Sick and Tired of the Nostalgia for Past Era Fighters

Anyway, the general idea is correct.

Boxing fans ought to discuss past fighters where it belongs: The Classic forum.

The way most done on about them is kind of sad. Yeah, these guys were great. Move on FFs.

 

of course when comparing simply past vs present its no comparison. but when looking at past fighters you need to take into account the difference in era. in nutrition and training. technology. when comparing past vs present you need to take all of that into account and look at what they achieved in their era. And also imagine if those fighters with that talent and heart fought in todays era with todays conditioning and training.

Thats why this past vs present h2h is so subjective. whos to say for example that wlad would have been able to compete in the 70's with how boxing was back then? if we all looked at past vs present h2h like you say, lennox lewis should be the greatest of all time? wlad should be top 3 all time? but even yourself will admit thats not the case.

i see what your saying that a lot of posters, including myself admittedly, get nostalgic when comparing past vs present fighters and maybe we do give past fighters more credit than they should. But thats always the case with everything. athletes are more appreciated once they go. Lennox Lewis classic example. loads of hate and scepticism when he was around. now that hes gone you could argue hes OVERRATED! Thats just the way it goes.

i also think your comparison in athletics isnt quite right. two totally different sports.

Dont worry fighters of today WILL get their dues once they retire :good

then in 20 years time when a heavyweight is on top, most will say ''what are you on about? wlad would have killed him''

 

I know. I just find it sad.

 

Those 3 attributes are great to have in boxing...but that doesn't mean anything if you can't use it against the best (no fault of their own), or couldn't step up against an Ali, etc when needed.

The guys in the past have already proven they can mix it in an ATG era and division...have the Heavyweights today proven that, including the Klitschko's? They have the size, etc...but could they up their game (they would definitely need to) to compete against the ATG's of the division...

 

OP is right. Active fighters aren't given the credit they deserve. Half this forum sounds like Bert Sugar clones who over praise retired fighters.

 

on the other hand i feel a lot of younger posters have an incredible bias towards new gen fighters. thats all well and good but you should have some sort of understanding and knowledge and appreciation for fighters of the past. especially ring legends.

 

If Wlad was from the 1920s... he would be bigger than Jesus, Mo and Star Trek put together.

 

Food is food, it has not changed much, unless you mean better "nutrition" wink wink nudge nudge... (for those of you who are dense, I refer to steroids and peds)
Lets see what today's better nutrition results in [insert photo of James Toney and Chris Arreola]


Now, I agree about Wlad beating Fraizer. I think hes too big, and if he's allowed to hold excessively like he does, there is nothing a small slugger like Fraizer can do about it. But to say that boxers of today are summarily better based nutrition and science leaves out some things...
Older fighters fought more often. There was more competition. Thus more experience.
A smaller heavyweight can still knockout a bigger one. All the modern nutrition and training... But you still can't put muscles on a chin. Lamon Brewster is not all that massive (and let's be honest, not all that skilled or even very good either) and he chopped down the big man.

So I agree with half of what you say. Training and athletes have improved. But boxing has not improved due to the changing nature of the sport. There is less competition, Olympics are no longer a good training ground, because they changed the system so much. today, at heavyweight there is a greater emphasis on brute force over skill or stamina. And, the frequency at which boxers fight as compared to yesteryear leaves them less conditioned and less experienced then their past counterparts.

The fact that near-40 year olds who make up a good chunk of the contenders at heavyweight is a good indicator that the heavyweights of today are not optimum level performers.

 

:good

 

This implies that athletes always get better. I don't buy that, I don't buy that at all. Take baseball pitchers, for example. Most of today's pampered stars couldn't pitch a complete game if their life depended on it.

So too it is in boxing. I'd love to see today's fighters having to compete in 15 - let alone 20 or 25 - round fights, or fighting 3-4 times a MONTH!

 

yea but those things you mentioned are not related to boxing at all? its like saying boxers of the past would just spend all day watching HD tv they wouldn't be bothered to fight!

im talking strictly about boxing. the training camp and the fight.

The science of training and nutrition and technology today makes it much easier for fighters to perfectly condition themselves and prepare for their bouts. And they are taking full advantage of it. When comparing past and present i look at skill sets and raw talents they possess. And compare how they did against fighters in their time with similar styles. also the work they put in back then and imagine if they put that effort into todays game how would they do?

I try to be as objective as possible when making these comparisons. Thats why i dont really agree with comparing past vs present too much because like you say they are two totally different games. We shouldnt give past fighters too much credit i guess. But then we shouldn't overrate todays fighters either. should be a balance in between. Fact is we have no idea how frazier would do today or how wlad would have done back then. Thats why its mostly guess work. And its unfair to simply say todays athletes are fitter better built etc hence past fighters would have no chance. you see my point?

 

So using this theory, Lewis, Vitali and Wlad are all clearly better than the ATG's at Heavyweight?

 

We would all be happy if the old school mentality was injected into the fighers of today somehow, you know why? Because we would see some ****ing wars. You can eat all the protein you want but toughness, chin, heart and the gift of having no fear is something you're born with. There would be no Whitaker,Mayweather without Willie Pep's blueprint. Just like there would be no Kobe Bryant without Michael Jordan, every kid grew up to be like Mike, and Kobe has done the best job at it.