Did Foreman cut water weight at weigh-ins?

Assuming they were legal in whatever local jurisdiction he was in, it would've been downright prudent to use them. He was an old man competing with a new generation of guys in a sport where you're inflicting brain damage on each other. The opinions of boxing forumites 30+ years later about PEDs shouldn't have been high on his list of concerns.

 

I think you're right to add the caveat that Chisora is more massive than Foreman. Something like 20-30+ pounds of muscle worth, which is a lightheavyweight/cruiserweight kind of gap. Also, unlike Foreman, he didnt gas out very easily; he had a pretty good workrate despite being significantly bigger than Foreman.

One thing I would suggest considering is that Chisora also had a style designed to fight bigger opponents. A budget Frazier style, but that's still a lot closer to what you're looking for against a superheavyweight than what 70s Foreman did.

 

Likely not a grave concern, no.

 

Chisora doesn't have a style "designed" to fight bigger opponents. People also claim his style gives smaller guys more problems than most SHW by virtue of pressure and cutting the ring. His goal is to maul you and that can work for every size big or small as long as you have the strength and punch selection to hold your ground and hurt them.

And as we've seen Chisora can still compete in the top 10 as an old man with a 6 round gas tank before throwing spent swings despite struggling with an old Gerald Washington a couple years back, which shows the top level besides Usyk is nothing to write home about. I'm not seeing why Foreman isn't capable of clearing

 

Chisora's style is designed to fight taller guys, but, yeah, not bigger and stronger.

Foreman's style was neither.

 

I'd be surprised if 70s GF, along with most of the division wasn't using PEDs too. In the 70s (and before) PEDs were legal, abundant and there was no testing. Why wouldn't a fighter use them?

I watched some of the video of Ali - Foreman and GF was walking like he was drunk when the bell rang to go to corner at the end of the 3rd round. His stamina was a serious weakness. He did come back with a busy 5th round, but got beat up at the end of that round.

The later 70s GF trained by Clancy (that knew how to pace himself better) would probably have been a much tougher fight for 74 Ali and the 80s-90s version would have done better too IMO.

 

Foremans style was designed to seek and destroy with maximum effort in his shots and witnesses from 2 generations suggests he had historical power and a good chin. He's susceptible to highly defensive styles more than anything

 

Yeah, when steroids started in boxing is anybody's guess.

My hypothesis, but it's only that, is that it came on a bigger front when weight training and trainers came into the sport, as was the case for American football.

 

If the test of a weak era is fighters who are able to compete despite physical drawbacks, I don't think the 70s comes out very well. The top guy in the latter half had Parkinsons, and the top guy in the first half had to cheat vision tests to be medically cleared. Foreman, meanwhile, was a 6 round fighter like (old) Chisora, except in his 20s rather than his late 30s / early 40s.

Chisora's style is a lot better suited to deal with guys who have a range and height advantage than Foreman's is, as @Bokaj points out.

 

His lack of head movement, upright style and long guard is not great against taller opponents. A bob and weave like Frazier's and Chisora's has is much better suited for that.

 

But what does this prove ? That guys with physical disadvantages can overcome people without ? More rounds, more fights, more hard sparring and less knowledge on the science of recovery will allow more damage to accumulate, this undermines the high skillset, ring iq and punching power of past fighters how exactly ? Chisora is an old ass man with shot reflexes and he's still making noise, considering Foreman could compete in the 90s as a fat old man decade out the ring your assessment on Foremans chances in todays era being doubtful don't mean anything. The only real differences stylistically is he paced himself better and didn't swing to destroy his opponent with every punch if you actually pay attention to his 70s fights, but he had the power to pull it off at the highest level, so he did it. He'd be walking down taller fighters and cutting off the ring, smashing the body, jabbing, setting up knockout shots because foreman has already fought bigger taller fighters. If your assessment meant anything he'd have had trouble with Jack O Halloran who was bigger and fighting behind a jab. Chisora doesn't have Georges power, or his resume

The biggest issue for me is you always focus on the limitations of past fighters ,but dont ever consider that whenever a mere top 10 cruiserweight or a small heavyweight gets introduced into the modern heavyweight division they're usually as capable of causing problems for the top and picking up some decent wins as any other super heavyweight contender like Hunter, Hide, Holyfield, Haye, Usyk, Byrd, Moorer, Donald, Perez, Jennings, a medically obese Ruiz, need I mention more ?

With that much success it actually makes one wonder what the heavyweight division would look like if the cruiserweight division was eliminated and all the smaller heavyweights were forced to challenge themselve higher up instead of just 3 of them per era. I imagine based on all evidence the average size of heavyweights would go down by at least 30 pounds and 2 inches.

 

Foreman worked behind a jab and could cut the ring, was a great body puncher. Foreman is going to land that's a fact, he always struggled with defensive fighters more than anything like a Chris Byrd, not a joshua or a dubois. It's as if Foreman never fought taller fighters the notion is quite hilarious to say the least.

He had good durability and good recovery. He does fine in todays era, Dubois almost died to Kevin Lerena and the stoppage was corrupt

 

Young Foreman fought no 6'6 guys that I am aware of, certainly no good ones. Wepner doesn't really cut it for me.

He fought three quality opponents his height. Got KO'd by one and almost by another. The one he beat easily, Norton, always fared badly against punchers.

An extended guard is not great when your at a height and reach disadvantage, easy as that.

 

So explain how those "bad" performances had anything to do with height. Lyle was a powerpuncher being compared by foreman to other big hitters like Cooney and Liston, but it was a huge slugfest and full of fighting off the ropes.

Muhammad Ali is Muhammad Ali