[RING, June 1962] What Happened to Body Punching? By Paul Berlenbach

Oldtimer gripes about the diminished skills, patience, and dedication of more recent fighters... Some interesting quotes though. Pardon any typos.

What Happened to Body Punching? By Paul Berlenbach (as told to Lew Eskin) (pp. 30-31, 48)

… “You can’t drive a spike with a tack hammer. It takes the right tools and the correct leverage to send a heavy spike through a solid plank of wood. In the same way it takes the proper use of the back muscles to get the needed force into body blows to do real damage.

“Today this is a lost art among the fighters. That is a question that has often been asked of me and one that I have asked myself many times watching the inept body attacks used by the present day ringmen.”

“For one thing,” said Paul, “the fighter today does not spend as much time as he should in the gym learning his trade. He does not spend hours pounding away at the big sand bag, as we oldtimers used to do. It is my belief hat it is on the sand bag that a fighter learns how to properly deliver his blows. According to Berlenbach, the present day fighter works one or two rounds on the big bag and lets it go at that, whereas when he fought the man spent hours pounding away at the sand bag.

“Practice makes perfect,” says Paul, “but today’s boxer doesn’t get enough practice. In the old days, few fighters reached the main bout class until they had three or four years experience as a preliminary boy, but today most main bout boxers have had less than twenty fights. In my day that was less than a year’s activity.

“True, I reached the top quickly. Sometimes I think in looking back, too quickly. I had a reputation from my days as an amateur wrestler and boxer and in my eleventh fight, I was matched with Jack Delaney in the first of our four fights. That was the only bout I lost before winning the title from Mike McTigue.

“As I said I reached the top quickly, I scored twenty-three knockouts in my first twenty-eight fights. Most of them with body punches either finishing off my opponents, or setting them up for the finisher.

You might say that my career was similar to that of today’s fighter in the short time it took me to reach the top. This is true—yet untrue.

“I spent long hours in the gym and had many, many amateur fights before turning pro. In watching todays’ fighters in action, I often notice that they have the wrong stance to be effective with their body blows.

“They stand squarely in front of their opponent,” he said “and when they punch to the body, it is with quick flurries of blows. True they land and are thrown much faster than I and other oldtimers used to throw our blows. But think, when was the last time you saw a man, either knocked down or out with a punch to the body?

Today’s fighters are arm punchers,” he declares. Paul says they swing with their arms, and do not get the proper leverage needed to deliver a real powerful punch. Not only with body punching is this true, he pounded out. That is why there are so few one punch knockouts . His opinion is that most of today’s kayos come after a flurry of punches. ”I was taught never to stand full face with an opponent,” he continued. “One should stand at an angle so that he can get full leverage behind his punches as I did. I punched with my whole body behind my blows. Most of the fighters of my time, and before, did the same.

“I have heard the story that today’s fighters eat better and are better conditioned. That is why they take body punches better. That is a lot of bunk. The old timers all did heavy labor even as kids. We might have been smaller but we were a lot tougher than the boxers of today.”

In order to get power in body punches, Berlenbach says one has to dig in, not only with his feet, but with arms and body, Today’s approach he declares different. The fighters train different. They do not learn proper procedure. Paul went on:

“Watching fights and fighters since I retired thirty-odd years ago, I have seen few real good body punchers and of those, most have been either southpaws or converted southpaws, who made good use of the left hooks.

“While Rocky Marciano did a lot of damage with his body blows, he was more of a mauler. He used strength, not sharp power to wear his man down. The same was true of Henry Armstrong, and of the present men, Bobo Olson, Gene Fullmer, Tony DeMarco, and Carmen Basilio who could inflict damage with body blows. But they were left hookers.”

Ray Robinson, a truly great fighter, also was a punishing body puncher, but Ray rarely relied on this type of attack, said Paul.

“Back before my time there were many great body punchers—Ad Wolgast, Kid McCoy, Battling Nelson, Bob Fitzsimmons, with his “solar-plexus punch”, “Nonpariel” Jack Dempsey, Jim Jeffries, Stanley Ketchel—all were capable of knocking out their foes with a smash to the body.”

Today’s boxers are faster afoot and with their hands, like Floyd Patterson, he pounded out. He thinks they have sacrified power for speed, the reverse of baseball, where the hit and run has been replaced by the home run.

“Many times over the years, I have showed youngsters my ideas on body punching,” Paul continued. They would listen then try out what I had shown them on the heavy bag. By they quickly tired, when they saw the long hours of practice that was necessary to master the art.

“When I was a fighter we did not tire of gym work. There was little to do in the evening—no radio or television, no cars to drive around like today. So we enjoyed staying in the gym, listening to the takes of the oldtimers and learning our trade.”

It is his opinion that modern fighters have too many distractions. They rush into to the gym, rush through their workouts and rush out again.

“Like the people I meet on the street, rush, rush, rush. No time to learn, too big a hurry to reach the top. Like I said before, I too was rushed, and I know if I had taken me longer to reach my goal, say another year or two, with about twenty more fights under my belt, I might have stayed on the throne longer than I did. I think this rush is one reason why the reign of the champions is becoming shorter and shorter with each passing year, continued the former title holder.

“Long, long before I laced on my first pair of boxing gloves, Sam Langford was quoted as having said “Kill the Body and the Head Dies” he continued.

“Old Sam knew what he was taking about. When you knock a man down with a head punch, he may be hurt, but he still has his strength. He is dangerous. Knock him down with a body blow and you sap the strength out of him.

“That was a rule of my day. Punch to the body. Today they still aim at the body but miss their marks. They throw plenty of body blows but the punches lack steam. The art of infighting is also being lost along with the art of body punching.

“Maybe this is progress. Maybe I am getting to the age where I long for the Good Old Days. But I can’t see it that way. To me body punching was a true form of art in the pugilistic trade.