How Jimmy Young Exposed the Greatest

Ali was 34 when he met Young. Young was 32 when he was stopped by C0oney (and had lost to Occasio and Dokes previously). But this stoppage had nothing to do with Young's age and shape but all about C0oney's offense (which also smashed Norton and Lyle at the time) I suppose?

 

Yeah I don't see how anyone can dismiss both age and poor conditioning as being the culprit to a bad performance. In fact they are likely two of the most important components when entering the ring. Its possible that Young may have had the sort of style to always give Ali some difficulty but frankly I'd like to see this theory tested against the Ali who fought Terrell in 1967 rather than the one who was 20 months away from losing to Neon Leon.

 

Ali was terrible in the fight. Untrained, lazy, fat, washed-up.

Thing is, Jimmy Young's revised reputation shoud suffer for this fight. Biggest fight of his life. I assume he was in his best shape, or close to it, and in his prime. Ali was there for the taking, and Young really put in a stinker of a challenge.

Maybe he should have been awarded the fight on points but it would have been a truly awful HW title-winning performance if he had been.

I think Leon Spinks should be given more credit for actually beating a similar version of Ali in better style.

 

Indeed. And despite Ali's poor display and condition, this was hardly a decisive conclusion regardless of who anybody feels won it. A draw might have been an appropriate verdict.

 

One point ? If that's the difference it's no robbery imo/

 

I definitely don't think it was a robbery. A draw and a rematch would probably have been the most satisfactory outcome from an objective standpoint.

 

Very true.

 

Great post. Very accurate

 

I don't see it as such a bad performance. Get in there, make you're opponent miss, counter sharply. Some nice lead right hands, a little of everything, just not a lot of everything. I enjoyed it and thought he deserved the decision.

 

Yeah I guess the author was right, Ali really sucked ...

 

It certainly wasn't a bad performance. He showed skill and ring smarts - even though that ducking through the ropes business did taint the image of him as a ring general. And it certainly wouldn't have been a scandal if he'd won the decision.

But guys like Red Cobra and some others here treat it like it was a Kalambay-McCallum or Pea-Chavez kind of performance and that's just silly.

If it was a ten years younger Ali, in good shape, that Young arguably edged like that, then perhaps we could name it in that company. But Ali at this stage just wasn't very special anymore. He was badly declined in skill and physical ability, and mostly relied on rings smarts, experience and toughness. Every decent contender took him to the limit by this time, and he would lose his crown to a seven fight novice not too long afterwards.

Norton had about as good a case as Young at deserving the decision over Ali, but against a much better prepared version and without having to embarrass himself by leaning through the ropes. Shavers perhaps won a round or two less than Young, but put a lot more hurt on Ali in the process. And then Neon Leon came along...

It really wasn't any special achievement to have a case for beating Ali after Manilla. So I can't see what makes Young's case so special. But please tell me.

 

:good

 

I thought Shavers beat ali too! Maybe Young was a genius. All these guys before him went toe to toe with ali and didn't get the decision. Jimmy says screw this, I'm not gonna let him touch me once, and make damn sure I hit him enough. Well, mission accomplished to me. I think ali had a broken eardrum and some other damage too