Never looked into this and honestly do not know. For me, I just thought it as 1980 being the year of the transition.. or Fighters doing the majority of their work pre and post 1980, educate me please, your thoughts?
I think the invention of Television was impactful. The fight clubs started to die off. The generation that came up during this was affected bit it may have been gradual. I look at the 1940s being the peak of the old school. They were the greatest fighters we ever had.
I’d say cutting championship fights from 15 down to 12 rounds, day before weigh-ins and no longer fighting outdoors would be the ultimate lines of demarcation. Didn’t all of the above take place in the mid 80s?
Good input so far .. Given my age I didn't start watching/following boxing till around '79 '80 .. so I had to go back and read, see film, read reports, discuss and what not .. It seemed to me there were so many great fighters in the 70's and obviously before, and going 15 + rounds.. that I missed what boxing was really about given that overall Activity in boxer's careers really started to tapper off in the 80's and even more so now
Also in the late 80s, we had the collapse of the old Russian "Empire"... gradually resulting in a huge influx of pro boxers from eastern Europe, making the sport truly global.
I think it’s about styles. In the 1900-1930 most fighters fought with hands down, low work rate, lots of clinching, not much combination punching. Post 1940 guards rose, fighters started throwing more combinations, higher work rates, less clinching, more jabbing.
This. To my eyes the first guy that I remember seeing and thinking "he's a modern boxer!" was Joe Louis. That's not to say "the old guys" were not effective, but to my eyes they seemed somewhat haphazard in their approach. You could see Louis had a system that he used and that he was technically spotless.
I suspect changes in gloves had something to do with that.You ever seen a 1920's boxing glove? A jab would open you up
Is it possible, that we may be looking at this TV thing all wrong? You know, fans staying home, watching fights on the "tube", rather than actually attending the shows - which resulted in fewer promotions and, as a consequence, the disappearance of most of the local gyms and fight clubs back in the 50s. But wasn't this a strictly American phenomenon? Is there any evidence, that the emergence of TV had the same (adverse) effect in other countries? Or is it the other way around - that TV, over the past several decades, has actually helped popularizing the sport in other parts of the world, making local stars household names? What do you guys think?
I'd probably say mid 80's with Mackie Shilton and others introducing methods from athletics like weight lifting and interval training. Well, those methods had been used in boxing before to some extent, but the success Spinks and Holy had with them gave them a more widespread acceptance. Sports science started to make inroads in boxing because of this, I think, which also effected things like nutrition, supplements etc. Quite possibly the use of PEDs as well.
