Why is boxing such an unforgiving sport unlike say..NFL?

These days, it's because fighters fight less often, so each fight has more significance.

If fighters fought 6 or more times a year, then 1 loss would have less significance.

 

Good point.

Its also an individual sport so the blame falls squarely on your shoulders.

And while I generally agree with the thread starter, its not like athletes in other sports dont get hammered. I mean look at poor Bill Buckner for example. Or take the preasure put on Payton Manning before he was able to win the Superbowl.

 

Exactly. Who remembers that Ezzard Charles had like 20 something losses, for example? No, they remember him as a great fighter from the past.

 

I think you hit it right on the head. :good

 

That's right, but that comes about because that's the mindset people get into overall, and they can't separate the occasions when that matters, to when it doesn't. That's what people promote too. (TV stations, promoters etc).

They'd rather have a guy 32-0 fighting scrubs, than a guy 29-3 fighting solid guy after solid guy.

You and I both know the guy with 3 losses is probably the far better fighter - but that's not how they're judged.

 

because nba and nfl games happen more frequently and they are team games. in boxing, when you lose it will be, more often than not, entirely yor fault. you can't say the same with basketball or football

 

i think the sport most comparable to boxing is actually tennis.

because of its 1 on 1 format.

If risks of injury were not so high in boxing, boxers would be able to fight more often, in tournaments, and then a loss here or there would not be the end of the world.

Boxing should be fought in tournaments anyways, like the olympics

 

Because a higher percentage of boxing fans have never participated in the sport. No offense intended but a lot of people who have never boxed don't realize the amount of concentration it takes to fight one whole minute, much less three, versus an opponent who, if he's done his job correctly, has spent a large percentage of his time honing his skills at knocking your head off. One minute is really a long time to fight but if you said that in front of somebody who never fought before he'd think it was a joke. It's no joke. A lot of boxing writers, keyboard warriors etc, dismiss a fighter for "lack of skill" when the truth of the matter is they don't know what skill looks like. It would be more accurate to describe the fighter as "limited" mainly because he is not as athletic or in some cases as juiced as his opponent, not because he doesn't know how to box. A lot of professional boxing writers don't know the sport well enough to truly analyze it and it gives fans who have not participated in the sport a false point of view. The writer might state Fighter A totally abandoned his jab without realizing that the reason Fighter A abandoned his jab was because Fighter B was slipping it smashing counter right hands into Fighter A's ribcage. For some reason everybody thinks he can analyze and point out a worldclass fighter's mistake in a fight when they don't see the whole picture. They could get some ideas from listening to Emanuel Steward's commentary or something along those lines but Manny is sitting outside the ring. He is not the fighter. He can only go by what he sees. The fighter he's the one who knows he has a broken hand, broken rib etc. Besides, most of these worldclass fighters have been boxing their entire lives, like De La Hoya, Mayweather, Chris Byrd. That's really a lot of experience that shouldn't be ignored. But we can drink a couple of beers, watch the fight, listen to the commentary and figure out what these worldclass fighters have done wrong with all our experience. Sure.

Truth is a tomato can would whip your ass.

Another reason boxing is unforgiving; one mistake and the fight is over. Forget to duck, drop your left, zig when you should have zagged and KO, go back to your corner and get your legs back under you and you can leave knowing that the armchair warriors in all their wisdom and experience will be more than happy to enlighten you of your fatal flaw. Does that happen in any other sport? Maybe MMA but football, baseball and golf can't end like that. One mistake and the game isn't over.

I think if boxing fans would actually walk a mile in the fighter's shoes he would have a more realistic idea about what the sport really is. A lot of guys love to go on about how tough the oldtimers were but I honestly believe this "superior toughness" actually comes from the boxing fans of the time period and boxing writers of the time period. Back then people knew what it was like to fight. They knew what it was like to go hungry. They knew what it was like to be in a war. They weren't as spoiled as most of us today. That's what makes the Golden Age of Boxing pug the greatest fighters ever, their fans and what their fans said about them. We'll never have fighters like they did because we don't want them. We're too jaded to walk a mile in their shoes.

 

I think we overanalyze fighters these days.

Is it unfair? Yes. Is it going to stop. No.

 

Excellent thread. The chaotic nature of boxing has its appeal, but it is also the sports main downfall.

All of the above sports have organization.

They all have a commissioner with power, a schedule for the fans and media to follow that always produces championship match ups, and the results of the games in general are not blow or stolen by ref's and judges. Oh yeah, and the other sports don't have PPV events!

Boxing is a mess. It’s full of shady commissions, promoters who kick each other in the nuts by putting on big fight cards on the same night, and mediocre writers. So even if a legandary fighter is active, fans have an easier time ripping him. Not so much in the other sports because they have organization, rules, and a schedule that produce an un despuited champions.


The reason Ali is a legand is because he had talent and the opportunity to prove it via scheduled matches vs the best.

 

Boxing is a bandwagon sport. Always has been, always will be.

Look at these forums for proof.

 

Funnily enough, Joe Namath is genuinely overrated. And, going by his overall career, there should be a few dozen other QB's enshrined in the Hall of Fame ahead of him.

He did score some extra points in my book for being drunk off his ass and hitting on the woman interviewing him during halftime of a game a few years back, though. It's hilarious, because of the sheer irony of it- saying something he wasn't supposed to, likely after throwing a few back, is why he became famous in the first place.