How well would the Heavyweight "Oafs" do today?

Tyson Fury, not Mike Tyson...

 

Even so your assumption was fairly precarious. Eve the Fury of right now would stand an ok chance at the very worst against Buddy ... and it is likely he is yet to reach his prime.

 

A fair number. But he probably fixed as many fights to lose too, which might explain some of his lackluster performances. He wouldn't be the only one. Joe Gans and Jack Johnson were said to throw matches. And I don't know but Sam Langford might have too as often as you hear about him "fighting with cuffs on." Jake LaMotta confessed to throwing a fight for the mafia. Liston probably hit the canvas for them in his second fight with Ali, etc.

 

Gotcha!

Fair enough. I really despised Fury when he came on the scene but he's shown me a few things lately… some real talent, punch selection, understanding of the game and b@lls. However, sometimes he's far too cokky and a cool pro will come along and check him. I can see him getting destroyed under the right circumstances.

Still, an exciting fighter. Let's have his career play out a few more years before deciding either way.

Is it mother****ing possible to get goddamned rid of the ****ing ****ty nanny restrictions on certain words… or worse yet parts of bigger, more important words. Christ ****ing Sakes.

 

Buddy Baer was pretty good. Didn't have his brother's charisma, but was probably a better fighter.

 

Size is one advantage, yet as noted more so, or at all after a certain point/dimensions, with modern rules, equipment, & 12 rounds.

But the proportional comparisons to much lighter fighting weights do not hold water.
Because there are diminishing returns after a certain point.
For example, being exceedingly muscular, like anything near a Ronie Coleman, under 6' & 300 lbs. at minimal body fat would be a disadvantage to being just pretty heavily muscled.

Whether the size, reach, power...Is an advantage, or by how much, depends also on what you may lose-at least compered to your opponents-in speed, workrate, & endurance.

 

I believe they could spring an upset. Why not? The super heavyweight style of tempo presents upset opportunism. Naturally you would still have to give the edge to a Lewis or a Klit four times out of five though.

I think today's pace would really suit the so called Oafs. Unless some of them got even bigger, then that could become some what counter productive. A big guy training within a career based on the pace and speed of smaller guys, often punching down, restricting leverage would proberbly relish facing a slower pace equally sized guy for a change.

There is less room for error using the lethal gloves and outlawed tape used in past era's too. Much of the so called clumsy and uncoordinated behaviour of the Oafs can be blamed upon the restrictions of facing fast (and harder punching) men with smaller gloves. But these guys fought often. They knew how to fight.

 

I hope people aren't serious when they suggest Tyson Fury is less of an "oaf" than Buddy Baer.

Personally, I have nothing against "oafs" in the heavyweight ranks. Sometimes big, awkward and ugly gets the job done.
But if people are seriously trying to persuade themselves that Fury is some sort of modern-refined improvement on old school oafery, that's a shame.
I haven't seen much of Buddy Baer but he doesn't look as clumsy and awkward as Fury from what I've seen.

 

The other question is why would you lump these fighters together in the first place?

They have very different attributes as fighters, and very different resumes.

Primo Carnera was very good technically, but didn't give or take a punch well for a man his size. He has a deep resume, to the extent that he would have stood out among the other contenders, even if he had never held the title.

Buddy Baer was a devastating puncher, and perhaps a good finisher as well. He was quite good technically, but didn't really make good use of his size. He was a good contender, with a brief tenure near the top.

Abe Simon was not very good technically, and perhaps not quite at the level of Baer as a contender. His success was largely down to the fact that he could both give and take a punch very well.

 

Fury would not be one of Wlad's top 10 wins, but he would not be among the worst 5 he's given title shots to either.

I agree he gets stopped early. I'd like to see Wlad fight Fury or Wilder next. There are quite a few delusional fans in the USA or UK that think their countryman would have a shot.

 

:good All of those mentioned, anyway.

 

Yes I agree the Oafs of yesterday are as good as the oafs today, Like I said Lewis and the Klitschko's are a class above but not unbeatable in fact they all lost to smaller men but a class above. The Oafs of yesterday would be trouble for the Thompson's and the Fury's and the Valuev's etc. and do well in the weak division today and may get a title in the 80's

 

Okay, so you did for the record mistake that as me talking about Buddy vs. Mike - good we've cleared that up. I don't want anybody misconstruing what you thought you read as my opinion. :yep

(though Buddy did pack a wallop and knock down Louis, so maybe in with a Tokyo or latter-day Mike... who knows if he might not have a puncher's chance :think - but yeah, on the whole, 9 times outta 10 my choice is the sensible one: Kid Dynamite was just levels above either Baer bro...)

I've seen the same improvements, but just find myself less than overwhelmingly impressed with them. I mean, okay, you can box cute and tall against the most lethargic & uninspired version of Chisora ever seen in the ring. Okay, you can impose your size on moderately skilled European-level natural heavyweights like Hammer, and more skilled but naturally smaller guys like blown-up cruiser USS Cunningham, but he is yet to show me that his transformations really place him up there with the elite. He may indeed by near the division's top just by way of how shallow a talent pool there is, but I still think he is on the wrong side of a huge gulf with the likes of Klitschko & Povetkin on the other side, and probably well beyond his eventual reach.

I agree he is a brutal humbling waiting to happen.

Yeah, but the writing seems to be on the wall IMO (and yours, going by the above).

...and he isn't always exciting (see: Chisora II, Hammer), but there is always that drama of whether his flaws are going to dovetail with his incremental steps up in class and catch up with him. I don't want to miss that moment when he gets put in his place, so I'll keep tuning in for sure. :yep

Yeah, that bugs me too. :verysad

No sign of the admins letting up on it, though.

 

the thing with carnera is this: he got a championship fight with sharkey. sharkey was known to be flakey. the film shows sharkey's head almost turning around like an owl before he falls like a tree (a pretty safe assumption he was asleep). he never commented on what happened the rest of his life.

this leads me, as an acknowledged know nothing but very sure of his opinion when he gathers a lot of information that:

primo carnera whatever his quality, caught jack sharkey the heavyweight champion and knocked his ass out. he won clean when it counted. if sharkey threw it, he would've said something. he didn't because he was probably so embarrassed by it he couldn't bring himself to terms over it.