Jab duels.

Any Holmes fight!

 

Leonard-Benitez
Norton-Ali

 

I think he meant 2-way - or are you saying that every single Holmes opponent had an educated jab as the crux of their style?

 

Most recent ones which I enjoyed.
Wald vs AJ
Brook vs GGG(in the first few rounds)

 

BJS vs Monroe was pretty much a jab fest, was boring as **** but...

 

Hearns vs Hill

 

Golovkin vs Jacobs.
Everything was set off of the jab.

 

Vitali Klitchko vs Lennox Lewis.

Holmes vs Williams

Douglas vs Tucker

Bowe vs Golota

 

Khan Paulie

 

Canelo Mayweather was definitely a jab duel. One thing to look for is jabs thrown in punch stats / compubox. Though we know that punches landed in compubox / punch stats is highly unrealiable and subjective, one thing that is reliable to gauge how much of a jabbing duel fights were is "jabs thrown". (especially jabs thrown as a ratio to total punches thrown)

Lets compare the Compubox numbers (jabs thrown as a percentage of total punches thrown) of Golovkin Jacobs, Khan Malignaggi and Canelo Mayweather to calculate quantitatively how much of a jabbing duel each fight was.

Golovkin threw 356 jabs out of 615 total punches, while Jacobs threw only 170 jabs out of 571 total punches. That's a total of 356+170 (526 total jabs) / 615+571 (1186 total punches) = 44.35% of the total punches were jabs.

Khan threw 369 jabs out of 653 total punches, while Malignaggi threw 280 jabs out of 531 total punches. That's a total of 369+280 (649 total jabs) / 653+531(1184 total punches) = 54.81% of total punches were jabs.

Canelo threw 294 jabs out of 526 total punches, while Mayweather threw 330 jabs out of 505 total punches. That's a total of 294+330 (624 total jabs) / 526+505 (1031 total punches) = 60.52% of total punches were jabs.

I can't seem to find the Compubox numbers of Saunders Monroe, I'm guessing punch stats weren't calculated for that fight.

But just for comparson, lets take a look at how much more of a jabbing duel Canelo Mayweather was than Maidana Mayweather 1 for example.

Mayweather Maidana 1 was (152 + 318) = 470 jabs / (426 + 858) = 1284 total punches. That's only 36.60 % of total punches were jabs.

Joshua Klitschko was (169 + 119) = 288 jabs / (355 + 256) = 611 total punches. That's 47.13% of total punches were jabs.

Golovkin Brook was (110 + 99) = 209 jabs / (301 + 261) = 562 total punches. That's only 37.19% of total punches were jabs.

So as you can see, Canelo Mayweather was way more of a jabbing duel than any of these fights. These are pretty interesting numbers aren't they? While I think most fans will agree that determining which punches land are subjective and the punches landed numbers in compubox are unreliable, I think we can definitely use the jabs thrown / total punches thrown numbers to get a very good idea of how much of a jabbing duel fights were. It would be interesting to see if we can find fights that exceed the over 60% jabs thrown to total punches thrown ratio of Canelo Mayweather.

Note : For Canelo Mayweather, Individually Canelo had a 55.89% jab to total punches thrown ratio and Mayweather had a very high 65.35% jab to total punches thrown ratio. That's got to be one of the highest jab to total punches thrown ratios Mayweather has ever had, and it shows just how cautious Mayweather was vs Canelo and how much he used the jab in that fight.

For Golovkin Jacobs, Golovkin individually had a 57.89% jab to total punches thrown ratio and Jacobs had a very low 29.77% jab to total punches ratio. What do you guys make of such a low number for Jacobs. Do you think Jacobs would ahve done better on the cards had he used the jab more vs Golovkin? With a 73 inch reach and a height advantage, you would expect Jacobs to have a much higher ratio. In retrospect do you think it was a mistake for Jacobs to not use the jab more?

For Khan Malignaggi, Khan had a 56.51% jab to total punches thrown ratio and Malignaggi had a 52.73% jab to total punches thrown ratio.

In Mayweather Maidana 1, Floyd only had a 35.68% jab to punches thrown ratio while Maidana had a 37.06% jab to punches thrown ratio. This is a stark contrast to Mayweather's punch variety vs Canelo vs his punch variety vs Maidana. I mean over 65% jabs vs Canelo to only 35% jabs vs Maidana. That just goes to show that Mayweather didn't need to use the jab vs Maidana because it was a much easier fight for him stylistically. He made it a more fan friendly fight becaue he didn't have to work as hard to land punches on Madiana than he did vs Canelo. He had to use the jab vs Canelo to win that fight because Canelo is a much better defensive fighter and was a much more difficult matchup for Floyd stylistically. These numbers are very telling.

And FYI for Joshua Klitschko and Golovkin Brook, the individual ratios for each fighter were almost identical to the total average between both fighters. Very close to 37% (Joshua Klitschko) and 47% (Golovkin Brook) for each fighter respectifuly. So in Joshua Klitschko and in Golovkin Brook, in those two fights, both fighters threw about the same percentage of jabs as a percentage of total punches thrown as their opponent did.

 

Oscar and Ike Quartey Great fight over all. The jab was key to set up other shots. High display of skill and an even battle to the end!

 

First fight that i thought of was Lewis vs Klitschko..

 

Canelo Golovkin was (233 + 361) = 594 jabs / (505 + 703) = 1208 total punches. That's a 49.17% jab to total punches ratio. Individually that's a 46.14% jab to total punches ratio for Canelo and a 51.35% jab to total punches ratio for Golovkin. Golovkin threw more jabs as a percentage of his total punches than Canelo did, which makes sense. So Canelo Golovkin was still way less of a jabbing duel than Canelo Mayweather but more than some of the ones listed.

 

No no .sorry OP ,my mistake, I meant that Holmes along with Lewis, Sugar Ray R, had the best jabs in the business.