Cus D'amato - No Swarmer Beats Foreman?

You have hurt my feelings.

 

I think Foreman is vulnerable to anyone that can mount an offense against him. That's the key. If it was as simple as adjusting your style to being more defensive and fighting off the back foot, Norton would have had more success. Even if he lacked power, Young's return counters to the face were not pleasant.

The problem with Foreman is he's a very difficult fighter to mount offense against.
Foreman as a strategist is underrated, he was always slow but had great reach and power, so everything he did was in service of maximizing those gifts to overwhelm his opponents with constant pressure from his preferred range. That's why traditional technique is overrated on this forum, if Foreman fought traditionally as a boxer/puncher and threw straight punches he wouldn't have reached the pinnacle twice. He pushed, he pawed, and sold out with wide looping haymakers that were difficult to anticipate.

I suppose my point. There are few fighters period I would lay hard earned money down to beat Foreman, because his power is a threat to anyone and he understood that. That's the difference between him and Lewis/Klitschko, Foreman was gonna try to pressure for the KO no matter what.

He would not be the favorite, but the confident Tyson who beat Holmes, is an aggressive smaller fighter I would not be surprised to see take Foreman down. What a war that would be for as long as it lasted, either way. I could see Tyson pushing through and finding a home for his right cross.

 

The claimed quote was "a swarming attacking style" not "swarmer".

Also the story one from hindsight told years later. Do you know the year when Lott made these claims? "Swarming" could well have been Lott's words by that stage.

 

It’s just not enough evidence for me that it even happened. Attacking style? Who knows what context is used here?

seems to me trainers talk in terms of game plans within styles or did in the days of Cus, Angelo, Clancy and Futch. I just find it fanciful that they ever talked in absolutes regarding everyone who fought a similar way.

There are many ways one type of fighter can fight within his “style”. A wrong way to fight somebody. A right way too.

There is a huge misinterpretation on the incorrect and misleading recent term “style advantage” - and a longing to attach it to established history.

I am happy to lose the argument and win the truth here if ever proven otherwise …but to me, this is one of those myths that will never be substantiated.

 

You were happy to use scant evidence (basically in a hate article) that Marshall knocked Liston down in their second fight tho.

Attacking style isn't hard to fathom when guys like Frazier and Marciano have been mentioned.

What fights would you put forth as an example of swarmers overly varying within their "style"? Frazier tried it against Foreman the second time and we saw how that went, well anyone with half a brain did than knows SAB did.

That's reasonable as it's about levels as much as anything at times. None of the swarmers are on a higher level H2H than Foreman so there goes that intangible.

There's enough there for me not to openly dismiss it as a "myth". Foreman himself has said he believes Tyson wasn't keen to fight him due to D'amato's preachings.

At the end of the day Foreman is to be favored over any "swarmer", very heavily vs most.

 

What's funny is that Foreman will be honest if you pay attention.

He even explained the whole "didn't want no parts of Tyson" as him being worried that Tyson might bite him, which was obviously a joke, but people took one sound bite without context and ran with that story as if that nullified everything he's said half a dozen times over the years complaining that the fight couldn't be made.

Not only did he state that he would KO Tyson within 2 rounds when he made his comeback, decades later within this interview he explained that Cus was "very smart" and that Cus knew that he was good at dealing with shorter fighters. He was heavily implying Tyson's camp didn't like what they saw in the footage and understood that win or lose, Foreman had intangibles and habits that could make the fight difficult.

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It seems, at some point, there really was a session between Tyson and Cus where they discussed how a short aggressive fighter would have nightmares against Foreman. And apparently Foreman heard about it.

 

@greynotsoold
"Swammer, Slugger, Brawler, Boxer puncher" Internally screaming?

 

Nice to see you back!

 

I agree that George is a fascinating champion who should be favoured over the vast majority who come to him..but this cannot be absolute. Just as the term swarmer is not absolute. Does it apply to brawling fighters or busy clever fighters? Nobody knows. Where does counterpunching fall into that description?

