Joe Louis in today's heavyweight picture

Widdow- In the 40's most if not all boxing trainers felt that lifting weights were not of any use to there fighters, infact most felt it slowed there fighter down, Angelo Dundee still feels this way to this day. I'm sure you know more than I do about this, but didnt Vitali get caught taking steroids or something? If thats the case, I'm sure both brothers probably gave each other shots up the ass(no pun intended), in baseball the Giambi brothers took steroids to together, I wonder if it's the same way with the Klit brothers?

 

Do you really think this sort of post deserves a response? I don't, but of course I will take the time so the truth can be told.

Vitali was given a steroid back in his amateur days for a serious leg injury. His doctor prescribed him a medical steroid for the injury to heal. Vitali told the board about this before the Olympics, which is why he wasn't allowed fighting in the Olympics. Vitali wasn't sure what the banned substances list was for Olympics and he found out that he wasn't allowed to fight with that in his system. It was a medical steroid for an injury. Vitali never pumped performance enhancing drugs or anabolic steroids up his ass for his physique, and neither did Wlad. The entire Ukrainian boxing team was tested randomly all of the time... and they were always clean... just as they are always clean today. On one of the random tests, the medical steroid that Vitali was prescribed came up in his test. That is when they found out that even though itw as a medical steroid for the injury, that it wasn't allowed being in his system for the Olympics. Had Wlad been on steroids, his random test would have shown it a well. Saying that they "gave each other shots up the ass"... man you are a better poster than this, aren't you?

 

It was more of a joke than anything Widdow, but I was always curious about Vitali and the whole steroid issue, I appreciate you taking the time out and explaining it to me, I honestly didnt know the whole story.:good

As I said in my previous post, weight lifting in the 30s and 40s wasnt even a big deal for the general public, let alone elite fighters, like it is now. Weight lifting didnt really gain it's popularity until the late 70's, with movies like "Pumping Iron", which featured body building legend Arnold Schwarzenegger(spell check), and carried into the 80's when steroids were the norm for alot of athletes and the public alike.

 

That's all well and good. It also has nothing to do with this discussion. First off... pretending like we can morph Joe Louis into a "modern body"... or Wlad into a "body from the past" is just nonsense. Wlad doesn't even do much weight training anymore, as he Manny has him sparring over 100 rounds for his fights. Weight lifting was plenty popular in the 1930's as well... look it up. I am sure Wlad does some strength training, and so did people form the past.

If we are going to be silly enough to talk about a fantasy match-up here... let's at least take these fighters for who they are. Let's take Wlad for the prime Wlad that we see today. Let's take Louis for the prime Louis that he was. It is just ridiculous to try and make Wlad smaller and Louis bigger, ect... makes no sense whatsoever. Once you start changing who a person is... then you are no longer talking about the same person.


As I already stated Primo Carnera was huge back then. It isn't like people HAVE to have today's modern science to be big. Did you hear what Conan O'brien was saying when Wlad was on his show? He was amazed at how huge Wlad's hands were to his. O'rien himself is 6'4". Wlad is just a big guy, simple as that.

 

Most, if not all fighters didnt lift weights back in the 30's and 40's, and the general public didnt as well, it only really became popular in the late 70's, early 80's. In the 40s we didnt have malls and other sports stores like we do now, if you wanted something like a weight bench or that, you ordered from a catalogue, more and likely sears.

You cant tell me technology and overall knowledge hasnt improved over the last 60, to 70 years, we know alot more about training methods and nutrition, who's to say Louis couldnt gain 25-30 pounds through weight lifting, HGH, and a good nutritionalist? I certainly believe he can, and I use Holyfield as a perfect of this, he fought at lighter weights through most of his career, and with the help of world renown body builder Lee Haney and some HGH, he was able to gain the weight in muscle, which allowed him to be ATG in the Heavyweight division and beat and be competitive with alot of big Heavyweights.

