Excellent item here that draws it all out for you. When I was fourteen I listened on the radio as then Cassius Clay took out Sonny Liston. This launched a true golden age era for traditional boxing that lasted not much longer than Ali's carreer.
What was becoming clear is that it was the toughest sport and also the most dangerous and even then attracted the most desparate.That debate has been lost by boxing generally. It can carry on as a skill sport with head protection in particular and likely only up to what we see as an intermediate level.
The other sport getting pulled back as well is American Football. Right now the damage is self inflicted but is likely to be followed by much tougher rules.
As stated, what has happened is that safer sports are pulling the talent.
Even brawling in general is booming in various varieties.The audience is still there.
quora
They say that the current heavyweight boxers don't stand a chance against the old greats like Ali, Foreman, or Frazier? Why is that so? Hasn't boxing evolved in the last 40 years?
Heavyweight boxing has devolved the last 40 years, not evolved.
Today’s best big men go into other sports. Boxing gets what’s left, as opposed to other eras, when the best boxed.
Training today is terrible, what few heavyweights we have don’t fight the best, they fight cab drivers and cooks to run up their record.
Fighters like Joshua run for their lives (ponderously at that!) from Whale sized journeyman, and Fury lumbers about the ring like Herman Munster and modern era fanboys try to claim they are better than the Golden Age - what a joke.
CREDIT PICTURE RING TV
Heavyweight boxers today are bigger than they were in the past.
But faster?
NO. They lumber about like dray horses.
More skilled, better at the art of boxing?
NO, they are not better. They are not even remotely as good.
The last great heavyweight was Vitali Klitschko, and the last great undisputed heavyweight champion was Lennox Lewis - I hope you enjoyed them, their like will not come again.
Tyson Fury is the best of a terrible lot of heavyweights
Tyson Fury is the best of this era of heavyweights. He is huge, with a high ring IQ and great courage. He is also not a great athlete, not particularly strong, not a great puncher, and has little speed. He lumbers about like Lurch from the Adam’s Family, without Lurch’s strength.
Lennox Lewis said about him:
“Never has a man so big punched so small.”
Yet he is the best of what is the worst era of heavyweights in history. The other two “top” heavyweights, (and I use the word “top” sarcastically) are Anthony Joshua and Deontay Wilder. One has a chin of the finest porcelain, and the other can’t box a lick. (trailing behind these two is the fattest champion of all history, Fatter Andy Ruiz!)
After a reporter asked how he himself would have done against Iron Mike Tyson, Fury said this:
Speaking to TMZ Fury said there would be no contest if he fought ‘Iron’ Mike back in his prime:
“Yeah, I think Mike Tyson would have knocked me out in 30 seconds.”
The reporter asked was he serious to which Fury replied:
“Yeah.”
CREDIT TMZ AND BOXING NEWS AND VIEWS
Heavyweights today are bigger than most heavyweights in any other boxing era.
But they are sure not better!
So why aren’t the bigger boxers of today better - there are nine basic reasons:
all the best athletes go to other sports; sports that have insurance, pension plans, and contractual income;
bigger is not better unless accompanied by skill, which it is not today;
boxing is the hardest sport to learn;
there is less opportunity to learn boxing, less fights, etc.
the great trainers needed to teach great champions are all gone;
Multiple sanctioning bodies with at least 5 major titles have left people confused over who is champion, diminished interest in the sport, further discouraging great athletes from entering boxing;
Promoters and management teams encourage the better boxers not to fight each other so as to not risk losing that “0;”
great black athletes have other options up and out;
athletes are more aware of the medical risks of boxing, including pugilistic dementia and death, and choose other sports,
All the best athletes, especially big men, choose other sports
Every fighter and trainer alive agrees that the numbers of fighters, the far fewer fighting as heavyweights, is proof that the best athletes, instead of picking boxing, as they did in Ali’s day, now pick other sports.
Emmanuel Steward said of today’s bigger fighters:
“they are nowhere near as skilled as the old fighters. All the good big men are in the NFL or NBA!"
He went on to say that the money is so good in the NBA and NFL, which have medical coverage and a good pension plan to boot, that fighters like Foreman and Liston, would today be in other sports.
