Thanks for your thoughts all. I do somewhat disagree that certain greats, from around the start of the 20th century look good on film, compared to 'modern fighters'. Nearly all the ones I have seen stand pretty much straight up and just look completely hittable. To me this seems to change as the 1900s progress.
The skill level has definitely not dropped, and there’s still one punch power punchers, in fact science has made diets and training methods of fighters much better
I don't think they are so much. There's always been spoilers who clinch a lot and there always will be. There's always been brawlers who seem to not prioritise defence and there always will be. There's always been technical boxers who jab and and pick their shots and there always will be. There's always been athletic freaks who are hard to hit and there always will be. Plus footage is usually that degraded it makes the movements look unnatural. Granted, you're unlikely to see two brawlers in a top level fight, but it does still happen.
Strongly disagree with this. Give me the old time non weight lifting, old style traing fight everyday and 17 xs on Jack Dempsey's 125th birthday.
Well it’s true, the very old school fighters may have had talent but they couldn’t compete with the guys today because they’re physically not on the same level
How can you say that? Guys from the earlie 80's were still going 15 rounds without these strength and conditioning coaches and eating pasta for carbs and steaks for protein. I was just rewatching Duran v Ortiz. Duran was doing the Fitzsimmons shift all night long and using the side to to angles punching off the opposite foot Tyson made famous all night and had the power to stop the man in the 15th. Now a days fighters are gasping for air by the 9th rd. Cotto and DeLahoya come to mind there. Guys through more arm punches now than I've ever seen and this is all with so called modern training methods and nutrition. Sorry man I dont see what your seeing.
I'm with you 100% Mo. I stop around the 30's myself. To me their's not enough reliable information or film to have a real educated opnion on fighters from the 20's and earlier. A boxing writer from those periods may have indeed thought Dempsey was the greatest ever. But how fare was this opinion when he wouldn't or couldn't fight the best minority fighters? How much reliable info that's out their on how good ( Or bad) Dempsey's opponents were? My preference is fighters I can watch. That really didn't come into being until around the mid 1930's. I have a real good feel on Benny Leonard based on the film on him. I can see he could be competitive with any lightweight in history ( Not Duran though) and defeat most. So what's been written on him can be validated by film study. Boxing really began to become more of a technical sport around the 30's also. It was becoming more than two guys just wailing on each other to see which one lasted the longest. So I agree with you on boxing early over 100 yrs ago.
That’s true, but back then all the training was just boxing and cardio, plus they are preparing to go 15 rounds so I’d imagine the top fighters had insane stamina, but there was still plenty of guys in the 80s and the 90s that would gas quick, but you are right about the arm punches, that is becoming too common now and it bugs me honestly
Agree! The number of pro boxers registered today, has doubled since the 1990s. Not only that, but this is the first truly international era, where boxers from just about every corner the world are now taking part - not least the former communist block, where lots of top boxers have been produced over the last couple of decades. So this period of a rapidly growing worldwide talent pool, just happens to coincide with a diminishing number of power punchers? Doesn't really make sense to me!
1940 Champ is likely the Lineal Champ, who fought just the other week, adding to a ledger that is already two to the three times larger than that of the 2020 guy, and has continued to train, in between bouts, because his and his family's survival depend on it. The 2020 Champ is more likely to be one of several titlists, with around 30 fights under his belt (and that's if he's one of the more experienced Champs) but not gotten around to unifying against any of his peers and who last fought 7 months ago; a period during which he has spent most of his time on twitter and filming an ad for his sponsor, because this is, in the main, his leisure time, which he uses to spend the disposable income his relatively short boxing career has afforded him. I don't know if this contrast represents one having an advantage over the other, though. Just saying...
This. A lot of old time fighters confirm this, since boxing over the last couple of decades has been made to be more aesthetically pleasing. But, aesthetically pleasing doesn’t necessarily mean more effective. When I used to volunteer with the Youth Authority boxing program back in the early 90’s with Jimmy Carter and Ike Williams they used to show a lot of footage from the 1920’s and explained that boxers had to start making their styles more TV friendly or more watchable by the late 40’s to early 50’s, since pleasing a live audience is different when compared to trying to keep the attention of a television audience.