Where would you rate his defensive skills and how good did he use the cross-arm/ philly shell technique? I've seen people talk about how skilled he was and how he used old school defensive technique but never seem to rate him that highly in that department. Was he really a slick/elusive target or was he hittable but made it up with his punching power?
The cross arm used by ol Arch wasn't on the level of Floyd's or Whitiker's defense but was made to order for the way he threw his short right hand with power. It was kind of a leaky defense but a trade off as it let him block most punches while keeping him in postition to punch with authority almost all the time. As he ko'd more opponents then anyone in history you could say it worked pretty well for him too.
At the top-level, Archie Moore has more KOs than anyone and as has been alluded to, his cross-armed defense was different from others in that it was designed principally to allow him to set up his offense. I wouldn't call him a great defensive fighter, partly because his defense was not as tight as other obviously more defensive-minded fighters but also because he was transparently a great offensive fighter first. But he could still be cute (at least from what I've seen on film) and had good head and lateral movement when he chose to use it.
Archie's was definitely more looser. Big reason being his head movement. I either read or saw in an interview where he said he could just move his head just enough for punches to slip by while he maintained his offensive or counter punching capabilities.
Yeah, you can see that with the head movement. I remember in the classic fight with Durelle, he dropped his shoulder to slip the punch and immediately countered with a huge right.
You mistook that for him being dizzy and head bobbling from those brutal knockdowns... Sorry, couldn't resist the irony of talking about his defensive prowess in a fight he got bounced off the canvas a bunch... And yea I know he came back and won. Just talking about defense...