Total hearsay. Perhaps George based it on here say?

are Tyson and Jack Dempsey Swarmers? Are swarmers allowed to counterpunch? If not, then there has NEVER been a heavyweight champion who was that kind of out and out swarmer.

Joe fought Chuvalo slightly different too. He won that fight. Same with Bonavena. True, Foreman did a lot better but most agree Chuvalo and Bonavena fought better versions of Joe Frazier.

All I did there was use something that was written down and talked about for many years. More Evidence came up that disproved it and I accepted that. More evidence supported that it didn’t happen versus it happening.

here we have no evidence something happened.

In this situation nobody can find proof in a quote. I wonder if people will come to accept that there is no proof in this quote?

 

Any boxer in any style/position can counter punch. Even a wild slugger like Maidana managed to land a crafty right hand counter on Mayweather whose ring IQ is over 150.

A swarmer trying to counter a slugger like Foreman who often had a size/reach advantage and who has both arms out to frame or grapple the opponent. It's incredibly difficult to do. Contrary to popular belief, Foreman did not simply swing wildly until Frazier wilted under his power. He often let Frazier lead and then either redirected him like a Matador, parried his punches, or walked him into a powerful shot.

Frazier initiated many of the exchanges and Foreman had an active, "mummy" guard neutralizing everything he was trying to do. Foreman didn't really start going on offense until the 2nd round when he knew for sure that Frazier was running out of options and badly hurt. Foreman fought a very smart fight and I don't see any short aggressive fighter beating that version of Foreman.

 

Right. This is what I believe. I am not certain this is made clear among those of us who subscribe with using absolute style grouping.

who says Swarmers always have to be shorter than Foreman? what style did Peralta fight out of? He was tall but he crowded George. Again, who are the swarmers? What is the difference between a slugger a brawler and a swarmer? The internet loves these terms. But they are not useful.

Frazier had a very bad time with Foreman…but a lot of lesser fighters did better than Joe did against Foreman. They still lost. But they did better.

Among them were short aggressive fighters like scrap Iron Johnson and Qawi.

Seems unusual for people looking for absolutes within “types” that the best version of a certain type did less well than any of the others.

 

Nobody said swarmers have to be shorter than Foreman, but they often are. It wouldn't make sense for a 6'5 guy with long arms to be a swarmer, his trainer would have to be an imbecile.

Peralta lost twice so I have no idea why you brought him up.

Swarmers tend to overlap with the idea of volume punchers (non stop methodical pressure). They tend to be better up close and on the inside. Sluggers/brawlers often have worse defense but more power and tend to go for one big hit or one big combination and prefer mid range. The similarities are that both have to be tough, aggressive, willing to let their hands go, and throwing punches in bunches downstairs and upstairs.

The swarmer uses footwork for closing the distance and creating angles up close that benefit their shorter reach and make it harder for longer ranged opponents to land hits.

The foreman who beat Frazier was better than the foreman who beat Johnson. You cannot use a fight where a swarmer gets brutally beaten and doesn't win a round as evidence Foreman isn't a stylistic nightmare for short aggressive fighters.

Cus was not referring to 90's Foreman and Qawi literally quit. I believe we've had this exact conversation 2-3x and here you are attempting to have it again. This is why I said talking to you is like experiencing Chinese water torture, you just keep repeating the same silly stuff over and over again until people get sick of the debate.

 

Good seeing you too!
(When you come back from your ban lol)

 

Yea and it's been exposed years ago as a myth to keep repeating it is odd

George was beat by a swammer when old and would lose to mike its easy to see this way to telegraphed and slow never would land shots mike was never hit often by these types

 

You're wrong.
Joe tried to box in the 2nd fight.
Cus Tomatoe is right.
Foreman's upwards hooks n cuts are all wrong for the Tyson, Bert Coopers, Joe's of the world.
Plus George's chin and strenght was freaky.

Styles make fights.