Why do people always pick the past fighters will beat modern fighters?

nice post. :good

 

Some of the fighters from the past where just plain better than the current ones..
Hearns and Leonard would probably dominate the 147 division if they fought today.. Benn and Eubank would probably also beat Kessler and Froch..
But saying that the likes of Joe Louis or Rocky Marciano would destroy the Klitschko bros is wrong, and proves that you suffers from nostalgia..

 

Youre right, unless they get in the ring we dont know.
I have said this before that H2H means little compared to resumes.
H2H G Foreman was going to destroy Ali but the resumes at the end of their fight with each other say far different

 

well said Locard

 

The bigger trap that people fall into is the people who aint took the time to watch some of these older fighters and so only rep the modern day fighter who they've seen and claim him to be better. Sometimes people rep the "good ole days" cause they are actually better.

I mean it aint nostalgic to acknowledge Nunn, Toney, Jones, Hopkins would wipe the floor with the likes of Williams, Martinez, Pavlik. All the latter fighters have fought or won the MW Championship, yet neither would probably last 5 mins with those fighters from a previous era.

Its like saying the action heroes from the 80's/90's weren't any better than they are today you're just being nostalgic, when actually, they clearly were.......... Arnie, Stallone, Segal, Van Damme to name just a few. Is there even one! comparison today?

Of coarse its not a case of old fighter auto beats modern day fighter. People who use that idealism are biased, but that is no more ******ed than trotting out that your being nostalgic when commonsense is telling you some things actually were better back then, namely the HW division, the MW division, and possibly more divisions if the truth be told. Look at the emergence of Euro fighters. Have Euro fighters got that much better? Not imo, Boxing has just regressed and opened the door for them. Actually maybe that's a bit harsh, maybe they have improved somewhat, but not significantly enough to be enhancing the quality that was in Boxing throughout the 90's. Some of the most skilled fighters of all time are Whitaker, Hopkins, Jones, and Mayweather. Some of the most formidable are Morales, Holyfield, Barrera, Pacquiao.

 

Well said! :thumbsup

 

in general, the new generation is always better than the old...

if not then humanity itself wont progress....

 

I hear you some people act as though, just because you fought in a earlier era your invincible especially the heavyweights I can see Ali and Vitali beating Marciano but at the same time I agree with some, for instance Manny Pacquiao I cant see him beating a 1979 Sugar Ray Leonard.

 

There's also many more pro boxers today.:nono

 

One answer is the past fighters have finished their careers. Someone like Ward has probably only fought a minority of the world class fighters he'll take on (and chances are, beat) during his whole career

The other answer is sheer bias. The idea that boxing is the only sport where it's participants have went backwards is nothing short of laughable

 

That's true. However, what we DO know, is that in EVERY SINGLE measurable sporting activity performances have improved over the years. People have become stonger, faster, fitter, thrown further, jumped higher etc etc etc. This leads to me to be convinced that, a few expections aside (Ray Leonard, Muhummad Ali) nearly all todays elite fighters would have beaten those from more than a generation ago.

 

That's what my wife keeps sayin' about me, BT

 

I think it's mostly just due to the frequency at which boxers of older periods fought as well as quality of opposition. Some of it I feel is the old time reverence of fighters of the past. Each generation tends to feel their period of boxing was the best, particularly in eras where boxing was a more popular sport culturally. There are similar examples in other sports, like baseball. Any perceived "golden age" will have a group of participants who will be considered the greatest at the time, and consequently being the best during a time that was a golden age will be catapulted to legend status. I'm positive we will be talking about a few "legends" of our own time, as we grow older and a new generation of boxing fans become the majority.