I know heavyweights wear 10 ounces now, and I believe it used to be 8 ounces years back. And then I think I’ve heard where Joe Louis wore 6 ounce gloves and maybe even as low as 4 or 5. But I was just wondering if anyone knows the full history of heavyweight glove sizes? I’m talking John L Sullivan to today. I was thinking maybe in the old days that the fighters had some leeway to use whatever size they wanted but not sure. I’ve always been curious about this, so just wanted to see if anyone knows.
I'm sure people much more knowledgeable than I can tell you what kind of records might exist, but it's clear just from perusing photos that early in the twentieth century gloves were often not much more than mittens made of leather or horse hair. Indeed fighting gloves from that time often look like bag gloves.
Gloves were 6oz since the filmed era. But it was stipulated only 4oz in the hand part of the glove and 2oz in the cuff. So they were literally 4oz gloves right up to the end of the Dempsey era. Later only the stuffing in the hand part of the glove counted and they remained 6oz. So they got a little bigger into the Schmeling Baer Sharkey kind of era. Film bares this out. 6oz gloves remained in championship fights right up to Marciano v Don Cokkell which was fought with 8oz gloves under the rules of that state but probably to try out Marcianos nose injury. After that it was always 8oz in heavyweight championship fights. I'm not sure when 10oz gloves were introduced. But going by photos I believe it was around the time 15 round fights ended. But I believe gloves were horse hair stuffed in championship or main event fights through the 1970s. Even though rubber foam filling was introduced in the 1960s. For a period New York had thumbless gloves. They came in around the time of Sugar Ray Leonard's initial one fight comeback between his first retirement and the Hagler fight. They were in use for a lot of Tysons non title fights in New York. That ended when thumb attached gloves took over. British gloves had lace sealed cuffs since the 1940s. Today tape is used over the cuff to prevent knotted laces being used as a weapon. That's why the brand names moved from the cuff to further up the hand. Recently fighters have been using different branded gloves to their opponents. That's new. Certain brands differ in size even though the weight is equal. A defensive fighter can select a glove that offers more shielding protection and a puncher can can select a narrower shaped glove for accuracy. It's personal preference but the weight is 10oz.