 

You obviously missed my first paragraph. I don't care about any of that. I deal with reality. Joe Louis was Joe Louis, and Wladimir Klitschko is Wladimir Klitschko. Creating different versions of either fighter is completely worthless. If you change the make-up of the fighter, than you change the individual in question. We would no longer be talking about Klitschko or Louis... we would be talking about fictional characters.

 

Well at 6'1 and half, 6'2 is almost the same height as Holyfield, and the fact that Holyfield fought a good portion of his career well under 200, but when Lee Haney, HGH, and other things came into the picture, he was able to get up to 215 and be at around 6 or 7% body fat, and actually improve his craft, who's to say a similiar sized Louis cant do the same and be able to benefit from the modern day technology we have now? I think you know it's possible, but refuse to acknowledge it for whatever reason.

 

Fantasy fights are fictional, they are not reality. People on average have been getting bigger and taller over the last 60 years. If Louis fights Wlad in the 1940's, he's not as tall or big, if Louis fights in the 2000's, he's taller and bigger.

Even if you do not accept this, will you accept that if Louis & Wlad fight in this era, would you give Louis 6 months to a year to apply any modern training methods and nutrition? Would you let Louis study film of Wlad, even though Vlad has probably watched all of Louis's fights numerous times? Or do these guys just drop out of the sky into a ring?

 

By the same token you have to apreciate the diference between actual acomplishments in the ring and fantasy fight acomplishments.

Louis has proved everything.

Klitschko still has a lot left to prove.

You can debate how the fight would unfold untill the cows come home but in terms of what each fighter has shown they can do Louis is far ahead.

Wlad is snapping on the heels of Jersey Joe Walcott and Max Schmeling right now in terms of historical greatness.

 

Widdow- Keep ducking mine and others questions, it just proves you have no answer and cant win an arguement, just admit Louis could easily gain 20-25 pounds in muscle with todays advancements in nutrition and drugs, if a similiar sized Holyfield could do it, why cant Louis?

 

Athletes have been getting bigger, faster, and stronger over the years. People on average have not. Joe Louis would still be Joe Louis. He would still have the same parents right? Or are we giving him different parents, and a different genetic structure too? If Joe Louis was bigger and taller, he wouldn't be Joe Louis anymore... and he would have a different set of attributes. Joe Louis was bigger back then, than the average man is today. So, there is no reason to believe that he would be even bigger today. Humans are humans... and evolution of that magnitude takes millions of years. 60 years isn't going to make someone inches taller. Technology has made fighters better athletes... but that is how the cookie crumbles. For all we know Joe Louis wouldn't be able to bulk up. For all we know if he weighs 225-230 like people are saying, his body couldn't handle it. All people are different and we can't just assume that Joe Louis would keep all of his attributes if he gained 30 pounds.



So once again... there is no use discussing anything along those lines. Fantasy matchups are pointless enough... but if we are going to do them, let's use the actual fighters, not some genetically engineered mutation of a fighter.

 

Alot of studies have proven that the more steroids that have been injected in the meats we bought over the last 50 years, have made humans bigger as a whole, the average American male now is 5'9 and a half, which is up an inch from what it was just 50 years ago. I understand you have your opinion, but there is no denying with the advancement in technology and drugs, Louis couldnt get bigger and stronger than he was during the late 30's and 40's.

 

I am sorry that I have other **** to do with my life, than to make sure I respond every second that one of you guys throws a remark at me in every thread. I have answered the same things over and over. Holyfield isn't Louis so stop comparing them. Louis and Holyfield both matured as they grew older, just like most people do. You act like Holyfield just blew up to be a huge heavyweight or something. Joe Louis started out his career at 181 pounds. His last fight was at 213 pounds. Evander Holyfield started out his career at 177 1/2 pounds and his last fight was at 211 1/2 pounds. They gained almost EXACTLY the same amount of weight throughout their careers. What is your point? MAN, WHAT IS YOUR POINT?!

So, with today's technology ect... ect.. ect... that you keep saying. Evander Holyfield started out the same size as Joe Louis started out and they both ended up about the same size in the end. Holyfield actually being a bit lighter. Well, I guss that blows your argument out of the water.