Expert opinions on Marciano VS Liston

Sure, I can do that. For you, it's just another chance not to understand the more difficult stuff that is said and pretend not to understand the stuff that is easier for whatever mad reason. But I guess for anyone else who manages to swim through the dirt in this thread, this might be something worth reading.

JOE FRAZIER: Here's the rule about the three styles. Most thing being equal, boxers do well against sluggers (unless the slugger can catch them); sluggers to well against volume punchers; and volume punchers do well against boxers. It's because the strengths of each style intersect with the weakness of the style opposing it. The strengths of the boxer work well against the weaknesses of the slugger. The strengths of the slugger work well against the weaknesses of the volume puncher. And the strengths of the volume puncher work well aginst the boxer. What does this have to do with strategy? Everything.

Most things being equal, boxers do well against sluggers.

Great boxers without great mobility are rare, but they do exist (Toney is a good example). This is because the basic job of the boxer is to score without allowing either volume puncher or slugger too close. This is easier in the first case than the latter because the fewer punches the opponent is trying to land the better. This is, of course, true in all things, but it's more important here because the best attribute of the slugger (or puncher) is his punch and his job is to land that punch.

As we'll see in a spell, the key ingredients to beating the boxer are either to a) box better than him (which is boxer v boxer and not relevant here) or to execute the style of the swarmer. The swarmer doesn't care if a boxer runs, in fact, he likes it. We've stated "all things being equal" here so we'll assume world class; a world class swarmer by definition of his style excels at: cutting off the ring, throwing (and landing) many punches and working inside (avoiding clinches). The puncher, on the other hand wants to "come forward and land punches so he can knock out out. And he doesn't want to take a long time to do it."

The key thing to remember here is that the very moment the slugger starts executing the swarmer's fight plan he stops being a slugger and starts being a swarmer. But a world class puncher often cannot execute a world-class swarmer's fight plan. Styles are not an accident. They appeal to the indelible abilities of the fighter.

Jimmy Young's execution of the boxing style against George Foreman is absolutely textboox in some of their rounds.

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5 is particularly instructive specifically because Young isn't doing anything that extraordinary outside of the details of this style.

He circles back and to the left just outside of the range, taking away Foreman's left hook and bringing Foreman's straight right down the pipe outside of the fact (and it's important) that his natural step is to the left can neutralise it. In other words, Young is always ready to make the natural move away from this punch, bringing it to where he was rather than where he is. This is not naturally true of swarmer v puncher. Very early in the round Foreman feints with this punch and Young shows the text book shuffle back and slightly to his left, showing exactly how the punch would be dealt with were it actually thrown. Foreman knows this now; but aside from committing himself more fully or throwing wide to the body he doesn't have a lot of tactical flexibility here. Meanwhile, Young's constant small moves (important for economy, after all he has to do this for the entire fight) prevent Foreman getting set. When Foreman gets close he doesn't try to fight him inside but ties him up.

What's important to note here are the natural advantages Young's natural execution of his natural style bring. Just by doing what he is naturally good at, he buys himself an advantage. He prevents Foreman getting set; he takes away his big punches when he throws them; he prevents booming sideswipes inside by tying him up.

Also important is the fact that he is excellent at these things. We know Foreman is excellent as a puncher; if Young wasn't excellent at movement, if he wasn't excellent at positioning and if he wasn't excellent at "naturally" tying Foreman up (as opposed to making a grab which can lead to falling foul of the referee) the execution wouldn't work. This is where "all things being equal" is important. The two were rated close to equal, Foreman #1, Young #3, but there relative merits only matter in the sense that they are close enough that they allow the natural advantages Young's style possesses over Foreman's to come to fruition.

Also key here are quick hands; Young's advantage are mostly defensive. He outpoints Foreman by outlanding him and he is only able to outland him by being quicker, although being more technically excellent is also valid.

The style advantage depends on none of this however. The style advantage is born of the boxer's ability to make it difficult to execute the stalking puncher's style while naturally bringing the stalking puncher on to his own punches (the slugger does have alternatives outside of changing style, but they are always oddities. One example is Shavers refusing to engage Ali at all on the ropes). Style advantage looks like this across the board. The deployment of one style "lines up" with deployment of another in such a way as to show favour to the advantageous style. This is what Joe Frazier is describing.



Most things being equal, sluggers do well against volume punchers.

In many ways this is the most obvious of style advantages and the most difficult to overcome without switching styles. The natural ingrained advantage to the puncher over the volume puncher is that the volume puncher does much of the slugger's work for him.

The slugger spends his career working towards trying to engineer openings. He basically has to trick the opponent into thinking it is safe to come within distance. This is terribly difficult because most opponents know the puncher's reputation and if they don't they know his power very early. It should be extremely easy to see why boxer types of a similar class eschew the natural dis-advantages garnered by the swarmer.

The swarmer doesn't just walk face first onto the punches of the slugger of course; there are numerous traits and tactics available to him to make the best of his bad lot. It is a fact, however, that the swarmer naturally presents the best punching opportunity, and this is for a number of very obvious reasons.

First of all, his style calls for an approach. He can't crowd, or land volume, the two keynotes of his style, from distance. So he closes. Closing is part one. As he closes, the puncher's opportunity should be obvious whether or not the puncher lands. Secondly, the swarmer throws a lot of punches - he's the most volume heavy of all the styles as a rule. The reason world class counter-punchers generally reduce punch activity of swarmers (see Calzaghe against Hopkins for a great example) is that every offence produces a punching opportunity for the slugger. No other style presents as many punching opportunities to the natural puncher. This is the keynote of the style-disadvantage for the swarmer against the slugger.

