I totally agree that Ali-Young and Ali-Norton III are not the outrageous robberies as often portrayed. I see Norton as the winner in his fight by around three points but a lot of the rounds were close - Hardly crime of the century stuff. Ali-Young ? A very messy one. A draw would have sufficed. La Motta was way past his best by the time he fought Sugar the final time,yeah.
LaMotta is getting a bad rap here. He was very highly regarded in his day. Part of the reason he is being considered overrated by some is because the vast majority of film we have of him is from when he was past his prime. He was already burning out when he won the title at 28. His prime was very short because before he even won the title he had been in some wars and was very jaded about the business. He just couldnt really get motivated anymore. That combined with the yo-yo dieting to make weight really hurt him later in his career. If you read what they were saying about him when he was younger, long before he got a shot, he was a lot better. He was compared to Harry Greb in that he was always on top of his guy throwing blizzards of punches, and he was often called the strongest MW in the world and impossible to hurt. By the time he won the title he was much more patient, threw less punches, well, his overall style had slowed down in general. He was still very formidable but he was no longer the monster he once was. I was lucky enough to purchase Joey LaMotta's home movies last year which had several of Jake's early fights on them and this was illustrated in the films. He was an extremely aggressive fighter, winging punches all the time, much quicker and more frenetic. A lot more fun to watch and a lot more impressive than the films we have all seen over and over again of him in the 1950s. Now, all of that being said, with LaMotta being past his prime and weight drained he still did very well against Robinson over the first half of the fight and was actually beating Robinson in a war of jabs. He faded late though and Robinson took over and never looked back.
I agree Hearns WAS NOT, a great Middleweight, he got knocked cold in his biggest fight at 160- and didn't have the chin and legs to make. A big impact on that division...
i doubt performance enhancing drugs are any more common now than 30 years ago, a lot more stuff is illegal now though. diuretics have been available for making weight since the dawn of weight limits. The best soccer team in medieval england was called corinthians, when they conceded a penalty kick the keeper would just lean on the post and let the opposition score. It's great, but why where they fouling in the first place if they were so sporting? because deep down they wanted to win. why where they the best team in the country? same answer. and that was amateur sport, how much would it have taken for them to be proffesional and save the kick? a few million? I don't see that there can be a ruining of the game, its either gone a long, long time ago to low blows, 'bad' decisions, cuffs, dives, the steroid era, what not and ect, or it is eternal.
I'm not saying he wasn't a very good fighter and one of the best MWs of his era. But when I see him ranked among the best MWs ever, I think that's over the top.
Interesting. I view LaMotta in distain for throwing a fight ( Can be seen on film ), and having a dubious win over Cerdan by throwing him down, which dislocated Cerdans arm. Cerdan died before there could be a re-match. In his second title defense at middleweight, LaMotta was well behind a mediocre Dauthuille, and suddenly came through late to stop him with 13 seconds to go in the fight! A dramatic ending for sure, but LaMottata was in his prime here, and should have won easily as Dauthille has a lot of losses and had never been past ten rounds. In their first meeting in 1949 Dauthuille won easy in ten rounds. Jake was not much of a puncher. He was more of an attrition guy who worked the body, and was game.
The 1970's were not the Ali Era. If there had been less favoritism, we would have seen not only Ali, Foreman, and Frazier winning the lineal title, but Norton, Holmes and Shavers as well, maybe even Lyle or Young. The heavyweights were sort of like the AFC North this year in the NFL. Each man had a person who was his kryptonite and that he would perhaps never truly beat. It was the greatest example of 'styles make fights' ever and not 'dominated' by one man as we so often hear. Marvin Hagler accomplished more than Ray Leonard, taking on all comers and never once cherry picking or winning controversially. Size should be a factor in assessing a fighter's greatness. What I mean is that Floyd Patterson spent a long career fighting successfully against bigger men. Manny Pacquiao, too. Duran did the same for much of his career as well. It takes greatness to do that. I'd probably pick Pernell Whitaker over any lightweight in history, head to head. Hector Camacho is underrated. In time, Vlad Klitschko will go down as a Top 5 heavy, probably top 3, and maybe even number 1. And I"m not a fan. The guys who troubled Ali in his second reign would have been dominated by Vlad.
