Why people romanticize past fighters over present fighters

This content is protected

 

Man Tyson looks so irritated the entire time he’s in that “pay my rent” phase… never seen this, awesome lmao.

 

But I never saw him in a firefight. Think of Norton Holmes.

 

There are boxing magazines from the 70s where the HW division is criticised for being a clown-show compared to the era of Marciano, with Ali being labeled as "smokes and mirrors" and Foreman being called a simple brute.

Evander Holyfield was literally a laughing stock in his prime for struggling with washed HWs from 80s and going the distance with two fat 40+ year old men, it took him beating Tyson in 1996 for people to actually see him as a great. In fact the entire 90s era of boxing was considered an inferior era to 70s and 80s due to how well Holmes and Foreman did for themselves.

This happens in every era. Most people don't realize what they had until they are long gone. Even the Klitschko brothers are getting more respect these days, because their era is over and there are new recent guys to laugh at and mock. Just wait a few years and see how Fury goes from a guy that struggled with an MMA fighter to a freak of athleticism (as he should) as new guys come along. Watch how Wilder goes from a one-trick pony with carefully-matched opponents to a devastating puncher that colded everyone (again, as he should).

I've been saying this for a while, boxing fans and their toxicity will be the end of this sport. Keep discrediting fighters like this and you'll see a lot more of that Mayweather-style career-management until nobody is fighting with anybody anymore.

 

Cos boxing has gone to the dogs, and the past is a better place to be.. sometimes.

 

At least, this is not surprising in a classic boxing forum. A niche of which there are not many left on the Internet, almost an endangered species. Boxing, once a great sport with a rich history, has increasingly become a fringe sport these days. I have no idea (as a non US American) how many teenagers today still know about Joe Louis, Henry Armstrong, Harry Greb, or Sam Langford in USA. I suspect hardly any. So why not let people indulge in their nostalgia and romanticization? Does it harm anyone?

 

Because those times were raw & purer.. less weight divisions meaning the talent pool was less diluted, fewer trinket belts, smaller/harder hitting gloves, same day weigh ins , higher fight frequency & no PEDs all made for a clearer picture & a harsher test than todays era. Those that thrived & rose to the top under those circumstances i rate higher than the ones today. Call me a rose tinter i don't mind.

 

I think Usyk has showed that dog in him. In the first fight with Fury he had a stretch of three really rough rounds, taking some hellacious shots to both body and head. Most would have gone down hill from there, I think, but he came back and took over the fight instead.

 

When did that expression come to mean showing courage and grit, instead of meaning being a quitter?

 

They are all juiced

 

He also toughed out a close Breidis fight and also that round 9 vs AJ in the 2nd fight and then he takes over multiple of his fights down the stretch even though much of this is to do with boxing IQ and fitness it also shows he is tough.

 

We have all ends of the spectrum here. There's those that blatantly refuse to rate modern fighters. There's those that refuse to rate past greats. The majority sit somewhere in between than god.

 

It correlates to their hairlines.