Who had the most perfect textbook Left Hook after all ?

Louis: The left hook is one of the most difficult blows to learn and use properly. The hook is used as a countering blow and a finishing blow. The shorter this blow, the better it's effect. The hook is used best against a left jab or a straight right as a counter. The right arm should be crooked with the elbow directly down in front of the ribs...relaxed...the head should have no singluar action of it's own; it works along with the body, chin pinned down. Turn your body to the right, shifting your weight onto your right leg, throw the left arm in an arc to the opponent's head. Make sure to hit through the mark and not just at it, with the knuckles up at impact of blow. Practice to give you co-ordination of bodyweight and arm-power which brings about a snap in the blow, and gives it more force It must be said at this time that the left jab and left hook can be most effectively combined Tony Galento had me going and even knocked me down with a hard left in the third round. In the fourth I threw a hard right to his jaw, then a powerful left hook which started his mouth, nose and right eye bleeding.

 

Yeah, it's not great.

 

"The shorter this blow the better the effect.”

This is a summary of the Louis offence spoken specifically about the left hook. Joe’s hook was at its absolute best when he threw it downstairs but when he went upstairs it was his shortest power punch. In his second defence against Nathan Mann he proved it an unusually flexible punch, too, and it would remain the most varied and improvised finishing blow in his arsenal long after the press had begun criticizing him for being a “robotic fighter.” Louis fought along disciplined lines, operating almost exclusively in a given kill-zone, working to bring that kill-zone to the opponent or the opponent to that kill-zone but usually in pre-determined, technically proficient ways. Against Mann though, as the broad-shouldered challenger rushed him for the first time, Louis propelled himself sharply back and away. His left foot no longer in touch with the canvas, up on the toes of his right, Louis corkscrewed a whipcord of a hook from his loosely hanging left hand. This punch illustrates two things concerning the Louis hook. Firstly, the positioning of his jab-hand and the frequency with which he throws that punch makes it a blow he can disguise, a natural counter. Secondly, it underlines the strangest fact of all concerning the Louis left hook: he drove it with his right leg.

In Box Like the Pros, his own, more detailed manual on boxing, Joe Frazier is very clear on how the left foot should be used when throwing the punch that made him famous. It is to be kept firmly planted; it is to drive the punch; when you bring your left hip around to follow through keep the left foot planted; “adjust your balance as you follow through with the punch, move a little if you have to”; but keep the left foot planted.

Similarly, Bernard Hopkins stresses this left foot drive:

“I dip a little to the left and rotate slightly to the left, my body weight shifts from both legs to mostly the left one…as I bring the punch up I’m driving with the left leg and at the same time bringing my hips around…”

In How to Box by Joe Louis, the transfer of weight is through the right leg.

“From the proper stance…turn your body to the right, shifting your weight to the right leg, throw the left arm in an arc to the opponent’s head. Make sure to hit through the mark and not at it.”

This is not unheard of. I think @Seamus said Ray Leonard threw and even taught the left hook right legged, or rather he was not a slave to the left leg and preferred to gain the leverage where he could. That sounds like Leonard, but it doesn’t really sound like Joe. It isn’t in keeping with Joe’s reputation for technical exactitude and this right foot pivot interests me.

Later in the second round against Mann we see Louis push through with the right foot for the hook once again. As Mann is finally baited forwards upon seeing Joe with his back to the ropes, the Champion throws out a lightning-fast softener, comes the other way with a clubbing punch to the side of Mann’s head before striking out with the punch the trap was set for, a left hook that combines the best attributes of the other two punches. Once more, Louis is turning through his right foot. Mann is stunned and almost goes to his haunches, his face an open question mark, his steps a trickling stream. It is a double blow for the men surprised by Louis, they come forwards as the aggressor into his kill-zone having landed some token punch (in this case a hard right hand) to which Joe gives ground before nearly taking the opponent’s head off with punches. And what punches! Louis still has his elbow crooked in the defensive position when he throws the first left hook, he’s throwing it across that famous and oft-quoted distance, mere-inches, perfectly disguised, impossible to see coming, the power generated in a fashion so brilliant and dynamic that they are almost beyond technically correct; that is, nobody would ever try to teach a fighter to punch in this fashion because it just doesn’t occur to most trainers that the person standing in front of them hitting the pads is the fistic equivalent of a primo ballerina. But it is perfect. The second punch was more fully born but it is still a mere forearm’s length in flight, punching all the way through the target.

Two more left hooks score the first knockdown of the fight just seconds later. Mann flapped after he felt the first one, arching back and to the side, but Louis looked like he was hitting a static heavy bag as he delivered and calmly made his way to the neutral corner. When the action resumed, Louis walked up to Mann and hit him with two more, one up, one down as the gutsy Connecticut man sagged on the ropes. The bell saved him and he wandered off to a neutral corner of his own, confused by the absence of a stool. The inevitable occurred at 1:56 in the third.

I’d nominate Mann as Joe’s best hooking performance, but it did not contain the most devastating hook he ever threw. Louis saved this dubious honour for a fighter who infuriated him personally more perhaps than even Max Schmeling, “Two Ton” Tony Galento. Employing the unfortunate language he has remained famous for, Galento managed to find his way under Joe’s skin, before adding injury to insult by dropping him with a left of his own in the third. In the fourth, Louis sent over what may have been the punch of his career, a left hook which Joe says “started [Galento’s] mouth, nose and right eye bleeding.” There is a beautiful series of photographs in How to Box showing Louis **** and wing in that punch. We see him adjust it in flight so the knuckle part of the glove connects with the point of the chin before Louis follows all the way through, his left hand resting calmly in front of his right, Zen-like. As Galento is falling, he too is Zen-like, but for different reasons.

Also of interest: we see Louis pivoting through his right foot. Why? Perhaps it was just the way he threw them and when his trainer Jack Blackburn saw how well they worked he refused to adjust them. Perhaps Louis had a strange ambidextrousness where his left hook was concerned and like Ray Leonard he was able to generate torque with either one of his legs dependent upon circumstances; there do seem to be times when he is driving through his left.

Or just maybe, Joe Louis didn’t like the adjustment Joe Frazier describes at the end of his procedure for throwing the perfect left hook: “Adjust your balance as you follow through, move a little if you have to.” Maybe he found a better way to stay balanced. Who knows.