Angelo Dundee said before he died:
“the great heavyweights are gone. Lennox Lewis was the last great heavyweight you will see in your lifetime. These guys coming up just can't box!"
Dundee reinforced what the great Manny Steward said:
“today’s big men are simply not as good athletes as their Golden Age predecessors.”
Bigger is not better
There are writers on here, like never-was and a few other fanboys, who know nothing of boxing, and who confuse size with skill.
Boxing writer and historian, Frank Thomas, explains the difference between size and skill:
“In the minds of some, size trumps all. Ergo, the Klitschkos [or Joshua] should defeat any other heavyweight who is not of similar stature. This gravely misunderstands the role of size in boxing, as amply demonstrated by yesteryear’s Primo Carnera, the Golden Age’s own Ernie Terrell, or modern fighters such as Nikolai Valuev and Lance Whitaker. In addition to height, it also misreads what “size” is.
Many modern heavyweights are the same height as their 1970s counterparts, but pack twenty pounds or more of extra mass. Yet does that mass make them a better fighter? If it was earned by lifting weights, [or PED's] as is all too often the case, then the answer is no.
Bulky muscles look impressive, but they do not help a fighter hit harder. Instead, they slow a fighter down and serve as useless bulk which must be hauled around the ring all night. Anyone who has trained using old school boxing methods is familiar with just how difficult it is to build good boxing muscle through weight lifting.
Because fighters today are bigger, does not mean they are better. A physique like AJ's is useful if he is posing on a stage for Mr. Universe, and not a bit of help in the ring while a fat Mexican is pounding his huge posterior. His size helps him against boxers without the skill to actually box him.
Heavyweights today are huge but lumbering stiffs
Fury looks like Herman Munster or Lurch, as he lurches about and the only thing that saves him is unlike his compatriots, he can actually box, and he uses smarts and skill to make up for having the speed and strength of Adam Ant.
Joshua is slow, ponderous, and has a chin of the finest porceillan. In addition, he has the ring IQ of a gerbil. He looks awesome as he poses before a fight begins, but a real elite heavyweight with speed and skill would have chopped him up like a mince pie.
Wilder actually has athleticism, speed and power, (not elite Patterson or Ali speed, or elite Liston or Foreman power) and he has the closest to any of the top modern heavyweights have to real athletic ability - but he cannot box a lick. He makes Primo Carnera look like Joe Louis.
And these three stooges are your modern heavyweights!
(Plus the Fattest champion and ex-champion of all history, El Blimpo Ruiz)
Boxing is the most difficult sport to master, mentally and physically
What sport is the toughest to master? That is subjective, however, you have to go by criteria established by experts, and in doing so, boxing is very clearly is the toughest sport to master.
That's the sport that demands the most from the athletes who compete in it, according to a panel of sports scientists created by ESPN.
The panel was organized from the following:
three Ph.D.’s that specialize in the science of muscles and movement,
a Director of the Coaching and Sports Sciences Division at the United States Olympic Committee,
a sports star and
various other sports writers, historians and experts
The panel then voted on what makes certain sports more difficult. The committee evaluated ten categories; endurance, strength, power, speed, agility, flexibility, nerve, durability, hand-eye coordination, and analytic aptitude.
Boxing emerged as the consensus most difficult sport.
It's tougher than football, harder than baseball, harder than basketball, tougher than MMA, gymnastics, hockey or soccer or cycling or skiing or fishing or billiards or any other of the 60 sports which ESPN rated.
MMA was 6th, Gymnastics was 8th.
Boxing was first.
The United States Olympic Committee officially lists boxing as the most difficult of the 60 sports it oversees
The United States Olympic Committee ranked boxing as the most difficult of 60 sports due to its high demands of endurance, speed and durability.
Not only are the physical demands incredibly arduous, the mental demands are extremely formidable as well.
There is far less opportunity than in previoius eras to master boxing
Gene Tunney observed:
“a fighter must fight to improve, there is no substitute for sparring, for actually getting hit to improve your skills, but at the same time, a man only has so many hard punches in him, so many shots he can take.”
