How our forum compares eras

But it was a tough era.

 

Sometimes when the Champ beats the chite out of you like Louis & The Rock did, the challengers are not so anxious to jump in the ring with them.

 

Fight fixing makes things much harder to evaluate, but there's no reason an ATG couldn't choose to be involved in fixed fights to make money, and lesser fighters could be more honest (especially from legal pressure from the authorities.

The other issue is determining what actually are fixed fights. I've read about a few listed as fixes, and a lot of the time, I'm not convinced they are from the evidence I've seen.

Corbett-McCoy, a lot of that just seems to be their wives (who hated them) stirring up ****
Hall-Slavin, Slavin just turned up drunk and took a beating before being KOed
I even have some doubts about Meggs-Stevens, the OG fixed fight.

 

It should be part of the process, but there is a lot of issues with it. The quality of opponent really effects how fighters look. Like take Eubank Jr Vs a part timer, and compare it to him Vs George Groves. The changing camera tech for sure biases it.

I think there's probably a trend there. It's funny though that the Black Period in the 1700's, possibly the worst in boxing history, doesn't seem to have had a clear top dog at all.

I do fear there may be a danger of circularity to this reasoning. People see the era as stronger because the title changes hands, so people conclude that stronger eras involve the titles changing hands. Like if Ali wasn't dimminished, would he have lost the titles in the 70's?

Remember though, Schemling won the title in 1930, Louis won it in 1937 (yes I looked that up), so it's a reasonable length of time.

Or contemporary reports calling the top fighters poor. Though it has to be seen consistantly, not just the odd reporter who thinks that, or certain top fighters looking bad.

Hmm. . . .
This is initially one I agreed with the most, but even that I think has a lot of caveats.
I certainly think the top guys that come out from this deserve to be rated higher as they are more prooven, but really it's more about the politics and match making than the fighters themselves.

Frequent fights can also be caused by not getting as much money per fight, but that also means less incentives to try and be the best boxer.

Not trying to **** on anyone, or be smug to be clear. Because I have nothing better. I think it's just really hard.

 

I don't believe in evaluating an era based on one criterion alone, but if forced to choose I'd say it's how good its best practitioners look on film. By that I mean how smooth and coordinated did they look, what sort of moves were they pulling off in the ring, how much speed and power were they able to generate, how easily were they able to beat the fighters below them, and so on.

You could argue a lot of that is subjective, and much of it is. But honestly, if someone can look at Tony Galento and think that he's anywhere near the standards for a top heavyweight in a later era they have clear problems with perception and understanding.

 

A lot of people here were picking Ortiz over Wilder for that reason.

 

For CT. This one rarely applies, but I think a fairly sure sign of a weak era, is if a lack of skill in the top fighters is consistently being reported.

I think the consistancy is key, because you get freaks in all eras who succeed despite being ugly, and people who just want to talk people down. That it's being reported by contemporaries also means it's not just from changes in technique, or poor quality video.

 

Another is past it guys from previous eras still being top fighters. But again you get freaks so it has to be a trend.

While you see more longevity now, I don't think that's the result of it being weaker, just fighting less often, shorter fights, and fighting at the top level at a later age. So that's another complexity.