Is anyone else getting tired of the revisionist?

Wouldn't one skilled chap going against another in the ring be considered the same thing as an amateur bout? Just because they weren;t recorded in official books, it doesn't mean old fighters didn;t have tons of amatuer experience. We just don't know of it.

Jack Johnson participated in Battle Royals, where he and other would be blindfolded in a ring, last man standing wins. He mighta gained some boxing intuition from these experiences that fighters of today never experienced.

 

Sports progress. People have run for as long as they have fought, and runners today are performing at a far far higher standard than 50 or a 100 years ago in every single event, that much is provable fact. Boxing is harder to measure than running, but we can see boxers are faster and slicker.

Semi-Pro means boxing not being the full time job, most boxers had other jobs and boxing was their supplementary earning. Walcott was pretty much an amateur because he had to work full time as most did in those times. You simply cant become as profecient at a sport if you dont have the time to train at it and people back then didnt

We judge boxers based on wha we see of them on film, on film boxing has progressed throughtout the 1900s, its obvious to anyone with good eyesight. Fighters are faster, better defensively, generally more 1 shot power and fight at a higher pace if you compare the best with the best

 

What do we mean by "revisionism" ?

Opinions always differ on fighters, at the time then are fighting and looking back in retrospect.

And writers, fans, and all manner of "experts" are fickle. We all change our minds a lot, or express opinions on fighters in different ways.
Most of the time I dont know where I really rate a fighter.

So, what is revisionism ?

 

A long career of amateur boxing is more of a modern, especially at the world level. Fighters have worked harder for world level amateur success since they saw the lucrative opportunities Patterson and Ali.

I'd imagine pre-Patterson boxers would like Julio Ceasar Chavez aim to turn pro at the first opportunity in order to earn money from their talent

I know all about battle royals and I'm not sure they are particularly conjusive to learning the sweet science. I bet the ****s at the time pissed themselves laughing at them though

Welcome to the forum by the way

 

When did they invent this basketball and this football?

A few years ago? Right about the time Yanks lost control of the heavyweight division.

I guess they did not exist in the days of Ali, Holmes, Tyson and Holyfield.

 

I dont know the history of sprinting so I won't pretend like I will.

However I do know that 200 years ago, running tracks weren;t made as efficiently today as back then. 500 years ago, I doubt the shoes runners were wearing were nearly as nice as today. Were they even wearing shoes when they competed in sprinting in Ancient Rome?

How complex is the technique of running? Can it be compared to a chess match? How drastically does one runner differ from another stylistically? You see, running, weight lifting, and other sports like that, are not dynamic sports that require the decision making that a sport like boxing requires. The art of running is something that can be improved on over time, because everyone in the sport is competing at who can do that one thing the best. In boxing one man might be the most powerful fighter, but a quick man might still beat him. Boxing is not a sport that can be measured like running can.


Also, what do you think a father is morel ikely to teach a child in any era of the human history? How to run, or how to fight? Everyone knows how to run. Not every 2 year old can say, I know how to fight and protect myself. They can all run.


Anyways your analogy comparing running to boxing for the sake of this argument is simply not logical.

 

I don't get what your hinting at. Are you saying that my argument is incorrect because people like Ali Holmes and Tyson found their way to the ring?

Because if you think basketball and footballs popularity in the 60's-70's compares to the times of today, your mistaken.


Any I guess we'll just have to agree about the old timers Power Puncher

And thank you, this forum is great.

 

You cannot see many things clearly in old fight footage. Fighters on old footage would look much much more quicker and sharper in their movements on modern cameras.

Someone like Floyd Patterson would look like a lightning bolt on modern cameras.

 

The old Harry Greb chestnut rises again so I have one question; would the guy messing around with Jack O'Brien, beat Loughran, Tunney or Walker that we have on film,?Simple question.

 

Some of the old-timers had hundreds, perhaps thousands of amateur fights, and unrecorded bouts.

The old "smokers" back in the day, the young fighters would fight every week, many bouts, tournaments, for a small prize they usually exchanged for a dollar or two. This was a massive subculture of the fight scene, and wasn't reported as part of the professional "prize-fight" or "boxing" circuit.
Not to mention when the amateur tourney scene really kicked of it was teeming with far more amateurs then it was in later years, and I'm going back to the 30s.

Then there's the boxing booth circuit in Britain. Hundreds of unrecorded bouts happened in the booths, often several rivalries between good locals and well-known booth fighters, quality boxing I've heard from people who were there. Many of the best Brits started out in the booths and finished up in them too.

It's a fact that the old-timers fought far more fights and rounds than the newer generations.
And that's probably a good thing for the moderns from the standpoint of avoiding brain damage !

It's a fact that the peak of boxing in Western Europe and America was back in the pre-WW2 days and maybe a decade after, 50s and the latest. Because in those days there was boxing clubs, venues everywhere, amateur and pro.
London used to have boxing halls all over the place.
Boxing was taught to every schoolboy and every military recruit. It was way more widespread. And before the days of welfare-state, and when wages were low (pre-50s) the working class young men were drawn to boxing to make a few coins, even if they were just small unrecorded bouts. There were far more boxers. There may have been surges in participation intermittently since then, but not on a large enough scale to turn the general trend and decline in boxing.
And the introduction of TV in the 50s didn't help the small hall and club pro scene either, for well-documented reasons.

These are just facts.
Historical facts. The boxing game has been in decline since the great depression and the second world war ended.

 

Thank you. :good

 

Everything you look back on is revised, without revision there would be no Internet...

 

One small point about the decline in American and British boxing, which of course is correct, but there is a big World out there.

 

Excellent post:good:good Agreed with everything except for the Robinson Comment His combination punching is elite and extraordinary in any era.

 

mattdonnellon, TOUCHE'....or Jack Dillon,Gunboat Smith. Battling Levinsky,Billy Miske,Underated Tommy Gibbons, Bill Brennan etc...To boot...
I truly believe that some of todays revisionists,would take this approach today...If Fighter Joe Smith in 1920 or so knocked out 50 fighters in a row,top contenders,they would most likely contend that the ko victims ,lost by heart attacks..How could those fighters ko 50 top opponents ? they were so primitive in the "old" days...I, cannot understand how todays fighters with maybe 40-50 fights,can be expected to be as good,as the 1940s, when top notchers had 100 to 150 bouts,in a talent richer era ? Boggles my mind...