TWICE A YEAR OR TWICE A MONTH?

Interesting thread. I like an old era. There's absolutely no way that Floyd, Calzaghe or Ward would've retired undefeated if they had fighting schedule of Henry Armstrong, SRR of Ezzard Charles. And it would be fine. People would've still enjoyed their skills, but it would be much more often - 15-20 times per year. Losses would come, but no one would pay much attention to it.

 

A lot of the old-time fighters who fought every week or every other week or three times a month just fought. They didn't spar in the gym or work out intensely like guys do now.

Most had jobs they worked at all day. They may have gone to a local gym to do some light workouts after their day jobs were completed. The real punching they engaged in was during their actual fights.

Buck Smith brought this up when he was fighting all the time in the 1980s and 1990s. He never sparred at all. He just fought (like every week). He said why spar when I can just get paid to fight?

And when boxers weighed in a couple hours before fights long ago, they pretty much walked around at their fighting weight.

That's why, back when Arguello beat Watt and Benitez beat Hope to win titles in their third division, they were like only the fifth and sixth guy in the entire sport's history to win titles in three divisions. Because, back when guys weighed in the day of fights, there wasn't time to dry out and then rehydrate. So most just fought at the weight they were always comfortable walking around at.

Fighters today who have six- or eight-week training camps and spar with a couple guys ever day probably end up spending more time in the actual ring than the guys who fought several times a month way back when.

Also, fighters today, like Canelo, for example, may walk around weighing 185 pounds or so, then have a long camp, spar a ton, dry out to 160, rehydrate another 15 pounds, then fight.

In the 1940s, Canelo probably would've had 160 fights by now, only got in the ring to punch someone on the weekends, and boxed at light heavy or heavyweight around 178 pounds.

But I doubt his skill level would've been any better. He's probably had more rounds in the ring now (thanks to sparring so many guys in camp) than he would've if he'd fought back then and boxed all the time.

 

Fighters in the old days fought to eat and did not spar like they do today.......in those days they learned on the job.....most could not afford to spar for nothing unless they are sponsored talent......a modern fighter can have easily 10 or more sparring sessions between fights depending on the trainer.....but the matches don't affect their career so they are more relaxed.....in my own amateur career in my gym plus pro time I guessed I had over 1000 sparring matches many were rougher than recorded fights....a sparring match can get rough but the learning if a good trainer is fighting someone that exposes your weaknesses and high level pros(champions) get partners to mimick their next opponent. Fighters also fought more often not knowing who or when in those days so we're always training for the opportunity that may never come.

IMO older fighters learned more subtle tricks because they fought so often so winning was always the point and they learned in the fires of competition....today trainers are smarter and do more to protect their fighters from excessive head trauma....there are still old school types with tons of fights Buck Smith comes to mind if he is still fighting...but fighters today make more money and knowledge of training smarter is known by most fighters they are protected and fight purses are negotiated for the highest price even if it takes a year.....until then the fight is on his own time.

We also have better equipment today that mimicks a fighters movements such as the focus mitts and rib protectors

 

If Floyd had a 100 more fights, I don't know who would've beaten him anyway. He fought and beat most of the top guys of his era. 100 more fights against journeymen to mid-level guys wouldn't have resulted in a lot of losses, regardless.

Who was going to beat him? Micky Ward? Jamie Rangel? Cosme Rivera? It's not like Robinson fought 100 more awesome opponents than Floyd. He just beat the same guys over and over.

If Floyd fought Arturo Gatti six times, I doubt Arturo wins any of them.

 

Ya but the main difference is a lot old fighters didn't have a pot to p*ss in or a window to throw it out of ... so guys were fighting in bars , streets, cash fights, sparred for cash, whatever it took to make a buck. A lot of them it was just the lifestyle growing up as kids. Fritzie Zivic said, if you went outside as a kid you fought, if you didn't want to fight, you stayed inside .. I went outside. For the most part, the old fighters had the mentally of I'll fight anyone anytime anywhere , just not the case today .. too much cherry picking and too much money involved. that's why the old timers are just way more hard core than the new guys.. You put Floyd in the 40's and some other eras with 150 plus fights with those brittle hands ... he wouldn't last past fight 80..he would get thrown up against the ropes and mauled .. he's just not hard core enough ..imo ..

 

Great post. Hard for me to imagine that today’s top boxers would be as skilled as they are (let alone more skilled), with thousands of fewer hours of deliberate practice sparring and on the bags/pads.

 

In this day and age, most bad habits are ingrained through the use of punch mitts. I am pretty sure that I can watch a fighter and then recreate the punch mitts routine his trainer puts him through.

 

Is that because mitts are bad or because some people misuse them? Any examples in particular (or specific fighters or specific bad habits) Are you opposed to using mitts in general?

 

Is it really that different though? Seems like a lot of old timers frequent fights were no harder for them than the modern ones sparring sessions. Although id still give a slight edge to the old timers, constant competition seems to build up more fire than some of the newer guys have.

 

Hi Uncle Roger,
I didn’t know you were computer literate...lol!

Floyd surely would’ve lost somewhere along the way. Who knows, maybe Spadafora would’ve beaten him, like he did in their sparring match, except it would be in the L column of his record, instead of in the back of his mind to remind him of “hard work, dedication!”

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http://www.fighthype.com/pages/content9983.html

 

As an aside, I definitely appreciated Spadafora's humble perspective on the session more than Jesse Reid's axe-grinding ****-talking.

http://www.*******.com/spadafora-reflects-on-mayweather-sparring-session--63969

 

Never saw that before ..enjoyed it . Didn't look like May trying that hard .. I scored it 1st round Spadafora , 2nd round May ....

 

One of the advantages modern fighters have is being able to watch tapes of their opponents and work out their weaknesses alongside their trainer. A fighter in the past would have turned up maybe not even knowing who their opponent was but certainly never having seen them perform before. They'd have to figure them out as they fought. So rematches were an important thing because they had the knowledge of what they'd learnt from the previous fight to go on.

That's one of the reasons you can't compare old-time fighters records with modern fighters records in terms of losses and why fighters like Sugar Ray Robinson or Willie Pep were so exceptional because they were going undefeated in 60-70 fights when they didn't have an instant preview of their fighters. They were just better than everybody else.

 

That works both ways though. The men who beat Sugar Ray Robinson and Pep were able to do so without studying their films either.