There is no footage of the Fox fight. There was nothing dubious about his win over Cerdan. Cerdan was a WW who came into the division and unjustly got a title chance at a totally shot Zale by leapfrogging Jake (they were supposed to meet in early 1947 and Cerdan's people avoided that fight like the plague). Jake should have had that shot years earlier and if he had gotten it nobody would have ever heard of Cerdan. As it was he was already past his best days when he got the shot at Cerdan. Maybe you could say the same about Cerdan but really who did Cerdan ever fight for us to judge that? He didnt start meeting world class fighters until he was 30 and had been fighting for 8 years. Even then he has only a handful of fights against world class opposition. Cerdan himself stated immediately after the fight that he injured his shoulder throwing a left hook just before he fell, not from the fall. That story came out later and guess why? It sounds a lot better that he injured his arm controversially than by legitimately. Either way it wasnt a foul when he fell and wasnt called as such (this can clearly be seen on the film). It was a combination punch, push, slip. Nevermind that LaMotta himself was fighting with a broken hand that was swollen twice its normal size when they cut the gloves off him. The bottom line is that fight was always going to be a rough fight and the delicate Frenchman, who was injury prone througout his career, was not made to stand in against a strong guy like LaMotta. Alan Rosenfeld, who wrote the book on Charlie Burley and was ringside for that fight, stated that Cerdan wouldnt have beaten LaMotta injury or no. When people like Nat Fleischer, who was totally in the hip pocket of the American promoters who represented Cerdan in the USA and who was largely responsible for garnering him the publicity he initially recieved here, stated that Cerdan would have won without the injury. Nevermind that LaMotta was beating the holy hell out of Cerdan before he injured his shoulder. Its funny you bring up Dauthille for two reasons: 1. The fact that LaMotta lost a non title bout to him before winning the championship illustrates how Jake was slipping at this point and wasnt as dedicated. He beat Dauthille when it mattered but 2. and more importantly ever wonder why Cerdan never fought Villemain and Dauthille? Maybe its because he struggled so much with the Belgian Cyrille Dellanoit, losing one and winning only by a whisker in the other. Dellanoit was basically on the same level as Villemain and Dauthille and its likely that in a series with those guys Cerdan doesnt come away undefeated. So I wouldnt go criticizing a burning out LaMotta for a subpar performance against Dauthille (which many thought he underperformed in order to get a give Cerdan a false sense of security and have an easier time getting a title shot) when Cerdan wouldnt even fight the guy. Its not like Cerdan was unbeatable. The guy looked vulnerable against Abrams, Williams, Raadik, and Dellanoit and those guys were four of the best MWs he faced and three of them were past their prime. LaMotta may not have been a knocker out but he was a terrific bodypuncher. One of the best ever.
JC Chavez would have beaten ODH in the first fight had not been for the cut that opened up on Chavez early ( a cut he received in sparring that had not healed) Chavez was just finding his range when the fight was stopped, he as usual was starting slow, but WAS coming on and started landing. Chavez won a great many fights in the late rounds, and ODH gasses. Chavez would have gotten to ODH late.
There is no honor to cheating, & the Will to Win regardless of whether you DESERVE the win or could get it honestly is not admirable. It is a betrayal of fair sporting competition & renders meaningless fan assessment who WAS better.
Whist I don't think it is the best of all possible worlds, I do think that it is a good thing that boxers don't have 300 fights anymore, that you can get a titleshot regardless of skincoulor and that the champ can't take three years of. All this yearning for the dark old days is a bit odd I think.
1. LaMotta was a legit hall-of-famer. Both he and SRR were about 30 at the time of the last fight. 2. How do you know Burley was overrated? he only has one tape. 3. Neither Young nor Norton "pressed" the fight, but Ali was totally done by that point and should have one both. 4. Hearns was a great middleweight. Top 10-15. NO other middleweight in history would have an easy time with Hearns. 5. Haven't watched the fight recently. 6. Pretty obivious. I actually gave Ali the first fight. 7. True, but untrue. The thing that progresses fighters is nutrition/steroids. Fighters were "better" 50 years ago in terms of skills boxing was once a sport on par with baseball and football in America in terms of popularity. Boxing was THE sport for the best athletes at one time, for instance; when Ali fought Frazier the first time, they made $2m each, whereas Wilt Chamberlin and Bill Russell made about $100,000, and NFL QBs made about $50,000.
- This boxing progresses **** is a lie. - Otherwise i don't care your opinion at all. This is yours and unimportant.
Yeah, I dont get that either! What was so good about the days when boxers, to make a living, had to fight every other week or so? I just dont see it... and the idea that such a crazy schedule actually created better boxers than today is ludicrous!