Old Time Fighters - Durability

Maybe as we evolve farther from the ape we get more fragile



Kidding, kidding

 

BIG DEE HERE= I`ve talked about this time and time again about his same thing. The people of thoses times were the toughest of the tough because they were the people still standing as all of the weak people were dead from
illness. They had no drugs to save you from death whatsoever. They didn`t even have pennicilln untill 1943. One guy said that it didn`t make any difference as it has no effect on a virus to which I say bull**** as it has always helped me when I had the flu and took left over pinnicilln from the dentist. In 1956 I had double-pneumonia and would have died without question without pennicillin and the other drugs invented during WWII.
These people had none of these wonder drugs to save their lives.
People of the times if they survived infancy they were stong babies.
and to make it to their teen-age years they had to be very strong of body
and durability. The amout of illnesses that could kill one at the time was
people died from the common measles, chicken-pox, scarlet fever, flues of all types. You name it and it was there to kill you. These fighters were the
strongest of the strong and it showed in the ring. HELL LOOK AT THE WORK THEY DID JUST TO MAKE A BUCK IT WAS BRUTAL. JACK DEMPSEY WAS A
HUGELY MUSCLED MAN. NOT LIKE TODAYS WEIGHT LIFTING GUYS WITH
HUGE PICS AS IF YOU LOOK AT THEIR CHESTS THEY DIDN`T HAVE BIG PICS
FROM THE HARD PHYSICAL LABOR THEY DID IT WAS THERE ARMS AND BACKS.
DEMPESYS WAS HUGE FOR A GUY THAT WEIGHED 190.

 

.........People weren't superhuman back then. All the histrionics aside, what it boils down to is two factors in my opinion:


First, fighters were better schooled in the old days. By virtue of the fact they fought more often, they learned more, and were better capable of dealing with tough spots in tough fights.

Second is the offshoot of idea #1. Fighters fought more often then, but didn't fight real big-time talent all that more often than they do now. It's the in-between fights that are missing now. A fighter's network contract is big enough now to the point that they don't have to take a lot of non-title or "keep busy" fights in between televised fights, so why bother? I sure as hell wouldn't if I already had the check. These somewhat inflated career numbers of the old timers can be misleading in this way.

Let's put in this way; there were an awful lot of Buck Smiths in those days.

 

Even Heavyweights trained to be fit and make the weight

 

BIG DEE HERE= Were talkin durability here, the ability to take it and give it.
What I said is a fact not bull**** they were tougher than nails in thoses days
as my grandfather was a farmer and farmed 900 acres of land with a small
Farmall tractor. My Old Man said he would work from sun-up to sun-down
everyday and would work all the kids under the table. They were all in High School and couldn`t keep up with the old man as he was in his 50s. This wasn`t my father`s father he was my mother`s ,father and he was tougher
than teak wood. His stamina was incredible by the age of 70 his body was completely worn out but he still wanted to work everyday and asked my dad for something to do and I seen him do it untill he died at 74 yrs old. He was born in 1888. He was 20 yrs old when Jack Johnson became heavyweight
champion. THOSE GUYS WERE TOUGH, TAKE ANY HEAVYWEIGHTS AND SEE HOW LONG THEY CAN FIGHT LIKE JOE JEANETTE AND SAM MCVEY 49 RDS
JEANETTE Knocked Down 28 TIMES AND MCVEY Knocked Down 19 TIMES
THESE GUYS TODAY ARE GOING TO TAKE THAT KIND OF PUNISHMENT.
NO WAY NO HOW IN YOUR WILDEST DREAMS WOULD THEY EVER TAKE IT.
THIS IS FACT NOT IMAGINATION. BABE RUTH HAD TO HIT HOMERUNS
OUT OF MAN SIZED PARKS NOT HIGH SCHOOL PARKS THE WAY THE MAJOR LEAGUERS DO TODAY. YANKEE STADIUM THEN 467FT CENTER FIELD AND 437
LEFT AND 457 RIGHT POWER ALLEYS. NOW 404 CENTER AND 375 BOTH POWER ALLEYS. HELL TODAY HE WOULD HE 1000 HOMERS IN HIS CAREER.
CLEVELAND INDIANS BALL PARKS BOTH OF THEM AS THEY PLAY IN TWO PARKS THEN 510 TO CENTER AND 525 TO THE OTHER BALLPARK. AND THESE GUYS HAVE TO USE STINKING STEROIDS AND LIFT WEIGHTS TO HIT THEM OUT.

 

..............See, you're the reason young kids don't listen to us old timers. Do you honestly expect anyone under 75 to be sympathetic to this point of view the way you tell it?

Look at the way this is written........

 

good point.

I wonder why pitchers don't complete games anymore, or football players used to play sick as dogs or with some serious injuries.

Basically to me it comes down to a state of mind. Athletes these days are paid well, back then they wern't, pretty simple really.

 

Like Marvin Hagler once said (I'm paraphrasing)"It's hard to get up and do your roadwork at five in the morning when you're sleeping in silk pajamas" The old timers often played and fought for thier suppers. No multi million dollar purses or contracts back then. Fighters now can sit on thier asses for a year or two after pulling down millions for a single fight. Back then if you wanted to stay in the public's eye and possibly get a title shot down the road you had to stay active hence all the fights they had. As a result you were better schooled. Today a fighter with promise is looking at a tile shot after 15-20 fights. That was unheard of years ago for the most part. Money money and yes money. Why risk losing a match when you can hold out for millions against the right opponent? Isn't it grand?

 

One thing you have to take into account is that a lot of those fights the older timers had, were against very undeserving opponents, even when they had reached their prime. This is nothing against them; fighting often was simply the best way to get attention and people to see you before the TV era. And that couldn't always be a top level opponent, but that does screw up the "1409584 rounds, never KO'd" statistics.

 

I find it quite enjoyable to read actually. I know that there's small man syndrome, but is there old man syndrome? This guy has a bad case of it.

 

One big difference in recent times is how guys react to a big loss. They tend to disappear and fall of the radar screen. Whenever they do comeback, they seem to be about 85% of the guy they used to be. They're good at climbing up the ladder but not so good at sliding down the ladder.

The older guys thru the 50's would get right back in the ring. Look at the Joe Louis > that Schmeling defeat and what he did. Or guys like Robinson who get battered pretty good and stopped by Turpin and 2 months later they have a rematch. Those are a few examples but the point is they were commonplace. Where you'd have to lookup isolated cases would be the recent times and look what a guy does after a big loss to look for that kind of quick timeframe.

 

I think their secret was they fought more often. The best way to train for boxing is to box.

Nice thread.