Bernard Hopkins: Black Fighters, We Are Built Differently

yes a teensy weensy bit, a lot of them

Im sure if you go back far enough, lots of our people are part spaniard, or part viking or part scot

 

Muhammad Alis had a White Great-Grandfather.

Thats not a teeny bit.

Thats a direct and demonstrable parental link to a race other than Black.

Without that link he is not the fighter or the man he ultimately becomes.

As I said before- the only way to talk Race is via scientific rigour.

 

how good a fighter was his great grandfather? it's 1/8 white... thats not all that much

it certainly does nothing to push down the numbers of black fighters who didnt have white great grandparents

I suppose its just a cosmic coincidence, all of these black athletes being so gifted... meanwhile, all along, the real super athletes were hanging out in Kiev... this of course expalins the Ukraine's continued domination of world football

yeah, thats it... you and Kauki are right, there's no evidence to suggest that there is an unusual amount of great black american athletes

 

That genetic diversity is probably a large part of why African Americans are so athletic.

 

I would go one further and say that genetic diversity is a large part of why the very best African American athletes are so athletic- a high percentage of the BEST African American athletes have a higher degree of genetic diversity.

 

HELLO, thats EXACTLY what I've been saying the ENTIRE TIME:bangh::bangh::bangh:

 

No, no its not.

Your starting premise was slaves bred for strength.

I place far less emphasis on this- in fact I only wanted to know why people had been fired from their jobs for saying it.

 

My main point was that BLACK AMERICANS ARE A UNIQUE ETHNIC GROUP THAT HAS HAD AN ABNORMAL AMOUNT OF ATHLETIC SUCCESS IN PROPORTION TO THEIR POPULATION SIZE... and YES, the fact that they were once bred like dogs here is a SIGNIFICANT factor... I never once said their genetic diversity wasnt a factor... EVER

Outside of the sarcastic shot at you about Ali (taken solely because you are so hung up on whiteness) , I have never once said that genertic diversity WASN'T part of what makes them special

my point is that they ARE special... both you and Kauki were arguing VEHEMENTLY AGAINST THAT the entire fucking thread... now all of the sudden you are Mister Moderate

 

I am saying it is genetic diversity of a particular sort amongst a population sufficiently large to provide the numbers of athletes required to make a noticeable difference.

You place a far higher value on the slave background.

As for being "hung up" on anything- pointing out that Ali had a white Irish grandfather is merely tracking his lineage with a great deal more rigour than talking about being "bred like dogs"

If anything....., the prescence of a flaccid Irish todger in there would suggest that, at least in the O'Grady household, very little time or effort was given over to the maintaining of good bloodlines.

It was pure accident- the triumph of Meiosis over Mendel, that threw up Ali.

 

you are backtracking here... the entire premise of your argument (and Kauki's) was that the huge drop in boxing participation among black American athletes has NOTHING to do with the fact that there are currently no notable black american heavyweights

you can not hold that view while also stating that they are "special"

the only logical conclusion is that their lack of participation is a MAJOR Factor because they are special.

Good Talk.

 

I think I have posted well under 10 posts pertaining to the racial theories you have been discussing.

The fact that there are no notable black American heavyweights has as much to do with the fact that they keep losing. Nobody notices a loser.

I already expressed, albeit in a different thread, that the ethnic, economic and demographic phenomenon that was the collapse of the USSR and the subsequent migration of its best athletes to a newly Unified Germany has played as much a role as anything else in the propulsion of non-black, non-American heavyweights to the pinnacle of the division, coupled, as it is, with a very slight- a VERY slight, decline in the standards of American boxing.

But no. You want me to believe in Basketball Diaries instead.

OK. :dunno:

 

this is where it gets idiotic

its not VERY SLIGHT... its ENORMOUS... participation in the sport among black americans hasnt been this low in 100 years... its a far bigger factor than you wish it was

as for the Eastern Euro push of the last 15 years or so, obviously there are more good fighters coming from those regions than ever before, but your assumption that it is the biggest part of the whole equation is based more on the fact that you hate Americans (you assume we are all Max Kellerman) and would happily trumpet any theories that would give America as little credit as possible... you are the only one with an emotional horse in the race... (i.e. STUPID FUCKINGYANKS!!!!) ... I couldnt give a flying fuck if all the champions in history were from Greenland and were rainbow colored

 

The drop is slight.

