Who were the real pioneers of boxing technique?

Well, heck, just to spice things up a bit, I'll toss in Jimmy Slattery. Alcoholism and personal problems wrecked him, but his style anticipated Muhammad Ali. Most writers of that era talk about what might have been... He deserves at least a nod alongside Maxie Rosenbloom, arguably the best repeated matchups of their era. Reckless abandon alongside masterful defense.

 

Have you ever heard or read that rather humourous story in regards to their second fight, Lex, where both Rosenbloom & Slattery were said to have each laid bets on the other guy to win the fight?

 

Jack Dempsey of course.

 

Oh, yeh! When I was first getting into amateurs boxing as a teenager I read every magazine I could get my hands on. There were great anecdotes from the guys who knew the boxers from way back when.

I recall another story where Jim Braddock and one of his opponents so obviously rigged the fight between themselves that the commission paid each fighter only a fraction of their pay and donated the rest to charity. (I'm trying to recall whether that fight was during the time when Braddock's hand was essentially useless but he had to keep fighting.)

In a class of boxing that dares not speak its name (The Professional Loser... shhhh... ), the all-time king is Reggie Strickland, with more than 300 pro fights and more than 250 losses, reportedly 25 by KO. But Reggie's record is misleading. He realized years ago that he could make a good living as cannon fodder, a safe opponent for up and comers.

Before his apparent retirement in 2005, I saw Reggie several times on televised bouts, usually 4 or 6 rounders. He had excellent defense, could obviously have beaten more opponents if he wanted to, and had mastered the art of taking a dive without making it embarrassingly obvious. He did it not so much to pad the opponents' records as to save his own skull from unnecessary harm.

I'm sure Reggie didn't pioneer this "technique," but he certainly mastered it and set the bar high... umm... low...? :yep