Top fighters' biggest technical flaws and physical limitations?

No, Foreman lost because of Ali's genius ring IQ, boxing IQ, his ropeadope tactics, and his stamina management.
Everyone knows this. Foreman didn't lose because of his lack of footing. That aspect of his game being exposed is just the collateral damage of Ali putting on a once in a century like performance.

 

He lost because his punches were wide and telegraphed (poor technique) and because he had poor guard and head movement and therefore was easy too hit. That's why the rope-a-dope worked. The fatigue came from missing and being landed on. Had he been the one who had been landing and Ali missing, the result would of course have been different.

 

He lost because Ali was a genius, not because his punches were too wide.

 

No. Because his punches were too wide. Ali just happened to be the lucky person to share the ring with him that night. Everyone knows that’s how the Rumble in the Jungle went down.

 

The one doesn't exclude the other. His wide punches and his lack of proper guard and head movement were factors in him losing. As they were aginst Young.

It's strange to me to claim that these flaws never caused him to lose a fight when it's clear as day how much Ali and Young exploited them on route to defeating him.

 

And he got knocked out because he was there to find with punches.

 

Jesus. So now an attempt to ridicule the concept of that it's kind of important in boxing to manage to hit the other guy and not get hit yourself.... This forum at times.

 

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Ali didn't KO evreyone he faced and probably no one else he faced took a single punch as well as Foreman.

But for ****s sake, this isn't algebra. All one have to do is to watch of Ali's punches pentretates Foreman's outstretched arms and hits his stationary head. And how relatively easy he finds it to evade and block Forman's wide swings.

The same for Young.

 

One gets hit cleanly more than the other one and misses more than the other one. Guess who stands upright at the end?

 

But those that think there are no problems with Foreman's technique, by all means practice what you preach.

 

Foreman was psychologically off for the Young fight.
And Ali simply outclassed him with a masterclass performance.

Foremans footing and wide punches weren't exploited by Joe Frazier.
Nor Ken Norton. And yet these are also world class boxers.

The Rumble In The Jungle is a story of Ali's genius adjustments and tactics.
It's not a story of wide punches and a lack of footing.

It's 100x more about what Ali did right, than what Foreman did wrong.

 

It's ridiculous to attribute Foremans loss to the same technique he used to become on of the greatest of all time, rather than acknowledging that it was Ali's special performance.

It was more about resilience, heart, IQ. It was an uphill battle. Ali had a wicked focus in his eyes. It was a war between Foremans power and Alis speed/IQ/reflexes. Ali's traits overpowered Foremans.

 

No, it's both. Ali couldn't land those straight down the pipe against everyone and he couldn't evade and block punches like that against everyone. He could do it easier against Foreman because of Foreman's technical flaws.

Frazier wasn't really going to land straight punches down the pipe was he? Norton wasn't ever useful backing up.

What Foreman did with his outstrecth arms and pushing opponents around worked well mainly against smaller opponents and/or opponents who weren't used to countering backing up. But his lack of defense cost him against Ali and Young and almost against Lyle.

That's nwhy boxing trainers won't teach you to do what George did. They will teach you to block and slip. That will work much better against bigger and/or skilled opponents.

 

And smarter, and harder to hit and a more accurate puncher.

But, yeah, Foreman was never hard to land on. His overwhelming physicality compensated more than enough for that in most cases, but not all.

Fair enough.