Special For Neil

Rocky Marciano came after Joe Louis. Do you think he was a modern fighter? Or oldschool?

 

(Mind you, I don't believe Floyd is an all-time great)

But essentially this means that old poll is based on newspaper articles and hearsay more than what the majority of the voters actually saw. With that said, it's not difficult to understand that there are fighters from that era Floyd would handle with ease. Personally, I believe if Floyd were around in the late 70's to mid 80's he wouldn't have made it past lightweight without two or three bad losses. He certainly wouldn't have had a dominant welterweight campaign. I can't imagine a scenario where he beats Hearns or Leonard. he could hope to stink out a decision against Duran...maybe.

 

My point stands. Hegman referenced this poll as proof many considered napoles greater by than robinson which I asked to see. and he was correct but as you said, how seriously can you take a poll that has ross ahead of robinson

 

Evidently it made plenty of sense in 1976.

Remember; this was before Larry Merchant and HBO (then Home Box Office whoever they were) started bombarding the boxing public that Robinson was an unbeatable god with no weaknesses.

Ray was a great fighter, but far from unbeatable and Larry Merchant has no credentials or training to make such an assumption for people thinking they will share his opinion.

 

Karl normally I would come to a thread started by you just to call you names. So let's stick with what works. You're a fag. Please do what your hair did and just go away forever.

 

He was modern.

But modern historically can still be old school by today's standards.

A lot of people now consider guys like Leonard and Duran to be old school.

 

Rocky was modern, for sure. His entire training regimen was constructed in such a fashion as to correct his weaknesses and augment his strengths. Rocky is one of the most over-rated, over-glorified fighters of all time, but his training regimen is verifiable fact and was constructed in such a fashion as to erode as quickly as possible as many as possible of his weaknesses and fine-tune his strengths. This, for me, is the essence of "Modernism". In the good old days, Rocky would have hit the bag and eaten his steaks and skipped a bit of rope.

I am convinced that no other 185lb heavyweight has ever or will every hit as hard as Marciano with one single blow. Its a testament to the regimen Rocky endured that his right hand, one-shit KO of Walcott ranks right up there with the one-shot KO punch executed by a better boxer than Rocky, namely SRR's stoppage of Fullmer. You cannot take a small, oafish man, with almost no amateur experience worthy of the name, and turn him into a bomber of such efficacy in such a short period of time without knowing what you are doing in the gym. Charlie Goldman did an outstanding job in that regard.


In training for the 2nd La Starza fight, Goldman introduced a small bouncing ball to the regimen...designed....to keep Rocky from getting bored. Marciano would bounce around on a platform, hitting the ball, bouncing it off the floors and walls, catching it at different heights, stooping, reaching, what have you. Most of the stuff that is written about Rocky is pure guff and nonsense, but not the bit about his training.

 

Could Floyd defeat these old time bums if he was fighting them one at a time, every 6 weeks? On their rations of potato and steak? On even, or worse, terms, where he could not bring his EGREGIOUS bargaining power to bear on them? Eventually, he would zig when he should have zagged and his hands, or his tendons, or his skin, still tender from some 10 rounder 6 weeks prior {and for which he was barely paid rent and food expenses} would give way and our Floyd would have a loss.

We have to compare like for like. Floyd still beats a whole pile of them, but he loses to some too.

Agreed on the rest though. 70's and 80's is where the toughness and dedication of the old timers meets the money and science of the new era. Floyd would struggle.

 

I don't know that we'd even see Floyd make the move to 147 while Leonard & Hearns were at the top of the division. I'm not even sure he would want a piece of Pryor, either.

I could see him taking on Saoul Mamby instead, talk a lot about a fight with Pryor, but never actually take the fight and wait until Hearns moved up to 154 and Leonard retired due to his eye injury before making a move to 147. And even then he would have his hands full with Curry, McCrory and Starling.

 

I remember reading years ago that Armstrong told Ross in the final he would carry him so he could last the distance, but he also warned him to not try anything funny.

 

I would be curious to see the Heavyweight version of this poll to see if names like Jeffries, Johnson, Fitzsimmons & Corbett appear anywhere near the top of the list.

 

Specifically the right hand. Legend has that he agreed to carry him but that if he tried the right hand, Armstrong would finish him. Poor Ross went on to fight in the Pacific during the war, he got Malaria and was addicted to Morphine for a while. He died young, relatively speaking.

 

Ross was a great fighter in a hugely important transitional period for the sport when the influence of Dempsey and Benny Leonard (the proto-moderns, if you will) was in bloom... I agree with Hegman that Louis is one of the first real modern fighters

Fact of the matter is that what worked in 1945 still works now... What worked in 1925 generally no longer worked in 1945 and it wouldn't work now

Pre Dempsey and Pre Leonard, with the guys like Fitzsimmons and Jeffires and Langford and Johnson??? forget it... those guys are like cavemen compared to Dempsey and Leonard and all who followed them... They were obsolete by the mid 20s... Great for their times, no disrespect intended, but the growth in sophistication of boxing between 1915 and the arrival of guys like Joe Louis is as staggering as exists in any sport, maybe more staggering than any other sport

 

Gene Tunney is the first guy I've seen with a modern style. No doubt there were plenty of others, but he's the one that stands out.

 

I'd imagine at least two of the four would be on the list if polling people in 1976. The top? Hard to say.

 

He's definitely one of those key transitional guys for sure...