Even counting the relatively greater popularity of the sport in England and Eastern Europe, there are still less fighters total, in the world, licensed to fight than there were in 1970, almost 50 years ago!
There are less licensed trainers than there were 50 years ago!
Floyd Patterson said:
“I was lucky, I had Cus D’Amator to teach me, to mold me into a great fighter. Without Cus, I never would have become a world champion. It takes great teachers, and I don’t see any coming up to take the place of the Cus D’Amators and the Charlie Goldman’s.”
Fighters today fight far fewer fights, thus boxing infinitely fewer rounds, box less in the gym, and simply do not learn the fundamentals of the game, because practice makes perfect. Greater money for a single fight means fighters do not fight as much, and thus do not learn as much.
There are also far fewer boxing events held. In addition, there are fewer fight clubs, licensed fighters, and licensed trainers today that in 1970, and in the US, fewer than even in 1930.
And fighters do not fight, and thus, do not learn. George Foreman fought 5 times in 1972, 7 times in 1971, and 12 times in 1970, while learning his craft! 24 fights in 3 years! Joshua has been a professional fighter 7 years, and has 24 total fights!
Steven Reiss, a professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, wrote:
“By the start of 1913 there were 89 boxing clubs in the state of New York, including 49 in New York City” There were over 20 boxing shows a week in New York City during this period. In 1994 there were only 19 during the whole year. (and 3 last year, the number has decreased yearly!) There were more, and better, boxers last century.
See Herbert Goldman article in the 1996 March issue of Boxing Illustrated March 1996. p 29. Reiss quote in "In The Ring and Out: Professional Boxing in New York").
Fewer boxers, fewer trainers, fewer events to box in, less training, less sparring, worse athletes - no wonder modern heavyweights especially are simply pitiful next to the Golden Age fighters.
The Great Trainers are just a memory now
Training hasn’t improved in any way. If anything because there are less qualified and licensed trainers than ever before. Joe Frazier commented in KO Magazine, March 1999:
“These guys aren’t trained by real champions, by great ex-fighters.”
The best trainers in history were fighters who knew all the secrets of the game. Rocky Marciano's trainer, Charley Goldman, claimed to have had over 300 pro fights. Jack Blackburn, Joe Louis’ trainer, was one of the great fighters of the turn of the century and had over 160 pro fights. He fought the likes of Joe Gans, Sam Langford, and Harry Greb. They learned to fight by fighting, and then by working with other great trainers.
That level of experience is completely gone from the sport today.
Ray Arcel, Hall of Fame Trainer, who learned himself from some of the greats, like Benny Leonard and Whitey Bimstein, noted right before his death:
“Boxing is not really boxing today. It’s theater. Some kids might look good. But they don’t learn their trade. If you take a piece of gold out of the ground, you know its gold. But you have to clean it. You have to polish it. But there aren’t too many guys capable (today) of polishing a fighter.”
Modern fighters lack basic skills their past predecessors managed easily
Modern fighters not only are not superior to fighters from the past, they are generally nowhere near as good. And there is evidence other than Boxrec’s computer and the pure numbers:
In this riveting book, Mike Silver point by point by the numbers shows the ongoing deterioration of boxers' skills, their endurance, the decline in the number of fights and the psychological readiness of championship-caliber boxers. The strengths and weaknesses of today's superstars are analyzed empirically and compared to those of such past greats as Ali, Frazier, Foreman, Liston, Joe Louis, Sugar Ray Robinson, Jack Dempsey and Jake LaMotta - and the modern fighters simply do not stand up in the comparison.
Fighters today fight far fewer rounds, box less in the gym, and simply do not learn the fundamentals of the game. There are fewer fighters, fewer trainers, with less expertise fighting fewer fights. The numbers do not lie.
Multiple sanctioning bodies leave fans unsure who is champion of what
It used to be there were eight undisputed champions. Now there are 17 weight classes, and five title belts, plus the Ring Championships, for a total of 102 champions for the 17 weight classes! Then they have super, interim, and regular champions, so they have, potentially, 306 champions! That is 306 compared to 8 in the days of Sugar Ray Robinson.
