A Faded Tyson vs. A Faded Louis

The Louis of the Marciano fight easily. Tyson from the Lewis fight would be more fair.

 

Not even close if you consider this - Louis did well against a ATG HW , Tyson did awful against McBride. When they were this faded Louis still could do things well , Tyson was losing often at this point to guys he would have wiped out with ease in his prime. Louis wins imo , dont know about in their primes though

 

The faded Louis would win and it would not even be competitive.

A better match up would be that Louis against the Tyson of the Golotta fight.

 

Louis, Tyson was far too gone at the McBride fight and I suspect part of him wanted to lose that fight to end the charade that had become his career. He started out far too tentative in that fight and he seemed far too docile.

The Louis of the Marciano fight at the very least was able to win the 4th round against Marciano. Something that an 05 Tyson wouldnt be able to replicate.

 

I think Louis was even ahead or even after 4 or 5 rounds. Marciano took over big time though, and in those losing rounds he still quite some damage that caught up with Louis later, perhaps.

 

You could probably dig up Joe Louis's bones and they'd beat Kevin McBride.

 

Louis, Louis, and Louis. Faded Louis vs Faded Tyson, Prime Louis vs Prime Tyson, whatever the parameters, Joe was the better man.

 

No, I think a prime Tyson would have a good shot against a prime Louis. I think Tyson would overpower him. It's not really a fair comparison though, since boxing and boxers evolved quite a lot during the 50 years between Louis' reign and Tyson's. If they hade been from the same era I would probably bet on Louis. It's a fight I would love to see, in any case.

 

Tell me more. How did boxing evolve since the Louis era? I have plenty of film footage in my collection, what techniques and philosophical approaches should I be looking for?

The major changes as I see them are all related to rules and equipment:

1) Better, larger gloves
2) Shorter fights (maximum of 20 rounds vs maximum of 12 rounds)
3) Three knockdown stoppages vs. unlimited knockdowns
4) Steroids

Now of course these are all significant in themselves; you don't train for a 20-round fight the same way you'd train for a 12-rounder, for example. But if the 40% reduction in fight length let Tyson blow off more energy, secure in the knowledge that under no circumstances would he have to fight more than 12 rounds, that's a result of the rules, not the fighter.

So what sort of evolution are you thinking of?

 

Tyson was far more shot against McBride than Louis was for Marciano. Louis would win by a KO in about 7 rounds. Now the Tyson of the Lewis fight had declined at a similar pace to Louis in the Marciano fight, so if it was that scenario, it would be a pick'em for me.:good

 

Well, the main differences as I see it are that HW-boxers today is bigger and more powerful without losing much speed. Compare the Klitschko-brothers with Carnera for example. This probably owes a lot to better training methods and better nutrition I would think.

Also, people are generally taller and bigger nowadays than before. Just over the last 30 years the average height for Swedish men have increased with about 2 inches, and would I think that it would the same for Americans. So basically, if Louis was around today he would have been bigger and more powerful, but having more or less the same speed.

Technically-wise, I would be very surprised if things haven't moved foreward since the 30's and 40's. Boxing would probably be the only major sport where they haven't in that case. Personally, I think it's a noticeable difference.

It's the same thing in every sport. Would Ben Hogan rule the roost in today's golf or Babe Ruth in today's baseball, if you transported them here with a time-machine. Does Jesse Owens records still stand? Would Bjorn Borg be among the elite in tennis (even if he had modern equipment)?

I suppose you gonna say something about steroids concerning some of these examples, but I don't think that's the whole story. Sports simply evolve, it's only natural. Of course, at some point there's bound to be a limit I suppose. But I don't think it was reached in the 40's.

 

Joe Louis, and Ray Robinson for example, look as technically-sound as any fighter that's come since, from where I'm sitting.

So I think "evolution" was complete by the 30s/40s at latest.

All the great modern trainers still hold those guys up as standards, as do the best modern technicians - like Hopkins and Toney.

 

Why wouldn't he? A better question might be, how well would today's golfers perform with Hogan-era equipment - solid wood shafts and wooden or iron clubheads, rather than the high-tech alloy and composite materials used today?

Again, why not? Look at the dimensions of the Yankee Stadium of the Babe's dy - 490 feet to dead center field!

Here's Yankee Stadium during the Babe's heyday:

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Yankee Stadium Today:

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Sure, it might be easier to hit a home run if you can pull the pull straight down the line, but if you've actually watched a bit of baseball you know that most homers are hit in what's commonly called the "Power Alleys" - left-and-right center field. In old Yankee Stadium you could hit a 450-foot drive - an easy home run in ANY modern ballpark - and have it get caught if it was anywhere near center field.

(By the way, I'm sure everyone who has watched any baseball history has seen Willie Mays make his famous over-the-shoulder catch on Vic Wertz's massive bomb to center field in the 1951 World Series. What is never mentioned is that Willie was almost 500 feet from home plate when he made the catch - an easy home run anywhere else in baseball. Check out the park)

Do sprinters still wear spiked leather shoes, run on a cinder track, and dig their own starting marks?

Why not? If a long-necked wooden racket was still a viable tool for playing tennis today, why isn't anyone using one?

I think you're getting too hung up on advances in rules and equipment, as I warned in my previous post. Let's look at a sport that hasn't had ANY changes in rules, any changes in equipment, and just to make everything as normalized as possible, it's been run on the exact same field.

The Kentucky Derby.

Now I won't say there haven't been ANY advances in equine medicine, care, and farrier work in the last 100 years, and indeed, horse racing actually lets you breed specifically for championship traits, but compared to any human sport the playing field is almost completely level.

In 1916, horse "George Smith" won the derby with a total time of 2:04.

In 1961, horse "Carry Back" won the derby with the exact same time - 2:04.

In 1999, horse "Charismatic" won the debry with a time of 2:03.25.

This year's winner, "Street Sense", won the debry with 2:02.17

From 1916 until 2007, the difference in winning Derby times is approximately 1.75 seconds, or a little over 1%. This is with several generations of selective breeding, new orthopedic horseshoes, anti-inflammatory medicines, and 100 years of assorted scientific knowledge regarding equine anatomy and training. 1%.

Other races show similar trends - the legendary racehorse "Man O'War" won the 1920 Preakness Stakes with a record time that still stands today - he would have beaten the 2007 winner by almost two seconds.

Now if you replaced the standard well-groomed dirt with some sort of high-tech composite racetrack like human track & field uses today, you'd see faster times. That doesn't make the horses inherently faster, but they will seem to BE faster, and this is a directly result of their equipment. So when you're trying to compare Jesse Owens to Carl Lewis, you're automatically putting Owens at an enormous (and I would argue extremely unfair) disadvantage through no fault of his own.