Why would we expect historic heavyweights to do well in the modern day?

Discussion in 'World Boxing Forum' started by VOXDEI, Oct 29, 2021.



  1. Finkel

    Finkel Well-Known Member Full Member

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    This is possibly relevant to the discussion.
    Just some graphs that show the size and weight of the top ten by decade. There is a gif, but the separate graphs can be found if you scroll down.
    This content is protected
     
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  2. Bukkake

    Bukkake Boxing Addict Full Member

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    So a fighter with 100 or 200 pro fights (not uncommon a century ago, during the ND era) would be a lot more skilled and cagey than a modern boxer with only 30 or 40 pro fights?

    Sugar Ray Leonard, one of the finest boxers ever, retired with just 40 pro fights under his belt. Does anyone really believe, that he would have been a much better fighter, if he had added another 100-150 meaningless "stay busy" bouts to his record? I don't think so.

    Several other recent champions (like Rigondeaux, Loma, Usyk, Inoue) will likely never reach even 40 pro bouts, before they retire. Does this mean, that they wouldn't be able to "hang" with the great champions of yesteryear - and that they would have been better off, with the added experience of an extra 100 or so pro bouts?

    Also (as already mentioned by NEET), once again we hear about how all the great trainers have died away, and how modern trainers are (mysteriously) too stupid to take advantage of the knowledge accumulated over the past 100+ years... even with all the film of the old masters, that today is available to us. Doesn't make much sense to me!
     
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  3. It's Ovah

    It's Ovah I'm your huckleberry, that's just mah game Full Member

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    What "absolute freaks of nature" competed in Louis's day? Or the Rock's? Even in Ali's day the only absolute freak of nature was Ali himself. Frazier was a crappy athlete, Foreman little better. Norton was a great athlete but never cracked the absolute top. Bonavena, Chuvalo, Quarry were mediocre athletes. This was also the era of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, a freak athlete if ever there was one. Why didn't he compete in boxing at this time? Why didn't Wilt compete in the 60s against the likes of Liston and a young Ali? Wouldn't that have been a sounder financial decision?

    I really think this whole argument is overstated and misguided. HW boxing attracts more or less the same amount of athletic talent as it always has, the difference being that isn't American talent, but then the US doesn't hold a monopoly on athletic talents does it? And considering Eastern Europeans weren't eligible to compete professionally until around the mid nineties onwards it seems an odd statement to make that the overall share of the world's athletic talent going into boxing has declined significantly. It hasn't; it's just been redistributed.
     
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  4. cross_trainer

    cross_trainer Liston was good, but no "Tire Iron" Jones Full Member

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    Why is it hard to believe that more experience makes you a better fighter? You see similar situations in comparable combat sports like kickboxing / Muay Thai, where the Thais' greater experience and large numbers of fights *are* considered an advantage against less active fighters.

    You have a better case arguing that modern guys get their experience from other sources (gym sparring, amateur records), rather than discounting ring experience, IMO.
     
  5. cross_trainer

    cross_trainer Liston was good, but no "Tire Iron" Jones Full Member

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    Conversely, boxing's complexity makes it much trickier to figure out how much a new training method actually improves boxing performance. Technique is also opponent- and metagame-dependent to a much larger degree than technical improvements in other, more linear sports. Many of the measurable sports you're discussing have partly improved athletes' scores by improving technique at doing a single, narrowly tailored thing. (Hammer throw being a good example.)
     
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  6. Hanz Cholo

    Hanz Cholo Boxing Junkie Full Member

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  7. MarkusFlorez99

    MarkusFlorez99 Boxing Junkie Full Member

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    Excellent write up
     
  8. Bukkake

    Bukkake Boxing Addict Full Member

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    I'm not discounting experience at all. Of course you don't make it to the top, without experience. I just didn't think it was necessary to repeat what we all know: that many of today's best boxers, who become champs after just a few fights, accomplish this because they have a HUGE amateur background. Without that, Loma obviously wouldn't have won a world title in his 3rd pro fight!

    What I mean, is that these fighters don't need dozens and dozens of pro fights to bring out the best in them. On the contrary, after a long amateur career at the highest level, they are pretty much the "finished product" when they leave the amateurs - and only need to learn to adjust to the longer pro distance. After that they should be careful not to have too many fights - or they will quickly burn out!. Loma probably was at his very best already after about 10 pro fights - and is today clearly no longer the superb boxer he was a few years ago. But with almost 400 amateur fights behind him, it's hardly surprising, if he's beginning to fade after less than 20 pro bouts.

    But lets take the case of Leonard: Even though he was an Olympic champion, he didn't have the ultra-long, taxing amateur career of a Loma or an Usyk. Also, he was still very young (just short of 21), when he turned pro. So not shopworn at all!. Would it have benefitted him to start out with gaining experience from 50 "learning fights", before going for world titles? Would that have made him a better fighter in the end?
     