Each of the four universally accepted organizations, the WBC, WBA, WBO, IBF, and the IBO, which is attempting to make it five, charge sanctioning fees for their title fights. They also charge for their elimination fights, and for everything else they can manage to screw a penny out of fighters for.
They are all allied in one form or another with certain promotors, and certain Television viewing options, et al. None of them work well with the others, and none of the viewing platforms do either. The horde of sanctioning organizations allows the horde of viewing platforms and promotors to con the public and bilk everyone out of more money.
Until 1965 there was basically one champion - the WBA/WBC split over Ali’s rematch with Liston was a forerunner of multiple champions, and much confusion.
Promoters not letting fighters fight the best competition
Ever since Floyd Mayweather introduced the value of “0” as in no defeats, no promoter wants to let a money fighter fight anyone who might endanger their value. Case in point: Eddie Hearn and Anthony Joshua. They could have had a Fury or Wilder fight years ago, but Hearn deliberately low-balled both.
In the old days, as Sugar Ray Robinson said:
“You fought the best, sometimes you lost, you learned from it, went back, and won the rematch!"
Today, you don't get that chance. Lose your zero, and goodbye. So fighters like Joshua are not exposed to real quality opposition - and then when they are, boom!
Nor is that the only case. Al Haymon won’t let Errol Spence fight Terrance Crawford, who is promoted by Bob Arum.
People have asked "Did Pacquiao ever offer to fight Kell Brook? … Errol Spence? … Terence Crawford? … even Shawn Porter? " Yes, he wanted to fight all of them! Why didn't he fight them? Because up until 2 years ago, he fought for Bob Arum, and all of them except for Brock fight for the same rival promoter who scuttled a Spence-Crawford fight, Al Haymon.
Kell Brook worked for Eddie Hearn, who also has a poor relationship with Arum, and any Pacquiao vs. Brook fight would have been held in England, which neither Arum nor Pacquiao was keen on. Now Manny works for Al Haymon, who also has a poor relationship with Eddie Hearn - and that fight won't get made not because Manny does not want it (Kell Brook trying to starve himself back to welterweight would be so weak Manny would eat him alive) but because Haymon won't work with Hearn.
It used to be that the best fought the best, but now, it is simply not the case, most of the time.
Racism was one ugly reason so many great Black fighters arose back in the day
Jon Jones mentions this all the time - and he is spot on.
Ken Burns, the great filmmaker who produced “Unforgivable Blackness” about Jack Johnson, has noted that young Black men flocked to boxing in the 20th century as a way to earn a living. He also noted with the real end of segregation in the 1960’s, there appears to be far fewer young African-American men boxing because there are other, better, ways to make a living, in other sports, and in general.
WK Stratton wrote in Floyd Patterson how boxing was one of the few avenues to a young Black man in the 1940’s and 1950’s to escape poverty.
Although things are not completely rosy today, and there are other avenues to get out, and other sports, the NFL and NBA, which pay more on average, and are less dangeorus.
Without the poverty stricken fighters of the past boxers are not as tough
Because social conditions are better in the civilized world.
Kids in the 30’s to the 70’s were generally fighting to get out of grinding deadly poversty and ghetto conditions too terrible to describe. Today, while things are not rosy, they aer far better than what they once were.
Kids are not whipped with blacksnake whips while they work the fields and denied an educaion as Sonny Liston was, or driven from his home by the KKK when he was 15 as Joe Frazier was; or living where you didn’t get three good meals a day, as Rocky Marciano did.
Generally, kids grow up easier today, and people are not as tough because they have not endured as much!
Finally, athletes are more aware of the deadly risks of boxing
You risk your life, and if you survive, you risk your sanity, in boxing.
Bleacher report's list of most dangerous sports lists Boxing as the most dangerous sport of the conventional sports.
It is generally believed that "approximately 500 boxers have died in the ring or as a result of boxing since the Marquess of Queensberry Rules were introduced in 1884. 22 boxers died in 1953 alone. 37 have died since 1989, compared to 21 for rodeo events, including bull riding. And this is despite rule changes in boxing, reducing rounds from 15 to 12 for championship events, and from 12 to 10 for regular bouts, requirements that doctor's be ringside and an ambulance be on standby, and more!
