Serious thoughts on this Harry Greb shadow boxing video?

As far as counting back years, I drew the line when we clicked over into the New Millenium. It's too scary to also include the many years that have passed since then. Tyson vs Holyfield 1? Hell, that was only 4-5 yrs ago.

 

Those times have been oft ridiculed on the forum since I've been here.

I don't see many at all saying fighters have progressed since the examples i cited. That would be laughed off the forum by the vast majority. Most in fact will say it's mostly devolved. Flash24 gives some great insight into this and he sure makes sense.

I'm not seeing any improvements at all from the 1940's, if anything the opposite. Surely we would be able to see them via your theory over 50-75 year periods. If they are that hard to see after half a century and more they just ain't happening.

The champs through a five or so year period of my biggest interest in boxing were -


Larry Holmes
Michael Spinks
Marvin Hagler
Thomas Hearns
Sugar Ray Leonard
Aaron Pryor
Roberto Duran
Alexis Arguello
Sanchez/Pedroza
Chandler/Pintor

Almost all of these guys were champs at the same time and prime. Imagine unleashing that lot on a current or very recent era.

 

It's been shifting for a while now, probably fuelled by increased access to footage and documents, plus demographic shifts. Once upon a time, Corbett and Fitzsimmons were spoken of as if they were the same as modern heavyweights. Then it shifted to Johnson. Eventually, I think most of his fans also folded; at least, they don't often claim he goes neck and neck with the best moderns anymore. Marciano was the most recent to go. A few of his followers still cling to the Old Ways, slightly confused about how time has passed their faction by. Now the battle lines for guys who could compete today have been re-drawn around Ali's career, with Louis as an outlier. Ali will last a while: he's a pop culture icon, he appeared on color film, and there are still a lot of Baby Boomers around. But in our lifetimes, he'll go, too, and the spotlight will move forward to a later redoubt.

 

Tyson’s the big thing with my son and his mates (aged 18), they watch his stuff all the time (although my lad likes other stuff, but doesn’t really go back much further than the 80s). My 15 year old nephew is obsessed with Tyson’s fights and every time there’s boxing chat it will invariably end up talking about him. They know Ali and are aware of some of his famous opponents (mainly Sonny, George, Joe and Kenny) but not to the extent of Tyson’s fights and life, as they find his style far more exciting.

 

And so the world turns.

 

I think if you watch the full length film with Harry sparring he looks pretty good. I don't know why all the need to denigrate old timers? Sure they had different styles of boxing and training and in many ways there have been huge improvements in many areas of today's game but I doubt many current fighters have Greb's guts, experience and courage and they certainly lack his vast ring experience fighting every type of style imaginable. His style may not please us as much aesthetically but it sure was effective! It is far from a given that modern fighters would flourish fighting in those days, I suspect they would face as many hurdles as an old timer put into today's ring.

I should also add that I doubt anyone would laughed at Harry while training, he doesn't look like someone to be messed with

 

Nobody will convince me that boxing has moved on and is superior now than from when those fighters were active.
No way.

 

I recognize that there are differences, but I have always pushed back against the asumption that fighters from later eras were superior.

 

Conversely you can walk into any boxing gym and see novices look amazing shadowboxing only to be beaten from pillar to post in sparring

 

I will even go a step further and state that I am not at all sure that runners today are even superior. Before someone quotes times to me, I have seen all that. I am still not convinced that equipment and track conditions do not play a BIG part in those faster times. I do not want to turn this thread from boxing to other sports. I will just say I have my reasons why I doubt this professed huge progress in many sports.

 

That's true. Athletes like Jesse Owens ran on cinder tracks, which is a track only used for horse racing nowadays. Experts have estimated that the difference between running cinders vs a synthetic track is about 1.5% to 2%. Just the track alone would shave about 0.2 of a second off of his time, bringing his personal best down to a flat 10 seconds.

 

There is also an argument to be had that the amateur athletics rules of the early 20th century simply stopped the best talent from getting to the top.

 

The force of personality! Their discussions are about whether Tyson could beat Fury, Usyk, Joshua, never whether, say, Lewis could (and definitely not whether Louis or Ali could).