Is boxing the only sport that has fans of Classic fights?

Good question actually.

I watch old fights from a lot of combat sports though. Maybe it's fighting? More respect for ancient warrior rather than pure athletes isn't there.

 

I'm not watching an hour long hockey game from '96 when I can watch a 30 minute Gatti/Robinson war :smoke

 

No. I regularly watch 'classic' basketball and baseball games.

I believe the introduction of sabermetrics in the '80's ended most people's pursuit of older recorded games. These new breed of Internet journalists are nothing more than stat-freaks.

True fans of the game like (author of The Book of Basketball) Bill Simmons has watched everything available dating back to 1947.

 

Boxing's an easier sport to follow old career's than team\season based sports too.

For something like football it's almost impossible to have the same sort of comperehensive footage available of a great side of the past as you can do for a great fighter.Now with every game shown live somewhere and streamed etc it's easier.

 

1) Boxing is an individual-based sport, so whoever you root for is a clear-cut character. If you root for a team, it's different. One year, they're underdogs who pull through by means of hard work and perseverance. They win you over, but next year the same team could consist of talented, spoiled individuals who do just enough to win. The fact is that you're rooting for a bag of money that buys a different team each year.

2) Boxers only fight a few times per year once they hit their stride. So each fight is special, memorable and has their own aspects style-wise and event-wise. When a team plays 40 times a year, it loses its shine after you've seen it live.

3) Boxing has a great, rich history filled with interesting stories and fantastic fights. I think this is one of the reasons that chess also has many "classic" fans, while tennis, despite being an individual sport, doesn't have that many classic fans. Its history simply isn't as deep.

 

**** it mate, I watched Kimura Vs Helio Gracie in awe. I was like 'yes someone f'n filmed this' because that was two renowned grapplers going at it there and a historic victory for the Judoka.

 

Great shout that. Very comparable to boxing in that respect actually, there are several claims down the ages for G.O.A.T. You'll have the Kasparov contingent, and then you'll get someone shouting for Fischer or Capabalanca.

 

Haha interestingly enough I've just started a chess club at ny school.

Back on the thread though, I am a huge football fan (hece my username) and my Dad and I support the same team and he loves the talk of the old heroes like Bremner and Hunter etc and he'll watch matches from back im his day but I can't bring myself to do it. With Leeds I'm very much in the present and I don't care so much for the history.

With boxing it's totally different though, I mean the amount of times I've watched old Dempsey fights is untrue.

Not sure why to be honest.

 

I believe I've seen people re-watch famous games a time or two, but I'm not really a fan of ball sports. Fans of Muay Thai seem to have some appreciation for the past. It's just not well documented in English. You can find a lot of Muay Thai fights on youtube and people talk about famous fighters on forums, but nobody has done the leg work to make a Ring Magazine style fight of the year record that would guide a novice through the sports highlights, or things of that nature. Names like Dieselnoi, Buakaw, Dekker, Kaman, Hoost, Payakaroon, or Urquidez pop up alot in kickboxing chat. But they've all got about two hundred fights to their name and it's a mess wading through all of that to find the best ones.

 

Hence why I'm doing it, look out for my book sometime in the next decade. It would be about the real legends of Muay Thai, the Thai's, not ****ing Hoost, who I do really like by the way.

Jomhod, Poot Lorlek, Apidet, Sakad Petyindee, Saenchai, Hippy, and yes as you said Samart and Dieselnoi, but also Samart's brother Kongtoranee. All of these will feature in the book, which is more about those that transitioned successfully to boxing but will hopefully have a lot on all the MT greats as well. It will work, don't worry.

Anyway, as for an easy summary you couldn't really do that. Not all the material is out there you've gotta' piece it together through word of mouth, even in Thailand. Muay Lok has an archive though. But it's not as easy as you think it should be, I'm expecting to trek up and down the country and have to learn (pretty much) three languages to do this properly, give up my job and sell everything I own an leave me family behind for most of the next few years!

The ATG thread on the MMA forum is as good a place as any to start.

 

Classic Football is watched. The 1966 and 1970 World Cup Finals; Madrid 7 Frankfurt 3 European Cup Final; North Korea/Italy and Portugal; The Matthews Final; Hungary destroying England at Wembley...

 

that goes for all fighting sports. seeing legends in their prime is a fascinating activity.