Why do old fighters get judged so harshly?

Exactly. Tommy gets praise for what he did well, not what he did badly.

Yes, he held his chin high but he was using lateral movement, pumping a fast jab, hooking to the body at lightning speed. We Hearns fans use that as the basis of our praise and gloss over the lack of defence as it is a point in his minus column. The reasonable Tommyistas accept, when challenged, that for all his attributes, he wasn't perfect.

The old timers I see on film often look like one of the three Stooges, saying 'Puddemup' as they stand rooted to the spot moving their arms in circles in front of them. You could overlook the defensive flaws if the offence looked good. But, frankly, it most often didn't.

For me, it's obvious that boxers in the early days did not have access to video as a learning tool. Also, they tended to fight locally and there is only so much you can learn fighting the same opponents multiple times and training with the same partners and trainers. There wasn't the same media for sharing of good practice that has helped so many industries, whether in sport or beyond, to evolve. There wasn't the same ease of travel to get different sparring, training or opponents. And there wasn't the same well of experience to use to refine techniques. It stands to reason that techniques in the first couple of decades of a sport will not be as good as techniques evolved from a century's learning.

For me, the fairest thing to say is that, with some standouts, the old timers were as good as they could be with the resources and opportunities available to them. And many would have been as good as, or better than, modern fighters if they (the old timers) had had the same diverse opportunities for training, learning, broadening experience and diet.

But they didn't and so, for me, they just weren't as good as modern counterparts. Having said that, I feel we have passed the apex now, though, and the lack of gyms, fight clubs and opportunities to practise have all diminished and, as a consequence, fighters aren't as good overall nowadays as they used to be.

That's how it can nowadays be viewed as a step to greatness when you beat an inactive 41 year old (as recently as the 90s Evander Holyfield was castigated for fighting 40+ year old challengers). And why the fight, two years ago, to decide the best P4P fighter in the world was contested at welterweight between a 38 year old former super featherweight and a 36 year old former flyweight. When your P4P no 1 is in his late 30s and fighting nearly 20lb above his original weight you have to wonder if things are what they used to be.

But that's another debate for another time. Over and out.

 

As if I hadn't rattled on enough, just to clarify where I am drawing the lines. I would say an old timer is a fighter from up to around the late 20s and modern fighters date from that point right up to the 90s. More modern fighters, where I feel the standard has been regressing, I trace back to around the turn of the millennium.

Over and out once more and, this time, I mean it. Apologies for the long-windedness.

 

It is very likely that the boxing talent pool peaked around the 1920s.

It is not an easy thing to estimate, but such evidence as we have points in this direction.

So how does that evidence stack up against the talent?

You have absolutely brutal talent pools in every division except heavyweight during that decade!

Heavyweight might just have been great if certain fights had been made.

 

Trouble is, janitor, 'such evidence we have' that supports your stance is just so scarce. A few grainy fight films and the reports of contemporary writers who had so little point of reference. For some of these writers, the hometown hero was one of the few fighters they actually saw.

It's difficult to judge one era against another when one era has so little physical record while the other has so much. And it's hard to judge the old timers on the footage we have when, as reznick pointed out, it is of such poor quality.

My own personal view is that the talent pool peaked in the 70s. Travel had made the talent pool deeper and boxing was a well-established and popular sport. To be the best in the world, you actually had to be the best in the world as there was ample opportunity for fighters to travel from all over the world to challenge that.

Also, the talent pool was deeper as the bars that you allude to in your final sentence had been removed. The pool consisted not only of fighters from all the world's continents but also all the domestic fighters, whatever their race and colour. For me it stands to reason that being able to draw from further and wider made the talent pool deeper.

 

Well, he was certainly a mammal looking at the moobs on him.

Earlier in the thread, Rez, you talked about how film can convey certain different emotions and be interpreted differently depending on angles etc.

Knowing that you are aware of how film can be open to interpretation, I am interested that you have taken to posting so many GIFs and using them in support of your argument. Surely, a two or three second gif is not adequate representation of anything. We have had a gif showing Marciano's 'quick feet', Carnera's excellent technique but when evidence only has to withstand a couple of seconds' scrutiny, you can show anything. Take a couple of seconds out of the Hagler-Hearns fight where Tommy takes three or four solid shots without folding. Take your pick, there's nearly 8 minutes worth. You could then make a thread that Tommy had a better chin P4P than Chuvalo. Given your experience of film and how context is so essential, I wonder why you put so much store in these vignettes which are but a fraction of a round much less of a career which should provide the basis for evaluating a fighter's pros and cons.

I've veered off topic, I know, but as you presented that GIF of Willard, I wanted to challenge the basis it has for proving anything other than that he needed a sports bra.

 

Let me ask you a question. Why do you get so defensive when I disagree with the points you make in which you use two seconds of footage to support your claim? I wasn't being obnoxious but you seem to be having a bit of a pop at me. No need.

All I said was that a two second clip is less valid than more substantial footage which gives context. For example, you said that Willard never stopped fighting and illustrated the point with a clip of Jess throwing two punches. What does that prove? Nothing more that in a three round fight he threw at least two punches.

And of course I am not going to make the claim that Hearns had a better chin P4P than Chuvalo. I used it as an hypothesis to show that when you are only presenting a few seconds worth of evidence, you can make pretty much any case you like. I'm not necessarily disagreeing with you so much as suggesting you could use the broader context of a fighter's career rather than a brief moment in time to support your point.

 

I'm in your boat, some great posts in here by yourself. I don't get too emotionally involved in the era you define as old time (correctly for mine) and prefer to stick to those we have decent amounts of footage of. I would mostly agree old footage quality does no-one any favors but also doubt many before (around) your cut off would overly compete with those forward.

 

I don't see how people can say you can learn nothing from a 5 second streamable clip because its so short. Yet Judge the old timers so harshly when there is also a large lack of footage of them. At least when compared to their entire careers.

 

You're taking Ezzard and his intentions out of context Rez. He's not flaming you or looking to have a heated argument. He's hardly known around here for complaining and whining.

 

You are going to get debated in here on those topics. That's much of what the place lives on. I thought he put it quite nicely and the couple of bits of humor in there weren't intended to rile. His post at the top of the page is one of the best this year.