Ali takes the best right hand in HW history on the chin

Ali takes another powerfull right hand at :26. Ali appears to start moving
his head away just before it connected.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EgKkk9ijEkI

 

I agree the punch in round two was the real deal.

As for Alis punch resistance improving with age, that is something i dont buy.
I suggest if Ali/Clay were mentally into fights with Banks and Cooper there is no way they drop him, he was so superior a fighter to his opponents pre exile he didnt stay focussed in fights like he had to later as he lost his gifts.
The hook Frazier dropped him with was a monster and most would have dropped had they worn that shot in the 15th of a battle like that. As for Wepner i dont think that needs explaining

 

Officially he got floored by a right hand to the body by my good friend, Chuck Wepner.

 

I cant buy the mental issue in the slightest. Anyone who has gotten older knows that the desire and bravado to put the body through pain doesnt get stronger (in most cases). The building up of neck muscles argument is also dubious at best. I cant see how neck muscles can make a fighter take better shots, to any reasonable degree.

the only possible way that i can envisage a chin getting better on a fighter is if he trains hard enough to improve his physical fitness. IMO, fighters with superb fitness are generally aware enough to shake off big hits and, more importantly keep their senses and fight back when they are hit. I dont think it is possible to argue that old Ali was fitter than the young version.

Alls the old version tells us is that (contrary to the popular opinion of the time), young Ali had one of, if not the, greatest chins of all time. He never had to take the punishment, but he would have if he could. In fact, it is because of this (more than his record, level of competition or anything else) combined with his uncanny speed and reflexes that i am quite confident that Ali is the greatest boxer that ever lived.

 

I'm also impressed with his ability to take this body punch from Ken Norton...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RGESgkFzCE
2:50

 

That body punch is brutal. I got a hit in the same spot a while ago and the pain is really bad.

As for Norton, it's interesting that he's known to be chinny but that doesn't seem to apply when he fights Ali. He takes three hard successive rights on the chin, but doesn't seem bothered at all.

As for Clay being floored by Banks and Cooper one must remember that he matured quite a bit physically over the next years. Dundee says he was still maturing when he went into exile. He was at his physical best right before the exile, so it seems reasonable that his chin was at his best then as well.

 

I think as time went on Ali trained his body to take more punishment than anything else, to go for the long haul, when before he trained for speed and agility, to escape punches...Dundee and Pacheco would say Ali would do the rope a dope in training camp, and let his sparring partners beat him from round one onward...I think and believe you can train the body to do alot of damn things, and toughness in ways, punch resistance, is one of them...but I believe the main factor was Ali's confidence in himself, that he could visualize being hit and weather the storm anyways. Chuvalo was one who lived by this belief, that nothing could be worse than what you could imagine it to be.

 

Ali trained for taking punches to the body as early as before the first Liston fight. So absorbing body blows from sparring partners was already an important part of his training in the 60's.

 

The shot was high and a bit of a reach but still a hell of a punch ..

 

I agree 100%. A better question is who deserved this fight on a fair score card. Ali or Shavers? I was a huge Shavers fan as a kid. He won some and lost some but was always entertaining.

Ali took a great punch for sure. Part of taking a good punch is part mental, and the ability to act like you are OK. Ali could take the punch, not fold mentally, and pull off an acting job that might fool fighters who lack ring smarts.

 

Shavers lacked ring smarts. Either that or he was an average finisher.

Look at the 2nd round vs Ali:

Had Tyson, Louis or Marciano put Ali in that situation; there is no doubt in my mind that Ali would have lost his titles that night.

 

It's because he lacked stamina. He had trained hard for the Ali fight but wasn't confident in going 15 rounds if fighting at a fast pace. When Ali taunted him after being hurt, Shavers thought Ali was trying to "rope-a-dope" him like he did to Foreman.

If Shavers had done what he did against Norton, who knows? Perhaps he could have finished Ali off or maybe he would have ran out of gas and be finished by the middle rounds.

 

Thing is, if Ali had another 30 seconds at the end of the 15th he probably would have stopped Shavers himself. And god knows how, at the end of the 14th he was ****ed, taking bombs all night and looked on empty, eyes glazed up everything before the 15th. Then he comes out and boxes like it was round 3.

As well, Holmes said about Shavers that when he was hit he was unconcious, but hitting his head on the canvas brought him round, as opposed to most knockouts.

 

It's not absolutely certain how a knockout works, but the generally accepted theory is as follows: normally the brain essentially floats in the skull, as it is connected by ropy tissue to the top of the spine. Inside the skull it is surrounded by brain fluid that protects it, helps it function, and cushions it from impact.

However, when the head is hit by an impact, the head can snap back or to the side at a speed or angle extreme enough the brain pushes the brain fluid out of the way and collides with the skull. The result is brain damage on a miniature scale, and a KO. Check out the way a Pacquiao opponent's head snaps around in the replay of a KO to get an idea. (The second replay, starting at 28 seconds in, is the best view).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGyyApK8ddg

The argument for the neck muscle thing is that it is essentially another stabilizer for the head and skull. If the neck muscles are strong and thick, they should prevent the head from turning or moving as sharply, thus lessening the damage on the brain and the chance of a KO.

Of course, plenty of fighters have ****ing huge necks and still get KO'd. Look at Mike Tyson's loss to Douglas, for example:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Exrpoc6GP60