Babyears over here gets excited at this point because it sounds as though the style advantage is a closed book on the fight. This, of course, is not the case. All style advantages can be overcome. A style advantage is nothing more, but certainly nothing less, than a general overlay of weaknesses and strengths.

The two keys to beating the style of slugger -

1 - Movement away from the puncher to prevent him getting set and to bring him forwards on to counterpunches. The swarmer moves forwards, the opposite of this.

2 - Counterpunches stressed at the expense of leading. The swarmer leads, or he moves into the space without punching, which is worse.

The most famous example here is Foreman-Frazier, but we had a delicious version of this recently in Roman Gonzalez, perhaps the best pressure fighter post-Pacquiao, and Rungvisai, a puncher so good he he managed to drag out a majority decision win, and a knockout in the (less instructive, weirdly) rematch.

 

Most things being equal, swarmers do well against boxers.


The key aspect of the swarmer or pressure fighter is disruption, by any means, probably the reason for its reputation as the dirtiest style. That may be a little unfair, but Zivic, Greb, Dempsey, Marciano and Armstrong himself were all dark-arts masters and I think it is no coincidence. The boxer, on the other hand, is the type who most relies upon co-ordination, both of punch and of movement. Co-ordinated attacks require both space and time, the single greatest weakness of the style I think and the reason that great boxing is so synonymous with speed - Robinson, Ali, Pep and Leonard are among the finest examples of the boxing style because they were able to execute in tiny moments. Rushing them and crowding them were extremely difficult because of their speed. Only the very best swarming attacks were able to get the job - LaMotta, Frazier, Saddler, Duran. These names are interesting.

Robinson was a better middle than LaMotta. Ali was a better heavy than Frazier. Pep was a better feather than Saddler. Leonard was a better welter than Duran. But all of these men were at some time able to close the quality gap with a combination of factors that included the style with which they deployed their boxing.

One of the most often repeated phrases in boxing is that the inferior fighter has to "stay on the chest" of the superior fighter, bring him down a level to turn the match into a dogfight. How this translates in this supposed argument about the existence of a style advantage the neutralisation of the boxers most famous attribute: footwork. The swarmer closes the distance as quickly as possible while cutting off the ring to prevent the boxer establishing distance and mobility relative to the opponent. If successful this will turn the fight into one that favours the natural attributes of the swarmer - work-rate, durability, endurance. This is where it is again to remember that this is in cases where the class of the fighters are approximately equal and where fighters are engaged in the using the styles which are right for them. It all comes crashing down where this is not the case.

My favourite example here is Ricardo Lopez-Rosendo Alvarez I

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Lopez is clearly the superior fighter here in terms of skill and ability, but Alvarez executes all the keynote aspects of the swarmer's style perfectly and is (frugally) rewarded. He created pockets of unsatisfactory squabbling that drew the contest away from technical aspects to those most in keeping with the swarmer. He out-worked Lopez, out-landed him and probably was due something more than the technical draw he got after 8 rounds. Alvarez often preferred a wide punch or a dip to a jab in closing and it was a dip - precipitated by a feinted dip - that bought him the KD in the second. Alvarez spent almost the entire remainder of the round closing the distance and working at mid-short range. This removed Alvarez's greatest offensive weapon, and the one most associated with the boxer, the jab-right, and his best defensive weapon, his footwork, combined with the virtual threat of his biggest punches which were mostly fully extended and straight. Lopez was repeatedly crowded to the ropes where he was denied the space and time for his fluid attacks.

There is no question of Alvarez pressing his advantage with a boxing attack because he would lose to the boxer's superior ability, nor is there any point in his stalking his man for he puncher's chance, because this plays right into the hands of the boxer too - boxers, when crowded, lose the jewels in their stylistic crown; this is what happened to Lopez in his two fights with Alvarez, and this is why, despite his clear superiority, Lopez struggled so badly with Alvarez.

It was a stylistic consideration.

Style advantages are most pronounced when they relate to elemental fighters. These are fighters who are married, in the main, to one style. Rocky Marciano was an elemental fighter, who fought specifically to a code, the code of the swarmer. Willie Pep, too, was elemental, a boxer. Sluggers are a little rarer because it is basically impossible to get by at the highest levels on power, but they do exist, George Foreman being perhaps the definitive heavyweight who lived to get a fighter on the end of one of his shots.

Most fighters show some variety of style. Sometimes it is quite pronounced. There was a lovely example recently in the Frampton-Santa Cruz fights. There are also some fascinating hybrids, like Juan Manuel Marquez (late) who adopted a sort of counter-pressure style, one I also think describes Joe Louis quite nicely - pressure the space, counter the man.

But all styles have strengths and weaknesses. All of them. How a fighter deals with these strengths and weaknesses is a hugely important aspect of the fight, but the stylistic factor in predicting boxing is paramount - it's paramount to predictions and it's paramount to strategy. You can't go into the ring blind to the disadvantages that lie at hand which are born of this fact, and you can't appraise boxers or boxing without a proper understanding of them.

We'll maybe have a quick(ish) look at Marciano-Liston in the light of these facts in the coming week.

 

Nope, this is completely incorrect. What i'm doing is identifying areas where the weaknesses in one style are naturally lined up against strengths of another style.

This is style advantage.

It's on way odd or controversial anywhere outside of your brain.

 

tbh, it's far too rudimentary. You know this stuff, everyone who reads it does, just about. But maybe you could do key illustrative fights or something, that's a maybe.

 

And Joe Frazier's, don't forget his brain.

Strategy is everything, of course, but there are keynote strategies for each style.

This is all laid out above in detail.

 

Even choklab knows this. He's just pretending he doesn't, and running interference.

I forget why, but probably something to do with Rocky Marciano...