Lol he always moves his head to his left. A left hook would flatten him, as his head remains on the same line.
It's like people who think they can philly shell but don't realize footwork and positioning is most of your defence - not tucking your chin and leaning back like an idiot. Hence why Broner got slapped around by Maidana. (And Quintero, PDL, Paulie) Moving your head again is more complex than it sounds. Firstly it can be a passive or active movement. Any kind of passive movement is a waste of energy in boxing and will tire you out. To be able to actively respond to an opponent by reading their movement and telegraphs is where you can actively move in response hence in theory wasting less energy, defence should be less energy dependent than offence. Also the whole symphony of offence and defence, if you can slip a shot defensively then land your own, that is probably the most simple example of the art of boxing. Defence & Offence. That alone takes years to master, some never do. Pull counter being an example of a high-level movement. What point am I trying to make here? Basically, you have to learn to walk before you can run. Learning to walk alone in boxing is extremely hard. Many people get stuck in their ways & they can only run at a set pace, they can't learn to turn it up a notch. You have to have the IQ, Footwork, positioning, co-ordination everything you can think of understood before you can move your "head" defensively well. You can be an A-class fighter and still have no head movement. Cough. AJ, Wlad. AJ still isn't comfortable in his own ability & has a far way to go to become complete in himself as a fighter if that's even possible...He's very unlucky to be fighting in the era of Fury. A guy who shows something new almost every time he fights because he is literally a descendant of Hercules.
Perfectly said. What James Toney did at CW and HW was simplicity at it´s finest. He did very little but was extremely effective. Yet what he did was extremely difficult. Like ridiculously difficult. Anyone who boxes can try to copy him and likely to some extent has. Those who have, know it´s really hard to pull off even in just a regular gym setting. Also, this reminded me of people saying that jabbing to the body and bodywork in general are underutilized today. Well, those two things are really, really hard to pull off.
Toney is always the guy who comes to mind with these topics. Only got flustered by the athletically superior Roy.
Punch avoidance is mostly about proper foot placement and second guessing your opponent, hence why all the best defensive fighters who employ this tactic seem to do so so effortlessly. It's not about flashy upper body movements and reacting on the fly like some bad Pernell Whitaker clone. Few fighters have the reflexes and natural sense of space to pull that off effectively. It's mostly the subtle movements and anticipations that work towards a solid defence.
Head movement as part of an active guard is vital, keep the head moving so it is hard for your opponent to know where your head will be as they try to target it.