CNN says 13 boxers a year die on average. Stunningly, CNN also says between 1890 and 2011, it's estimated that 1,604 boxers died as a direct result of injuries sustained in the ring, according to a survey carried out Manuel Velazquez.
So what are the risks on the way to becoming a world class fighter?
First, it can kill you.
Second, it can leave you crippled or insane.
People are more aware getting hit in the head does cummulative damage
Gene Tunney observed:
“a fighter must fight to improve, there is no substitute for sparring, for actually getting hit to improve your skills, but at the same time, a man only has so many hard punches in him, so many shots he can take.”
But all that getting hit takes a toll. Imagine yourself hitting your head at least 50 times a day from the time you are a teen until you are 30. A quality boxer like a Floyd Mayweather is in continuous training, and if he is active, he receives an average of 50 punches to the head a day according to Dr. Peter Lewis.
In a thesis prepared with colleague Michael Wang and published in the British Medical Journal, Dr Peter Lewis described boxing as “a popular activity with many health benefits” but also stressed the dangers, finding that most of the trauma contributing to brain damage boxer sustain happens in training, especially in sparring, rather than in fights.
According to a retrospective, randomized study by Dr. A.H. Roberts regarding CTBI among ex-boxers competing in Great Britain, every boxer tested had evidence of chronic brain injury, and approximately 17% had symptoms consistent with pugilistic dementia, which was believed to have been the result of repetitive concussive and/or sub-concussive head traumas, generally over the course of many years.
The 9 factors come together to show a drastic decline in skills in boxers today
Perhaps history’s greatest trainer, Joe Louis told a story in his autobiography about Jack Blackburn. Jack was asked once about comparing Joe Louis to Jesse Ownes; which, Blackburn was asked, was the greatest master of sport.
Blackburn paused, thought, and said:
“boxing can kill you, or can kill the other guy. It ain’t just physical, it takes mastering your mind plus your physical talent. The heavyweight champion of the world is the number one athlete on the planet.”
And Blackburn was right. Over 500 guys have died in the ring since the dawn of the modern boxing age. Boxing takes years, sometimes decades, to master, and requires exquisite mental facilities as well as extraordinary physical talent.
That mastery is gone from the sport today.
There are today:
as many as five champions instead of one, plus super, regular, and interim championis, compared to days gone by when one fighter was champion and everyone knew who he was; 8 champions then to hundreds today;
the “champions” fight cab drivers instead of contenders; (Ali by himself fought 4 times as many top 100 all time greats as the 3 modern Stooges and Fat Andy have managed all together);
fewer great athletes box;
athletes who do box are ones like Dominic Breazeale who failed at other sports;
Fewer fighters fight,
there are fewer fights,
boxers fight fewer rounds,
there is less time training and sparring,
there are far fewer trainers, with less expertise, the great trainers are all gone;
Racism doesn’t drive as many poor Black kids into boxing as a way out;
People are more aware of the dangers inherent in boxing.
The bottom line is best summed up by Boxing Historian Monte Cox:
“The myth most often foisted today is: Fighters are “bigger, faster, stronger and better” than ever. Do they have superior fundamentals? Do they throw more punches? Are they “new and improved” and better than the legends? The answer to all that is NO."
CREDIT TO:
Boxrec for height, reach, records, statistics
Boxing Illustrated March 1996. p 29., Herb Goldman
Floyd Patterson by WK Stratton
In The Ring and Out: Professional Boxing in New York, Stephen Reiss
Joe Louis by Joe Louis
KO Magazine, March 1999, Joe Frazier, Ray Arcel
Ranking Sports from Least to Most Dangerous: Includes NFL, NBA, NHL and Soccer
Sport Skills Difficulty Rankings
Top 60 Sports Ranked By Degree of Difficulty
The Arc of Boxing: The Rise and Decline of the Sweet Science by Mike Silver
The A-Z of Boxing: A Boxing A to Z (The Little Book) by Ian Welch
The Old School is Far Better Than the New ⋆ Boxing News 24
Tyson Fury On How He Would Have Done Against Mike Tyson | Boxing News and Views
Unforgivable Blackness by Ken Burns
Victory Over Myself by Floyd Patterson
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