Traditionally, the heavyweight division has always been shallower than the other divisions.
America gets the credit America deserves. Ignoring the collapse of the USSR and the funneling of that raw talent into the finishing house that is Germany, and positing in its stead some nonsense about basketball is not how to earn respect.

 

the drop is anything but slight

never ignored by me ever

 

You know.....Pat Putnam thought it was the end of the world when Holyfield picked up after Tyson. Not only did Holy go on to become an ATG, but he kicked the shit out of Tyson too.

The drop is slight. Things cannot have been that good in the first place when guys like Moorer were winning titles and losing them to Foreman, and when Bowe was refusing to fight Lewis.

When things are that bad, it only takes a slight drop for some other big guy with an amateur background to get a look in.

 

In my opinion, the drop was already beginning in the early 1990s as boxing dissappeared from television screens, basketball became more popular than ever, and the epidemic of gang violence with firearms also grew to historically enormous proportions... who needs to be good at fistfighting or knife fighting when you've got a Glock?

Its not slight, Irish... its a major, major drop

Boxing is at best a fringe sport in America now

It used to be front page business, every major paper in the country had a big-time boxing writer, the average guy was at the very least fully aware of who the big name fighters were... its not like that anymore and it hasnt been like that really since the last of Tyson's better years, when you started to need an HBO subscription and PPV to see almost every compelling matchup... My god, Kelly Pavlik was the undisputed middleweight champion of the world... nobody has a fucking clue who he is over here... if it had been 1986??? he would have been on Wheaties boxes, all over the TV, he'd have a videogame named after him

 

The fact that boxing is a fringe sport is not directly related to the lack of talent- boxing was referred to as the "so called sport of professional boxing" in the 1950's, it was riddled with gangsters and crooks.

Every decade of boxing has suffered from one crisis or another. Critically, all of these crises were AMERICAN crises- Joe Louis bum of the month, colour-line fights, the Mob, Ali and the Islam gang, Don King, ABC tournaments that didn't feature Hagler, Duk Koo Kim, James Douglas, all American related crises. All of them involved and were pertinent to...America.

Boxing might be on the slide in America but how do you separate the dancer from the dance? Boxing is not America. America is not boxing.

Is the sport slipping cos nobody cares? Or does nobody care because American fighters can't win like they used to? And are they losing like they never did....because the sport is sliding, because they are all off shooting hoops? Or has the rest of the world got in on the steel smelting, car making, technology stealing racket too??

There's a whole 'nother world out there Cdogg and they feel entitled to compete.

 

in the 50s, it was wildly popular despite the naysayers

its not a lack of talent, its a lack of enough participants to produce some talented fighters...

like I said, an American WHITE BOY was recently the UNDISPUTED middleweight champion of the WORLD... nobody was even aware of it

if that happened 20 years ago or more, that guy would have been a national obsession

Gerry Cooney was a SUPERSTAR here, he never won a thing, he barely earned his title shot against Holmes but the fight was a bonanza of big business here... everyone knew who Gerry Cooney was, everyone.

People stopped caring about boxing when they started getting charged money to watch it in their living room... its no coincidence that many people's awareness of boxing ends around 1991 and that Tyson, the first guy that you started to have no chance of seeing on regular TV is where millions of Americans boxing memories cease to exist any further

I guarntee you, that even if a white american guy beat one of the Klits for a title tomorrow, he would be at best a semi-notable figure... people dont care and they havent cared for a long time in this country

when no one sees the endeavor as a pathway to fame and fortune anymore, they arent going to bother with it... the reward can be found other ways with a much bigger payoff

Im not syaing its impossible for a guy from Slovakia or Latvia or East Germany to be a terrific fighter, what Im saying is that a big portion of the talent pool for 80 years has dwindled essentially to a puddle and that HAS to make a difference

 

What do you say about Australia's population, some tiny 20 million, and where they finish on the medal tally each Olympics,...

Superior genetics,..... oops,... it's a majority white country with majority white athletes,..... it's got to be something else!, bewilderedly ......it's just got to be something else!!!.

