Was Ali's level of athleticism for a HW boxer unprecedented at the time?

Zora Folley beat Eddie Machen, Doug Jones, Bob Foster, and George Chuvalo. What were Johnny Paycheck's biggest wins? What did he have to offer besides a cool last name?

 

If he continued he would have fought Frazier in '68 and beat him as he would still be at his absolute peak and Frazier wouldn't mature into FOTC Frazier as he did in real life.

 

It's an interesting point, but I think those came in as a regular thing later on.

The Boomer generation were generally larger than their predecessors, which led to more talented big men. Steroids also entered the sport, but I think you see more of that post-Spinks/Holmes II, when all of the other modern training starts working its way in.

It's certainly true that people like Ali and Duran were willing to take drugs to improve their performance (since they tried), and that the occasional boxer did use PEDs, but I don't know that steroids were a widely known and available option in the traditional boxing establishment at that time.

 

Folley was a bit past it. Ali even acknowledged it, but he was levels above Johnny Paycheck. He also beat Henry Cooper and Nino Valdez besides the fighters I cited.

 

Patterson was just as fast. Maybe he couldn’t dance like Ali but his hands were just as fast if not even faster cos he was more direct an didn’t waste time showboating

 

Yes. What made Ali different is that he had the level of athletic ability that you saw from the smaller fighters of the past group, like Patterson, with much greater size.

 

If anything older boxers are arguably more suspicious in some ways. I mean look at how often some of them used to fight the top heavyweights currently fight tends to be 2 times a year most the time.

 

It still is. I have never seen someone move like he did n his prime slipping punches going BACKWARDS while countering while on the move.

 

almost except for Johnson. another plus was his height and size

 

Paycheck, Musto and Jack Roper were noticeably worse than all of Louis's other title opponents.

Paychecks 44-4 was mostly fluff but he knocked out Al Ettore and King Levinsky.

 

Ali’s speed and agility for his size were definitely unprecedented.

No argument against Ali’s popularly perceived status but I would say that some of his moves were more about aesthetics (balletic) than practical application or moves that couldn’t be somewhat negated by opposing technical proficiencies.

I think the no nonsense executions of the more copy book aligned Folley (past prime as he was) gave a hint as to how a fighter might best approach Ali without being mesmerised by his moves or needlessly following him around otherwise.

As Ali admitted himself, he didn’t move in on Zora until Folley began to show clear signs of gassing.

It seems Folley could be erratic at times but he was an excellent fighter overall, nonetheless.

 

It was a pretty common theme early in his career; he was the 'master of wasted motion.'

 

I basically agree with this, especially during the Chuvalo fight when was going out of his way to prove that Chuvalo couldn't hurt him, but I don't think he chose to get hit in the Cooper and Sonny Banks fights.

 

I don't know if he 'felt like' getting hit. I think sometimes that he was so sure of himself that he forgot that the other guy had skills and was trying to win as well.