Of his era, I'd rate the most technically advanced fighters in no particular order as Leonard, Sharkey, Tunney, Dempsey, Canzoneri, Ross, Panama Al Brown, Jimmy McLarnin, Fidel La Barba and Kid Chocolate and a handful of others that would no doubt come to mind if I thought harder

The difference between any one of those guys and anyone from Jack Johnson's time (literally just 10-15 years earlier) is mind-blowing

 

Yeah, there is a pretty stark difference. What do you think made the biggest difference in the evolution of boxing in that time period?

 

Honestly, inventiveness and influence

To me, Dempsey and Leonard shattered the existing templates and put the ball in motion and others followed

It's like Babe Ruth... He said "fuck it, I am uppercutting this baseball" because he saw that when he did that (even with the Dead Ball) he hit it high and far... Coaches didn't want you to do that... Ruth wasn't one to follow rules... Ray Chapman gets killed with a bean ball, that's the end of the Dead Ball era and Ruth's style starts producing the unexpected effect of numerous home runs with the new lively ball... Other strong hitters quickly begin imitating the uppercut swing and home run totals begin to soar, though few hit anywhere near what Ruth is hitting during that same time span... Same era, really, late 1910s, early 1920s as Dempsey and Leonard... I've often wondered how much of a role film played in all of this... Even though this was pre-TV (hell, it was pre Radio) highlight reels became very common in theaters of the day... As a result, people could now SEE Babe Ruth hit... They could SEE Dempsey fight out of a crouch and throw hooks... they could SEE Benny Leonard bounce around on his feet and throw combinations and have offense in motion... Does it seem outlandish to imagine that other fighters or ball players seeing these things went home and tried them, worked on duplicating them and shared that with others leading to all of the various tweaks and diversions? Seems pretty logical to me, along with hands-on observation by other fighters/trainers in various gyms or at the fights (or ball players at the park or on the other team, etc)

 

It makes sense to me, but still something still seems missing. It's not like the high jump where one technique revolutionized the sport and everything followed. I know you're not saying it got modernized because of one major change in that regard. However even such a drastic change takes time to reach an entire sport. As you pointed out most people couldn't see the "new ways" at the time. To top it off the people in the know like trainers are often the most conservative of them all. It's just an amazingly rapid time line.

 

:bears:

 

I'm convinced

 

That thing is a perfect representation of the so-called "History" channel

 

I thought we had mended fences and I was going to invite Neil personally to my fight card next year, sit him in the VIP section at ringside and personally introduce him to Marlen after the fight at the meet and greet.

That is all off of the table now as he continues to type shit about me here.

 

Fuck I blew it

 

Certainly this is your perception, but still untrue.

Part of what makes Robinson the greatest isn't the fact that he was unbeatable but he won inspite of flaws and in dramatic fashion at times. Plus, the guy was 121-1-1 at one point. He lost 18 fights, most of which after the age of 40.

Hell, I always include Archie Moore as a top ten all-time fighter.

When I think about guys like Floyd, Ottke and Calzaghe and their obession with being undefeated I tend to look at that as more of a black mark than a selling point. It says to me there were challenges out there they steered clear of to maintain a perfect record. In Floyd's case I never had a problem with his choice of opponents prior to the 2nd Castillo fight. After that, seems he carefully managed his career.

As much crap as I gave Oscar during the earlier part of his career for managing his way around better fighters, he did the opposite toward the end of his career. While I wouldn't consider Oscar a great fighter, in retrospect he gains more respect for tougher fights as he grew older.

Just my two cents.

Lastly, I'm no Merchant fan; however, the guy has been around the game for a long ass time and has covered it for years. He certainly knows the game and has insight neither you nor I would ever have due to his access to fighters for the past 50+ years. I find it astounding how flippant you've been about that.

 

Untrue?

You are full of crap.

That old fart has never boxed before and has run down fighters and fight folks for the past 50 years, guys that have more character in their pinky than that runt has in his entire body.

Robinson was not the greatest my friend, and you (like a lot of other people) have listened to too much "HBO".

Merchant, Lederman, Lampley and Kellerman have one big factor in common: none of them have ever boxed before.

It is gullible and easily manipulated boxing fans like yourself that take an old midget like Larry's word for it that Ray was the greatest ever when he was not.

 

I don't know about anyone else here, but my thoughts regarding Ray Robinson (or any other fighter) are not in any way influenced by anything Larry Merchant had to say about him. To be honest, I don't ever recall ever hearing Merchant discuss Robinson at any length, much less shill for him.

Robinson may or may not be the greatest ever, but I would definitely rate him over Napoles as an all time fighter.

 

Merchant has shilled for the guy as far back as 1979 that I know on video.

The term "Pound for pound" was an off the cuff remark made by a sports writer in the late 40's-early 50's and Larry took that phrase and ran with it and has not shut up about it ever since.

 

This is precisely the reason you're a target of so much disdain. My post wasn't in anyway offensive or derrogatory and yet this is how you've chosen to respond. I simply provided my opinion the same as you've provided yours. Why get defensive when your opinion is questioned? That's amateurish at best, childish in nature.

Secondly, the "he never boxed" excuse/tirade has reached its expiration date. I'm hopeful it will be retired from the internet before the year is over.

I don't hear ex-players chiding Joe Buck for never playing big league baseball or in the NFL when he calls those games. The same goes for Bob Costas and other announcers.

Lampley never bobsledded so who would you suggest cover that event when he does the next Winter Olympics?