How Can A War "Ruin" A Fighter?

Great post.

 

Depends, it could be physical or mental. When it comes to the physical part, imo, it is the body who choses to switch off before enduring the level of punishment it has suffered before. It is like a defense mechanism in a sort of way. Kind of like when you drink too much, your body rejects the alcohol by vomiting before allowing further punishment. I don't know exactly how accurate my theory is, but that is just my observation.

 

There are one key difference between boxing and non-combative sports:

In boxing, just like in most other sports, you exert yourself physically. You move, you slip, you punch. This is taxing by itself; just try and shadow box at a high pace for 12 or 15 rounds, You'll be well tired. But the reallly crucial element in boxing is that you simultanously absorb punches. Punches thrown with the power and accuracy only years and years of training will give. Punches to the soft internal organs: liver, heart, kidneys. Punches on muscle and bone. And punches that literally jar your brain.

I think the real damage is done on the margins. When your muscles are near exhaustion and aren't able to recoup between blows and no longer have the ability to soften the punches that affect your internal organs and your brain. There is nothing like this in non-martial sports. A quarter back or a line-backer receive punishment, sure, but not dozens of hard well aimed blows in the space of just seconds when their body already is exhausted. Not in the way fighters do.

 

No. I'd have to dig it out of a pile. I think I've repressed the memory of it.

 

Physically and Mentally, just changes them.Look at Bruce Curry after the Monroe Brooks fight.

 

It can ruin a fighter for all the resons given here but mostly because a war take you into an area where even winning you can be punished worse than a regular loser. you can win a war and never be the same. joe frazier after FOTC and nigal benn after the mclenan fight are good examples of how EVEN winning a war can ruin a fighter. freddie mills wrote "you can never truly hope to ever be the same after a fight like that" regarding the beating he once took in a hard career.

It is frightening being taken to the limit. To suck it up, fight past exhaustion, dizzy and trembling, swalowing your own blood. forcing yourself to push out more than your body wants to give knowing there is no energy or pep left to be effective. You wont quit because quitting is harder to deal with later but at the same time there is less to give each time you go there.

No mater how hard you train there are limits to the punishment and exsersion you can take. If you cross that line, even if you win you pay a price.

 

interesting

 

Superbly written explanation. :good

 

Good post, in a way the protection (gloves) makes it worse as the fighters are able to endure long sustained punishment, it would probably be safer for a fight to end as a early KO, unless its a really brutal KO, then to fight a war for the full 12 rounds.

A bit of it must be mental though, probably more so depending on the fighter though

 

Mostly mental. After an all-out war with your arch nemesis, the rest of your career will be a bit anticlimactic.

 

On a neurological level I think it was found that after an initial knockout a person becoems more suseptable to it in future.

 

All good posts here. :good

I pretty much agree with most of it.
I do think some of you might be underestimating the physical damage and wear and tear that can occur in a 30 minute fight. I mean, some of these fights between two elite super-conditioned athletes are akin to ordinary guys slugging each other with baseball bats for half an hour.

Even in sports like Tennis and distance running you'll have guys needing to lay in baths of ice or resting up for a fortnight after a real maximum effort tournament or race. And their shelf life is short.
Boxing is just as strenous, and more so, and the training regime before a fight is severe, the peak of conditioning is extreme PLUS the sport involves taking hard punches from men who are the best in the world at delivering hard punches.

Sit ringside and witness what these guys are doing to each other. The physical aspect is serious.
There's only so much effort an elite athlete can put out without coming to a point where his body starts going backwards.

As for the loss of punch resistance, there can be many factors, eg. lifestyle changes, conditioning etc.
But I think having a "good chin" or the "ability to take a punch" is often largely a matter of being relaxed and rolling with the punch, taking the sting out, actively absorbing the weight of the blow. Even when a shot looks "flush" it's often seen, felt and absorbed and diminished by the fighter who's receiving it. As they say, it's the one you never see at all that KOs you.
So, I think a fighter can lose that skill to relax and absorb a punch simply because he's developed tension and anxiety stemming from the KO or beating. That's mental, IMO, but I'm no expert.

 

But, you're a keen observer 'n write well, U.