Chris Bryd TKO 10 Vitali Klitschko- Let's revist round 9

Sorry I don't have all day to post on the internets but I have my alcoholism to keep up and that requires a job which requires a family which requires the drinking. A perfect circle.

And of all people to claim Vitali lacks testicular fortitude it's the guy with that wheezing queen, Tom Brady, in his avatar.

Cheers.

 

He's a **** of a lot better than that Wiley piece of **** in your Williams "spectacular" highlight. Took out an undefeated Cody Koch, Bigfoot Martin and Booker Word. I passed on the chance to spar with Word once. Just looking at him made me want to **** my pants.

And oh, haven't been in Portugal for a while.

 

Somehow I doubt Vitali sat out four of his prime years, gave up his title, and had multiple surgeries to avoid fighting Rahman; who I might add had not beat a ranked opponent in over 4 years at this time. That is just beyond absurd. The multiple cancelations were frustrating for everyone but seriously. I wouldn't buy that if Rahman was prime Liston. Sometimes the simpler answer is the most likely one, did Vitali execute the most complex and exhausting duck in history or was he actually injured?

 

This is a massive and (sadly) unacknowledged post. I commend you.

 

and, for that matter, Brian Nielsen at 64-2 has a better won-lost record than either of the Klitschkos.

 

Consider who you are replying to. Vitali has been in 300+ combat matches if you combine his amateur career and professional career in boxing and kick boxing.

Tom Brady? If you bump into to that drama queen, you'll get called for a foul.

 

It's a rambling, intellectually-flawed post full of inane redundancies. But you were close

 

He points out that the quality of athletes entering boxing has declined since the 1960s and 70s because of talent pool shrinkage. Even if you accept that larger fighters are better--and I do--BritSillyNanny's post bypasses the issue.

Yeah, 1200 fighters are competing at heavyweight today. Great. But how does that compare with previous statistics? That question deserves as much consideration as the "modern training vs. old training" and "bigger vs. smaller" arguments that I see so often (I side with the "moderns" in both).

Aside from vague armwaving, nobody posts facts about the talent pool's SIZE in different eras. Usually the old-timers rave about film or about how "boxing was HUUUUUUGE AND POPULAR back then", the moderns talk about globalization, and nobody produces the stats.

(Admittedly BritSillyNanny doesn't either, but at least he raised the issue).

 

So you contend that the influx of former Soviet Republic, South African and Western African talent amounts to a dilution of talent? Even though the populations of these areas is at least equivalent to the vaunted U.S. of A? Even though, the supposedly alltime greats in Ali, Frazier, Holmes, Tyson and Holyfield would have never sniffed the major leagues of football, basketball or baseball? Even though the 1990's represented possibly the greatest era of the division and we are only 10 years departed from that?

Really?

 

As crosstrainer was saying, we need the real numbers of professional active fighters worldwide from various different years to actually have the discussion.

I'm under the impression that numbers of professional AND amateur boxers in, say, the 1930s WAS far far higher than in recent decades.
I dont have the figures, but I believe that as my default position in the clear abscence of the solid statistics.

 

Then, how do you account for the fact that the 1990's was the deepest era ever seen in the heavyweight division?

 

No.

I've made exactly the same argument that you're making now. I've also argued the other way.

What I'm saying is that we need statistics before going further. The two sources I've received on this forum when I've asked the question (Cox's Corner statistics on U.S. boxing gym decline and a book which stated that Britain had more licensed boxers in mid-century than the entire world does today) have suggested that more fighters were active during the mid 20th century. Globalization might just mean lots of tiny talent puddles instead of one giant pool.

Note that I said MIGHT. We need more statistics before we assess the quality of fighters in any particular era, and we certainly need more than a vague sense that a certain era was "deep" or "shallow" because it's popular or we enjoy watching fighters from that era.

 

Was it? It had exciting fighters and lots of competition at the top, sure, but smaller talent pools can also be very exciting and competitive. Same goes for the 1930s. Within limits, fighters only look as good or bad as their competition allows them to look. Without numbers and other information, we can't tell.

I'm not arguing for relativism, or that each era should be judged by its own standards. Some periods WERE better than others. Some champions fought better competition than other champions. Our job, as boxing historians, is to figure out which ones were better and to provide solid evidence to back it up.