More Important? Height or Reach?

when i first read your quote i misread it as Roach, but both important lol

 

Not weight, height or reach has greater independent corrolation to power/chin and ultimate success than circumference of the wrist....check the study/paper by Lucero in BadLeftHook site.

 

I'm so surprised at people picking reach. I used to think reach as well, but height does a lot of things for you, even if you don't properly use it, whereas reach is something that has few advantages without the skills for outside fighting. For a shorter fighter, having to punch up at an angle is always an inconvenience, takes away power, and makes you more vulnerable to body shots or over-reaching than it would fighting a same-height longer-reached fighter. You can have shorter arms as a tall fighter, but you still have the advantage of being to pivot into punches at shoulder level without any extra effort, while the opposite is true for your opponent, due to the angle. Not to mention using size and height as a way to control the pace itself.

 

Neither one ifya can't fight.

 

It can sometimes depend. A guy 7 feet tall will have an advantage over a guy 6 feet tall even if their reach is the same.

95% of the time though, the answer is reach. It's to get a size difference as drastic as the one I mentioned, and otherwise having a few extra inches of reach can have a big effect on the course of a fight and how it has to be approached.

 

Is this with or without WWF rules being allowed?

 

I think more guys have utilized height to win a fight than reach. Lots of guys with decent reach have come up short. Hasim Rahman, I believe, has a pretty long reach, but I think against Vlad K. for example, he'd of been better off with height. I think the defensive benefits of height outweigh the offensive benefits of reach most of the time. Think of the wrecking machine Earnie Shavers would've been if he was 6'3"...I think it would've made a difference for him. When you're short you're constantly having to protect your head, and short guys inevitably have a lot of shots bouncing off their skulls.

 

Reach of course... people here seem to forget that almost all tall boxers also have reach, and wouldn't be nearly as effective if they didn't.
If you're tall but have short arms, you still have to get close to your opponent and then height suddenly isn't a big factor anymore.

And do people here think it's a coincidence that a lot of the ATG's had a big/huge reach for their size?! :think

 

This is true, they both go hand in hand, but look at fighters like Corrales and Margarito; even though they had reach, they barely used it, and their height made it simple for them to hit a target, but harder for most opponents to deal with the imposition of that height as well as consistently target it without a high level of exposure. Even on the inside, height made it difficult for their opponents to effectively tag fighters with average defenses.

Then you have guys like Yuri Foreman. Even though Cotto was able to cut off the ring and beat Foreman with basically a jab and a right hand (up until the injury), Yuri's height still made it a task for Cotto to locate the target without getting hit from up above a guy with a good height advantage. Cotto's superior skills won out the day, but when Foreman flurried (and Cotto effectively covered up), it was much easier for him stylistically than it was for Cotto to hit and not get hit. Again, Cotto's timing and skill won him the rounds, but his task gave him the role of the one who had to work a bit to get some offense going.

All of this despite the fact that Cotto had half an inch on Yuri in arm length.

 

Many people thought that Ronald Hearns was the same as his dad Thomas Hearns, yet Ronald has I think a 73 inch reach and his father had a 78 inch reach. Big difference. Leonard had a longer reach than Ronald who is 6-3 and his dad is 6-1, yet Tommy has more advantages and speed obviously. If Ronald had a 78 inch reach it still would not matter that much since he has not learned how to use his jab the way he should. I like Ronald but he needed more seasoning before going to the title fight picture. I hope he fights a few no names guys and gets more seasoning and maybe he can be a champion after getting experience. I am still a Ronald fan. I know I went off on another subject, but reach is more important. Having both is great since the taller guy has to be reached for.

 

I agree with this. I no idea what the guy on the previous page was talking about how punching up is an advantage.

 

Reach and height are part of the same total package.

If the same size and both launch at the same time the man with 1/2 an inch more reach lands first taking 60-70% of the sting off.
If a full inch jump that 10% or more.

Height means the other man has to reach that inch, or three more up to put the power on. and if the guy is taller mostly he has a bigger reach.

 

just imagine T-REX vs. Dhalsim in boxing rules. Trex wouldn't even land a single punch

 

If you think about the biomechanics of a punch it is definitely preferable to punch up rather than down, the transfer and leverage is far greater for someone punching up. Punching down breaks the chain of energy.
Stats such as height and reach are made far too big of a deal about in boxing, they mean very little. It's about skills and timing.

 

Reach, height just makes you a bigger target area.