The so called glass jaw...

I personally believe that the so called 'glass jaw' is not only much less prevalent than people think (one knock down or a bad night does not mean you have no punch resistance), but also that I think it is no where near as important as people want to make out.

For example, it is perfectly possible statistically speaking for a 'glass jawed' fighter to win 95% of his fights against top competition and to lose the 5% by unlucky* knockout. A puncher with good punch resistance might win 95% of his fights (by KO some of which might be considered lucky!) but could lose 5% by UD which could be considered unlucky as he was not able to land the winning punch. To me there is very little difference between the two, they are both exciting in their own ways. If getting knocked down or having KO loss was as much a problem as most people make out then we wouldn't have 5 out of the top 10 P4P list who had either been KOed, suffered knockdowns and/or been labelled as a glass jawed. To emphasise the point, these fighters have all been either knocked down early in their career or suffered a (T)KO, but are in the top five (ring ratings) of the world in their respective divisions:

Wladimir Klitschko
Oleg Maskaev
David Haye
Jean Marc Mormeck
O'Neil Bell
Enzo Maccarinelli
Glen Johnson
Anthony Mundine
Kelly Pavlik
Jermaine Taylor
Sebastian Sylvester
Felix Sturm
Cory Spinks
Vernon Forrest
Alex Bunema
Oscar De La Hoya
Winky Wright
Carlos Quintana
Miguel Cotto
Ricky Hatton
Vivian Harris
David Diaz
Jose Santa Cruz
Julio Diaz
Amir Khan (#7 but get so much stick I thought I'd include him)
Manny Pacquiao
Humberto Soto
Jorge Solis
Naoki Matsuda
Isreal Vasquez
Rafael Marquez
Celestino Caballero
Somsak Sithchatchawal
Veeraphol Sahaprom
Silence Mabuza
Jorge Arce
Daisuke Naito
Pongsaklek Wongjongkam
Edgar Sosa
Omar Nino
Daniel Reyes
Eagle Kyowa

...so much for that the glass chin.

(I've probably missed a couple or made a mistake or two but the general point remains)

* - I know that boxing is premiditated but I consider luck or lack of it to simply represent the real world manifestation of probabilities of any parcticular outcome - an unexpected knockout by definition is hard to predict as we cannot estimate the probabilities with any consistancy so I think it is fair enough to call it unlucky. On the other hand, depending on the opponent it would generally not be unexpected to lose to Calzaghe or Floyd by UD so that would not be unlucky in my book.

 

I agree, but more to the point the same would apply to almost everyone on that list. I remember loads of threads popping up (albeit on a different forum) about Cotto's chin after the Torres fight, it hasn't exactly held him back, nor has it for almost everyone on the list above.

 

Ah yes, I forgot about that one! I think with so many examples (and they were only the active fighters!) that it it fairly clear that the chin issue is overplayed and even those who do have problems can often still achieve lots and shouldn't be written off.

(edit: damn it, I've just made myself a gaylord.)

 

Good, then we agree! I think my post might have been a bit long and boring to make the right point but I was just trying to say that all those boxers had suffered bad knockdowns or KOs but were STILL very succesfull. Most people seem too keen to jump on the chin bandwagon when a fighter gets wobbled, but I don't believe it means anywhere near as much as most people would have you believe.

 

I do agree that there must be some degree of chinnyness, I just feel that the vociferous reaction often following a fight were someone didn't take a punch to the face like it hadn't happened at all, is maybe a bit harsh sometimes.

People are too eager to write fighters off, I imagine that following the fights in question for those named above there would have been some keyboard warrior somewhere proclaiming that they would never achieve anything in boxing because they have chin made of the finest china. However I would be interested to know the sum total of world titles they have won!:bbb

Very true! Put poor conditioning and excessive weight loss in there too, I'm sure they have accounted for many losses that resulted in fighters being labelled chinny.