[GIF] Max Baer showing skill and reflexes with a triple jab, followed by a sharp combo, and a slip

You missed his point (or read it as uncharitably as possible) and had the nerve to be rude about it because he disagreed with you. FYI, this is the type of thing that Mcvey has called you out about in the past.

The guy seemed to be saying that Baer’s rather pedestrian work in that footage might have been impressive if he had used it successfully to achieve some end. But he didn’t, so as is, the footage you posted was unimpressive. Just my interpretation anyway.

 

Frankly, the suggestion that a boxer could only have learned whatever technique his main coach had learned back when his main coach was a fighter seems too silly to merit a serious response. God bless you for humoring them though.

 

I don't watch footage.

I study footage.

There is a crucial difference!

That is like saying that there is ample footage to demonstrate that that I never clipped my toenails in the bath.

You are trying to use footage to prove a negative.

You can't do that.

If I even produce one clip of Joe Louis using footwork, then the negative is disproved!

 

So did Blackburn invent these ideas while he was in prison?

If not, then who invented them, and when?

 

But that wasn't really my question, was it? So let me rephrase it slightly: Were there boxers back in Blackburn's era, who fought even remotely like Louis.

 

In the lightweight division, yes!

 

Your posts give me the distinct impression that your primary mode of "studying" footage is reading what other people have written about it instead of viewing it yourself.

If I can produce dozens of rounds of a fighter like Louis mostly completely ineffectively struggling to cut off and close distance on mobile opponents, while losing round after round, then we have to recognize that the man had slow feet! Maybe you're thrown off by the terminology? Having "slow feet" isn't some kind of congenital birth defect whereby a boxer physically can't ever move his feet quickly.

 

I assume that ideas emerge organically and sporadically, through trial and error, and through the tinkering and fine-tuning of individual fighters and trainers. Even if Blackburn had been the only many to ever train Louis (and he most certainly was not), the odds are that Louis would have picked up things on his own from sparring partners, his own experience in amateur and professional fights, and by observing the fights of others. And of course, Blackburn would have continued to tinker with Louis's technique and hone his skills according to similar observations while coaching him. I honestly don't get how this is at all controversial or contentious.

 

Yes, Louis struggled mightily against Walcott and Conn, for starters. And I disagree that this can just be explained away by pretending that Walcott and Conn were superhumanly fast defensive wizards. I have little doubt that any number of other heavyweights would have been far better able to close distance on them and attack them effectively. And I'd also bet that several of the "less great" mobile big men of the 80s would have given Louis a very hard time, for similar reasons. Pure speculation but that's how I see it. And the suggestion that Louis chose to mostly haplessly follow little guys like Conn and Walcott around in circles for double-digit rounds while getting potshotted and ambushed time and time again as a matter of stylistic preference seems rather farfetched to me.

I see plenty of reasonable assessments on this forum, including from people who have very different views on particular fighters or aspects of the sport of boxing than I do. I really enjoy reading well-thought out and supported views that contradict my own, and I've changed my thinking about a number of fighters from some of these threads. It would be easier for you to appreciate the discussions on this forum more if you had more of an appreciation and respect for boxing technique, and if you were less of a hero worshipper. Instead, you seem to get outraged any time someone dares to point out a weakness or limitation in a great fighter, and you start trying to come up with dubious rationalizations and (at best) uncharitable strawmen to attack and dismiss those viewpoints. You seem unable to fathom the fact that even the greatest heavyweight boxers of all time weren't flawless, and that boxers can have very, very successful careers (especially at heavyweight!) despite obvious limitations. You seem overly committed to your idiosyncratic, revisionist views on these issues, and unjustifiably convinced of your own special ability to see and understand things that many, many sensible observers in the 1930s and the 2010s don't. I have no interest in starting another embarrassing, pointless flame war, but that's how I see it, and I'm sure I'm far from alone.

 

Apparently you don't get my point at all! In #29 you say:
Is there any evidence that Blackburn taught Louis things that were absent in Blackburns era?

By this I presume (correct me if I'm wrong), that you believe Louis' great skills were also seen in Blackburn's era, and that he took the best from his own time and taught them to Louis.

So is it not only fair, to ask who displayed these skills decades earlier... to which your answer is, that such a question is unreasonable!

 

Pompous much?