
  12 round fights focus more on strength and punching power than on stamina like 15 rounds do. Stamina is a young man's quality, while strength and punching power generally don't fade that much with age.

• 
  It's not exceptional for boxers this day to be in the amateurs up to their 24th birthday. This gains them experience without the risk of losing an 0. In ye good old day, most boxers turned pro while 18-21.

• 
  These days, once you beat a name opponent, you're fighting no more than twice a year. At that pace you can preserve your ability and age really well.

• 
  Better nutrition, knowledge and general living conditions now than 30-60 years ago.

An example is both Klitschko's. On average they fight 2-3 times a year and always stay in healthy shape between bouts. While they're in the late 30's and slowing down a bit, their reflexes are still outstanding. Hopkins is another example.

It's also interesting to point out that not only boxers are getting older. Life expectancy of old people now (born in the 30's and 20's) is better than those born in the 18th century.

 

Its not just Heavyweights, look at the top P4P guys:

Manny Pacquiao 32
Floyd Mayweather 34
Sergio Martinez 36
Bernard Hopkins 46
Carl Froch 34

Some possible reasons:

Fighters staying in great shape to old age is nothing new but add...

1. Easier, lighter schedules
-Nobody is getting broke down fighting twice a month anymore. 3 fights a year is considered busy these days.


2. More medical developments
-Vitali is a Frankenstein of contemporary surgery, would be a cripple a few decades ago.

3. Better overall living conditions.

 

Nutrition, advances in medicine and training techniques help to maintain physical condition for longer period of time. That, combined with experience extends prime years. Talent is not a substitute for experience.

 

.I think the answer is two fold. Older fighters could develop faster because there was more competition, less fear of losing a fight, more fight towns and less TV exposure. Today a fighter is paid by a sponsor who is keeping him winning on TV with gimme fights until he can negotiate a breakthrough fight where the risk factor suits them and the winning record can be preserved

Bottom line is fighters used to fight more often and would be the finished article much earlier.

With the competition diluted with so may belts and TV exposure a fighter stays a prospect much longer so a kind of rested development occurs. A 27 year old fighter can be 28-0, already hold a minor belt without facing a rated fighter and still be years away from making it big because he can defend that minor title against nobodies before he faces a fighter of his own level. winning fighters already have belts without paying their dues and its too hard to match them in a competitive fight because the risk vs. reward is too great.

Of course a mainstream fighter is already old by the time the public knows who he is. He will fight less often and be facing other inactive but name fighters to kind of milk the earning years.

A fighters career is a much slower burning effort these days. If somebody hasn’t been on TV for ten years he’s nobody.

A better fighter who is younger wont of had the level of exposure to warrant a show down anyway and he will only have fought professional losers. The TV exposure is so diluted that a career has to be old enough to catch on with the public.


Also I believe in the old old days a lot of fighters fought with the handcuffs on in the smaller towns or off TV, facing a familiar opponent over and over again and pick up subtle veteran traits at a younger age. Hold back for 8 rounds then fight on the level for the last two. When he got a break at 23 he had fought with a lot of fighters within his level without being too shop worn. He would be chomping at the bit and everyone would know who he was.

 

This is a good point. What used to be career-ending injuries are fixable today. Shoulders, knees, hands, eyes. etc.

Great post. :good

 

Because a human being , even if he belongs 2d very small minority that can develop into an over 220 lbs body takes a lot of time to develop into it .
Even the Klitschkos , Lewis , Bowe and Valuev weren't born d way 1 remembers them .
And 2day , 1 needs 2b bigger than in d past in order 2b even remotely competitive even against smaller HWs than d mentioned above .

In d past HWs weren't HWs , some of them were light middleweights in 2day's standards like Fitzsimmons , Tom Sharkey & Joe Chonski , not 2 mention Langford and a few others .

 

A few issues to consider on some of the tired arguments here:

1) The "Big athletes have gone to football and basketball" argument. Firstly, this assumes the only quality heavyweight talent lies in the US, where (American) football and basketball mean anything. Firstly, it is obvious with the dissolution of the Eastern Bloc that heavyweight talent lies in other places, too, notably Eastern Europe and I would imagine in Western and Southern Africa, also. But let's spin this "other sports" argument on its head. Professional football has been extremely popular in the US since the late 1960's when it surpassed College Football. Now, did the Golden Age of 60's-90's heavyweights deprive football of great talents? Ali, who had very limited footspeed? A Frazier who exhibited his lack of strength on national television? A softish Larry Holmes? A Mike Tyson who was notoriously uncoordinated outside of the boxing ring? George Foreman tried football but gave up on it. My point is that the crossover of skills and abilities between football and boxing is razor thin, basic functional strength probably being the only aspect to consider.

2) Elite athletes in all divisions in boxing and in all sports are getting older. The heavyweights are not an anomaly. Here are 6 of your Ring top 10 Pound for Pound. Paq - 33, Mayweather - 35, Sergio - 36, JM Marquez - 38, Waldo - 35, Pongsaklek Wonjongkam - 34. Then think of the likes of American footballer Brett Favre having his best statistical season at 40. Lance Armstrong winning his 7th Tour de France at 35. In my own preferred sport of athletics, sprinters are not peaking until 30 when once they were long retired by that age. Even high jumpers are performing well into their 30's.

3) There is no money in the division. Not if you aren't any good. Waldo allegedly pocketed the equivalent of $20 million for spanking Haye around the ring for 36 minutes. No money at all in the division, right.

 

I don't think the argument is that the very best potential fighters are going to be the one's with basketball skills, or whatever. I think the argument is based on overall numbers of sports-inclined young men, most of who see boxing as the last choice sport to concentrate on. Whereas in the past, say, one in every dozen boys really wanted to be a fighter. Nowadays it's even more of a minority pursuit.

If you want to speculate in the way you are, why can't you imagine that today's Tysons or Alis are failures as football/basketball/rugby players but became so because that's where the wanted to go and didn't even consider boxing ?
Surely that would be the logical conclusion to come to.

Not that I subscribe to that argument of "other sports" much at all. Just saying.

And why is that ?
There must be reasons for it.

I believe in most cases it can be summed up as they operate in more priveleged circumstances, where they can afford to preserve themselves longer. They can afford to take layoffs (they have sponsors, training teams behind them, good wages etc.), they have medical surgery and drugs to fix them up, they are protected throughout their careers.