In most sports the current guys are better than previous eras, why would boxing be any different?

Why is what wilder is doing per se bad? He lost twice, he got wrecked one time and he got a draw in a fight that was close and surprise, surprise he lost to tallest guy out their with the biggest physique that stopped the reign of one of the most dominant hw champs of all time.
Yeah his technique is unconventional, but so was alis, toneys, martinezes only because something looks crappy doenst make it crappy.
People on here really believe that wilder was somewhat magically born with a monster punch and that his whole boxing career is based upon that.

 

This is not a new thing,you are failing to comprehend the terms "plateau" and "regression"

 

I remember the Liston vs Williams fights both being none too technical. They were just charging in like two bulls and slugging away the way I remember it. Maybe, that's overstating things. Liston at that time was like a young Mike Tyson, furious aggression but you could see there was method and art in what Tyson did. Liston had some of that too. Wilder was more like young Foreman, although Foreman was never as raw and he did get better eventually. However, the guy I usually liken Wilder too being all physical and almost no technique is Marciano. When I think of technique in heavyweights, I don't think of Ali who relied more on God given speed and reflexes. I think of Joe Louis. Louis was like Alexis Arguello. He could throw all of the punches textbook. Their only weakness really was their footwork, which Ali and Holmes both excelled at. Some guys had it and some guys didn't. I think Wladimir Klitschko showed better technique than Joe Frazier for instance. Lewis and Holyfield were more skilled too. But your point is sound. Even undersized as they were Ellis, Quarry, and Patterson probably take guys like Kownacki apart on sheer skill alone.

 

How does a marathon runner racing against a clock, relate to two men fighting in a ring?

Boxing is not constantly developing.

Instead of scratching your head wondering why, just go and educate yourself by watching some fights.

I’ve now given you 5 divisions which were significantly better 20-25 years ago.

So how is that possible?

If you don’t think I’m right, we can go through them one by one and all take a vote on it.

 

He didn’t lose to Tyson because Tyson was taller, you nut.

He lost to Tyson, because Tyson took away his right hand as he’s technically superior.

Don’t even try and compare Wilder’s technique with those guys.

Yes, some of those guys had unconventional styles, but they still had great timing, balance and accuracy. They had great footwork and coordination.

Comparing Wilder to Toney is probably the dumbest thing you’ve ever written. And that’s quite an achievement.

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Yeah, today’s HW’s are so superior.

 

Yep, great times. Yeah, the Napoli situation was bad.

 

He’s been back since though.

They still love him.

The horrible thing about that documentary, is how Diego denied for years that he had a son to that other woman. He denied it for about 30 years. I thought that was awful.

 

But boxing isn't analogous to a speed playing contest. There are very few objective goals being set for subsequent generations to match themselves against like there are with sprinting, marathon running, weight lifting etc. It's just two men getting into the ring and using their two arms and two legs to beat the other within a strictly defined ruleset, as it has been since Dempsey's day. Do you understand just how subjective that is to an-alyse?

Even the few objective stats we can get don't tell the whole story. Recently Kownacki vs Arreola broke the record for most punches thrown in a HW contest. But did you see the quality of those punches thrown? Garbage. Mostly slaps and arm punches that weren't hard enough to put either man down even a single time. So what does that statistic actually mean? Very little.

Boxing has always been a sport where you have to use your own judgement to evaluate it. No one's judgement is infallible which is why it's so open for debate. You can't argue that Jesse Owens was faster over 100m than Usain Bolt because the times he recorded prove he wasn't. You could conceivably argue that Joe Louis was a better boxer than Deontay Wilder.

Getting back to the writing comparison, millions of people have tried to be better than the rest, but are today's Pulitzer or MAN Booker prize winners objectively superior novels to something like Don Quixote, Great Expectations or Moby Dik?

 

How would you know when boxing reaches its ceiling? How would you measure when boxing surpasses previous decades? What evaluation criteria would you even use to measure that?

 

He’ll see what’s happened in other sports.

You’re talking about a guy who thinks that today’s best fighters are the best fighters of all time, where they keep getting better.

Apparently, whoever’s the HW champion in 2050, will be able to crush Tyson Fury with consummate ease.

He can actually predict that right now.

Ha!

That’s who we’re dealing with here.

 

Maybe he's right, maybe he isn't!

I think we should just leave it at that for now - and come back and bump this thread in 2050, where we then can continue this discussion!

 

it is also hard to objectively measure soccer since their is only very limited scoring, a little bit like with boxing. You can be on the defense for 89 minutes and then score one goal in minute 90, as in boxing you can be down 11 rounds and win by ko in round 12. nether the less you can still measure certain aspects of the sport that will tell you that the sport has developed. Boxers punch more, the ko percentages of hw boxing are going up since the 90s, they are taller and heavier and the most effective fighter in the history of the sport is mayweather who is from a very recent era.

their is no better or worse in books. Writing books is no competion. No one is sitting in front of his and thinking, i will destroy that guy with my new great book. You can go out and claim that harry potter is a better book series then every hemmingway book, but you can not claim that deontay wilder is a better boxer then tyson fury, or that Holyfield is better then Lewis. They lost in a clear contest with a winner and a loser.

how can you seriously say that boxing cant be compared to sprinting, but then move on and compare boxing to writing books.

 

If hw boxers wouldnt be taller and bigger from decade to decade( this is really a trend for the last few decades) when the punch outputs would drop or stay the same for a very long time. And when phenomens like wilder and fury wouldnt emerge for a very long time. Even the biggest wilder hater has to accept the fact that the guys power and agility is out of this world and he will have an impact on upcoming heavyweights in terms of pure punching power.

 

Thing is I can (sort of) understand where he's coming from. Old school fans can be notoriously frustrating to deal with, especially when they show zero appreciation for anything more modern fighters do or unduly praise fighters from an earlier era above and beyond what is necessary. But that's no excuse to go to the opposite extreme, or to blindly assume that newer is better.

A lot of HWs in recent decades have shown a level of size and athleticism that was never seen before, coupled with very solid technical skills. I'm talking fighters like Wlad, Lennox, and now Joshua and Fury. This where I'm fully prepared to admit that modern HWs have an edge over older ones. But fighters like Arreola, Kownacki, Miller, Joyce, Breazeale are awful technically and athletically, and are still (or at one time were) considered major players in the division. You can't tell me someone like Dominic Breazeale is in any way superior to a Buddy Baer or Abe Simon from Louis's day, nor can you say that someone like Schmeling or Tunney has obviously cruder skills to a Michael Hunter.

Schmeling was pulling off pull counters eighty years ago against the top fighters of his day. Clearly whatever advances we've made in the technical department are greatly overstated at the higher end of the weight scale.

 

My point is that boxing is a lot more subjective than it is objective. You have to use your own judgement a lot more to determine who is 'better' than another between eras, and it's never clear cut. You can't just assume a linear upward progression because of stats like increased height and weight. That's like comparing average sales and page count and coming to the conclusion that modern authors are superior to older ones. You can make an argument sure, but you can't just assume anything.

KO percentages: what does that mean if the fighters you're KOing have no idea how to slip a punch or lack the conditioning to defend past a couple of rounds? Or what does it mean if fights are waved off at the drop of a hat? Is that comparable to a true KO?

Taller and heavier? Again, is someone like Kownacki superior to an Earnie Shavers because of his height and weight? Is Ruiz a greater champion than Holyfield because he outweighs him by 70lbs?