Let's continue on fact ... Baer made Bowe look like Jack Johnson on defense ... at least Baer knew how to throw a jab, move his head and glide on his feet ... you are also leaving out the fact that Bowe was a much better TWO handed puncher and much faster. I've never seen a more telegraphed right than Baer's .. he looked like a Warner Brothers cartoon character winding up to throw it ..
..but he wasn't stopped! The Lewis fight? Seriously? If you get hit with a solid punch in teh amateurs the fight might get stopped... did you even see that fight? Bowe didn't go down or anything, it was actually a competitive fight by both. Bowe wasn't scared of Lewis (maybe his manager was though). Hey, I don't even like Bowe, but he was pretty good.
baer also had a great left hook - just check out the finish on this!! For those of you who dont like black and white film at least roll it forward to 4.42 for the KO. [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8Xh4WUGq24[/ame]
Newer isn't better but the more modern guy always gets underrated around here... most of the time. Max Baer was very limited.
you might want to watch this... the quality and speed is perfect. its staged and corny but max demonstrates moves you wont credit him with without watching it. forward it to 1.20. [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RpFTVrutZe4[/ame]
Older is not automatically better, but bowes career didnt even pan out all that well. A bridesmaid to Lewis at the Olympics, as a pro one good win against a guy who beat him and more than a few controversies...its disappointing.
There are some rather ridiculous notions about Baer's skills in this thread for sure but the fact is that the man could punch and he had a very solid chin. I hesitate to say that he would have no chance considering that Bowe's chin wasn't exactly tested against knockout punchers. If it turns out that Bowe can indeed take it then his superior skills would get the job done, though his punching technique & defense are often overrated. His punches didn't always have much better form than Baer's wild bombs, and his defense was leaky without a doubt. It likely wouldn't have been a complete wipeout. No doubt about Baer's power either, as crude as he may have been: [dm]xep9er_max-baer-ko_sport[/dm]
Should be a very ugly crowd pleasing brawl. Bowe will bank on his durability and go to war with Bear; probably pissing him off in the process. You can throw skills out the window in this one, the tougher and harder hitting fighter will prevail...and that would be Baer.
I went back and watched some Max Baer fights recently and was astonished at how terrible he looked. Doubt he would have been a top-5 heavyweight in Bowe's time.
Bowe by knockout. He the bigger fighter also the better boxer. Rid**** was a two handed threat unlike Baer. Put his punches together better and Bowe wasn`t exactly lacking in power himself. easy call.