Jimmy Young:the definition of an enigma

Lack of discipline and desire.

 

Any Jimmy Young fights worth watching? I've never seen any of his fights

 

Watch his Foreman and Norton fights.

 

1) Jimmy fights outside of his natural style. Tries to be the Philly mean-machine which was as far I understand an archetype back then (even now Philly sparring sessions are known for being very taxing, aren't they?) Either way he has potential but fails to actualize it and eventually gets disintegrated by Earnie.

2) Young make adjustments. Gets a winning streak (including a win over Garcia) which culminates in a draw against Earnie, a win over Lyle, and the fiasco against fat as a hog Ali in which he would have gotten the decision had he shown some balls.

3) Young goes on another streak, this time catching Foreman at the right time, once again utterly outhustling Lyle, and losing a razor sharp decision to Norton, later crowned the heavyweight champion of the world after Spinks agreed to rematch Ali.

From that point on his discipline and motivation went downhill. There was a period of time in-between Jimmy being damaged goods and past it, and he was irritatingly beautiful as far as defense goes. A forgotten wizard.

 

Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose sometimes conditionally things happen that aren’t meant to. Jimmy Young beating guys that doesn’t seem “correct” might just be an overestimation of a boxer or merely an underestimation of how beatable a guy might be with the right plan.

 

With better management, both personally within himself & in the form of representation, he probably should have been champion at some stage. & would have been during some of the weaker eras.

 

I respect the fact that Jimmy young was a good fighter. But I didn’t particularly care for his style. He was uninspiring to me personally.

 

Personally, If he’d fought Evander I’d be curious on the outcome.

 

Jimmy Young certainly added some spice to the golden HW era.

 

Lack of a champions mentality.imo

 

Too inconsistent for me to rate him higher than fringe contender at the best.
He had the potential but lacked discipline and perseverance. Young could run hot and cold and you never knew what version of him was going into the ring.

I just don't know what to make of his resume.
- His best win doesn’t rate too high for me: Foreman was burn out and ready to quit, as he actually did.
- Beating Lyle twice is nice, but it was Lyle after all and kinda past prime.
- “Almost” beating a post Thrilla Ali who was damaged goods already and going downhill fast.
- His loss to Norton is viewed as “controversial” for someones, but not for me. It could have gone both ways. It is not like Young was clearly dominating the fight, and you can make a case it was Norton the one who was making most of the action.

 

That’s it, in a nutshell, imo.

I think he only ever held something “approximating” to that mentality during his run of success - feeding off the run itself and its promise of bigger and more lucrative opportunities at each and every next turn - but at every post I think he needed to be a winner

It did seem that Jimmy overplayed the “pity poor me” card when he didn’t get the decisions that he felt he deserved - which might’ve then caused him to drop his bat and ball.

He wasn’t like, say, a Ken Norton who hung tough and stay dedicated despite his own career hiccups.

His effort vs Ali was as appalling as the condition Ali himself came into the fight. If Ali couldn’t have bothered to train, he should’ve gotten out of the game, right then and there himself.

Even when Young fought Foreman, he wined a bit during the fight.

Foreman was the prejudiced villain going in but Young was practicing his own fair share of foul tactics.

Any hint of Foreman fighting dirty in kind and Jimmy was quick to react histrionically.

I also read a revealing SI Vault article on Jimmy in which Young said that he really didn’t like being hit and was fearful of incurring any permanent damage from boxing.

I would question his unconditional drive to win but not his courage at all.

He rematched the fearsome Shavers after all - fought Lyle and Forman too.

Then later, he faced yet another killer puncher in Cooney - when Gerry was knocking down the old guard like ten pins - but not Jimmy.

Despite a horrible cut, Young hung as tough as any man could - and despite being well past his best, Young deserves huge credit for his amazing show of intestinal fortitude in that fight.

He might not have been pleasing to the eye and perhaps too defensively minded for some - but it sure didn’t stop him stepping into the ring with fighters that many other boxers would’ve preferred to (and did) avoid altogether.

And believe it or not, I think Young could whip out a decent punch here and there - he simply wasn’t inclined to throw same for the most part. He clearly hurt Ali and that was still no mean feat, even at that stage of Ali’s career.

Young wasn’t small for that era either. A solid 6’2” and 210-213 when actually in shape.

Appeared to be room there to tone and harden himself up somewhat - always looked a bit soft in the body but his conditioning, as it was for the Foreman fight in extreme heat, could still be very good.

At the very least, I view Young as very much part of the rich fabric of the 1970s HWs.

Sad that he passed away far too early.

 

Jimmy was a riddle inside a mystery wrapped in an enigma.

That’s a lot of layers. No wonder people couldn’t get through them to hit him clean.

 

The most boring fighter of all time possibly. A defensive wizard who was *extremely* gun shy. He had absolutely zero oomph to his shots and at times it looked like the practice of throwing punches was something he greatly despised. Had he developed some decent offensive skills he could have been a lot better, and he would have easily won the close fights he was involved in. He could have been a better version of Chris Byrd, as Young had a better chin and recuperative abilities.