prime armstrong vs ike williams...

Armstrong with his nonstop action does indeed make it a war, and a close one. However, I feel Henry's style is made for Ike Williams. Armstrong makes Ike work hard, but the cumulative effect of Ike's slashing punches results in Henry being extremely hurt at fight's end. Williams by late TKO.

 

i don't think williams is over rated as a puncher but i wouldn't pick him as an overwhelming favourite either

 

Good post, McGrain. While I agree with your points regarding Armstrong's particular strengths, it still always appears that Ike did his best work against this style of fighter. Wait for them to charge in, effectively creating more force for his own blows with their forward momentum, and taking them apart with short, jolting, accurate punches. And when he had his man hurt, he posessed some of the finest finishing skills of all time.

However, there's still more to it than that. For one, Armstrong wasn't an easy catch, least of all in combination. His bob and weave was second to none, and he combined this with very awkward punching rhythms and angles. You had to simultaneously be on your guard defensively while attempting to seek out perfect punching opportunities against a perpetual motion machine. Now, if your chin and punching power are strong enough/the opponent's abilities in those regards weak enough, this shouldn't be much of a problem for more than a couple of rounds. Therein lies the problem for Ike. Hank's durability and punching power were both very strong, and his stamina in particular knew no boundaries. Ike's durability wasn't quite up to par, and for that reason I feel he's the more likely of the two to be ground down in this matchup eventually, because Armstrong was just unrelenting. He'd be in Ike's face showing the same disdain every minute of every round, taking most of his best stuff, but not as often as Ike may've managed against lesser swarmers like Beau Jack.

What it all comes down to in the end for me is Hank's ability to take a licking and keep on ticking, and Ike's lack thereof, comparatively speaking of course. I'll go with Armstrong by late stoppage circa round 12, even if the styles may look to favor Ike on the surface.

 

His KO percentage is surely misleading, though. One of the follies of his often too reserved style against the wrong sort of opponent, in my opinion. Although I'd agree he wasn't one of the special one-punch knockout artists. He was a great composite puncher, though, as you might say.

 

Nope. I think they're about on par with each other, personally. If anything, Armstrong is often underrated as a pure puncher, as people see him almost strictly as the attrition-based, ground-you-down type. Granted, that does seem to be the impression we get on the majority of the footage, but his black-out punch seemed to deliver results every bit as well if not better than any particular punch of Ike's. His vast amount of early rounds KO's are a testament to this, although not exclusively to that punch.

 

i'm a fan of his

 

what do you mean ??
i'm a fan of his means i like him, i also think he'e up there with duran and the rest, whoever they are

 

he was beautiful left hooker.typical of the late 40's box-fighters

 

I don't see any evidence of Armstrong being a devastating puncher LW and above, I'm not an expert but he looks a solid but far from brutal puncher, more quantity over quality as far as I can see

SUrely you're aware he wore the cuffs numerous times, throwing fights and carrying opponents. The footage of Williams at his best looks pretty brutal

Pressuring Ike Williams with short not so brutal punches seems like suicide, almost a Foreman-Frazier scenario. Putting a puncher on the back foot can be a good strategy as can not giving him space, but getting in close to a precision banger is dangerous. I don't think Armstrong has faced anyway who was such a stylistic nightmare of this quality, bar Robinson who supposedly carried him

PS I've just remembered our Louis-Toney debate needs attending to, I shall get back to that this evening