The 'genetical diversity' of black americans on the sprinting track,.. hasn't done them alot of good against the much less admixed Jamaicans,.. they're getting slower and slower,.. or... as the excuse goes,.. "Losing interest" ... I guess,..

Oh American football,... what have you done.

 

yeah, you're right, Kauki... there is no historical precedent suggesting that the black american population has produced a disproportionately high number of world-class athletes in sports that Americans give a shit about... none at all, no evidence exists... It's fun here in fantasy land... LALALALALALALA.... LALALALALALALA :dancingBaby:

 

Yes, sports that are virtually only played by Americans like Gridiron in particular,... but listen, if there was no European involvement in boxing, don't worry, you'd still be getting tantalisingly OWNED the way it's supposed to be, in light of this, a more plausible theory is that there is something different between white americans, and continental whites,..because good white american fighters are virtually non-existant. Even Australia, with about 40 registered pro-boxers, will produce somewhat of a champion or a contender every now and then. :crafty:

 

Basketball is played all over the world, how do you explain the 80% of NBA players being black americans?

yeah, Australia is a fucking hotbed of boxing greatness... Jeff Fenech, Jeff Harding, Jimmy Carruthers, Les Darcy and, and, and um, uh... 4 notable white guys and then one russian/asian hybrid (Tszyu) and an aborigine (Rose) ... what a vast history of successes...

guys from all over the world were taking part in boxing long before 1991 (the fall of USSR) and there was shit any of them could do about everything from 147-Heavyweight being saturated with black Americans

but, you go ahead and live in fantasy land where the sharp drop in participation by this historically deep talent pool is somehow NOT a factor

I bet if Brazilians, Spaniards and Italians stopped playing soccer, England might win the World Cup

 

I didn't say Australia had a great history, there's barely any fighters here, these domestic cards, can barely put two fighters in the same division together, they've got to import scrubs from overseas, and yet, it'll still produce a couple of contenders, like Danny Green, Paul Briggs, Mick Katsidis,.. just 3 or 4 here and there,..that's still 2 or 3 more than you billion white americans can manage!?,..let alone trying to compare to Europe,..and thus,.. I dont think you should be pulling continental whites, down to the level of white americans,... :crafty:

 

I guarantee you that there are more "continental" (which I suppose means every other country besides America) white fighters than there are white american fighters... you really think that America is loaded with white people who are professional prizefighters??? especially nowadays??? man, there's probably 10 times as many MMA fighters as boxers

 

Maybe,.. but there would be atleast 10,000 X more there, than there are in Australia,.. there would be more in America than in the UK,.. or any single European nation. Like Basketball, pro-boxing has had more of a sustaining interest in America over the years than in any other country, and even though it seems like 'times are tough' ,..America still has the largest base of pro-fighters in the world.

I do agree though, that there will be more white american MMA fighters than there will be pro-boxers eventually, if not already.

 

Cdogg - arguing with jingoists is pointless, especially when they know dick all about the matter at hand to begin with.

 

AH yes, Ireland and Australia, those veritable bastions of jingoism.

 

indians? mate, a billion people, and no olympic gold medals, ever. desis just aren't built for sport.

the chinese are always going to be hamstrung by their slenderness. i've never seen people as skillful as some of the players i saw in china, village kids who've done nothing but play football their whole life, but as soon as they start playing with internationals they just get muscled off the ball. basketball, no-contact sport, might be a better bet.

 

You must be joking me on the Desi- they have some explosive athletes, and some more than useful wrestlers and weight-lifters.

You keep an eye out that some good pitchers don't make it into Major League that are of Desi extraction.

 

There was one white-american journalist,.. who came to Hasim Rahman wagging his tail, wanting a pat, and trying to get perhaps some sort of racial reaction or sledge out of him in regards to the Soviet heavyweights,.. Rahman simply replied,.. "No, I think the rest of the world are just starting to catch up to us".. I thought that was a fair moment of 'outrageous white supremecy' from Hasim Rahman, he's been in there with enough races, black, white, hispanic, Maori,..not to be shocked and hysterical that there are good fighters of various colours, with different styles and strengths.