  9. cross_trainer

    cross_trainer Liston was good, but no "Tire Iron" Jones Full Member

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    Fighters grow at different rates, obviously. Leonard needed less than some, more than others. I think it would be fairer for the pro-older-fighter faction to say that the experience provided by earlier careers allowed those fighters who could benefit from the experience best to get it. (Like Archie Moore, for instance.)

    But there's also a caveat here: It's long been thought that the amateur and pro games are two very different beasts. Being a great amateur doesn't necessarily translate into being a great professional, and piling up extensive amateur experience might not be the equivalent of learning the pro game over the same zillion rounds. Robinson fighting a hundred guys as a pro seems on its face to be better preparation for the world championship in the 50s than a dense amateur career from the 2000s would be.

    However, I will say something in favor of the modernists. I think that the "Everybody had a hundred fights back then" card is overplayed. They didn't all have a hundred fights. They were arguably matched more competitively and more often in the pro ring than today, but not everybody was Armstrong, Robinson, Moore, or Greb.

    EDIT: That said, I don't know whether it would have made Leonard a better fighter -- at least at his peak -- to have 50 learning fights. It's a more interesting question than the rhetorical one that I suspect you intended it as, though. The choice NOT to give him 50 learning fights was probably motivated more by economics and earning potential calculations, just as it probably is now and was in the 50s. Certainly, Duran had a lot of fights (71-1 when he fought Leonard), and Duran beat Leonard despite being a smaller man. So it's something to think about...
     
    Last edited: Oct 30, 2021
  10. sasto

    sasto Boxing Junkie Full Member

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    I think we have great evidence that fighters from the 60s and 70s would hold their own (I'm not saying mop the floor, I'm just saying not look ridiculous) with modern fighters.

    George Foreman showed up in 90s and held his own. He held his own against guys who held their own against Lewis and the Klitschkos. This was an ancient, high mileage fighter from the 70s who isn't considered the best of his own era, and he was top 10 20 years later. He beat Moorer who beat Holyfield who drew with Lewis, a modern superheavy.

    None of this is to say who would win between prime Foreman and Lewis, I have no clue. I'm simply saying Lewis (or AJ or Fury) would have to be at his focused best or he won't succeed. It won't be like smashing a tomato can.

    If it didn't happen between the 70s and 90s, and didn't happen by the time Lewis and Vitali were on top, when do you reach the point that past HWs would have no success?

    By the way I think you can tell a lot about ability by watching film, even across eras. To take it to an extreme, I can watch a Silver Gloves tournament and see a quality difference between the top WW in the tourney and Bud Crawford.

    Likewise, you can watch old fights and see there was quite a bit of technical sophistication and a high level of physical conditioning along with tremendous mental toughness that will make the greatest of that era a problem in any.
     
  11. Pugilist_Spec

    Pugilist_Spec Hands Of Stone Full Member

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    I'm not saying that. I'm not saying certain skills can only be learned by actually fighting a ton. You can obviously learn them in a gym. But someone has to actually teach them to you. Thats why I made the point with the trainers. Guys in the 40s and 50s fought a ton, more than fighters nowadays, but they also continued to be active in the sport after their careers have finished. And you had many great trainers around like Arcel, Dundee, D'amato, Steward, Slim Jim Robinson, Futch etc. who were around when pro boxing was deeper and more competitive than ever. These guys worked well into the 80s and 90s with the crop of fighters who were around at the time. Leonard was trained by Dundee for example. Once said trainers and the old school fighters completely disappeared from the sport, you were left with a hole because first hand contact was simply lost. This isn't exactly the knowledge of some ancient civilization that has been lost and can never be discovered again. You do have a ton of filmed fights to study and most certainly a bunch of trainers and fighters around today that picked up a lot of knowledge and wisdom from the best. But there's still a drop off nowadays, especially with the heavyweights because skill and wits are simply less and less of a focus compared to athletic ability and power. You have several interviews with trainers where this point is made.
     
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  12. Ph33rknot

    Ph33rknot etreuM aL Full Member

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    Stamina and better skills
     
  13. Bukkake

    Bukkake Boxing Addict Full Member

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    You're right, of course... being an outstanding amateur doesn't automatically mean, that you will reach the same hights in the pro ranks. Howard Davis is a good example of this. Mark Breland is another, whose great amateur career didn't translate into pro super-stardom (though he did win a world title!).

    On the other hand, I doubt Loma and Usyk would be where they are today, without their very extensive amateur careers.
     
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  14. Somali Sanil

    Somali Sanil Wild Buffalo Man banned Full Member

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    Liston would be a Michael hunter size fighter today, maybe smaller, it’s not ‘BigSonny’ this time around, that’s a huge factor to consider.
     
  15. theanatolian

    theanatolian Obsessed with Boxing Full Member

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    Why not? We have no measuring stick in boxing to suggest fighters getting better. We can only go match up by match up, style by style. For example,

    “Fury knows how to use his size, he’d have an advantage over any smaller HW from the past with that massive advantage.” is an argument based on logic.(not saying I’d agree or disagree with it)

    “Sprinters have better records, thus modern boxers are better than the ones in the past.” is not. It’s just extended analogy by fanboys and/or haters.
     
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