Fastest/Most Suddenly You've Ever Seen A Fighter Go Downhill......

Framptons leglless, listless defeat at the weekend to a big but moderately-powerful 130lbr made me wonder about what other fighters have gone downhill so fast.




Just idling through Boxrec and saw that Quarry's loss to Frazier in their 2nd fight was as early as MID 1974.....I had felt it to have been a lot later for some reason.

6 months prior to that he had looked sensational blowing out Shavers in a round- but that may have had more to do with what had happened to Shavers in sparring vs a guy called Jeff Merritt.

Quarrys last big win was vs Shavers. He never won another meaningful fight and his activity from the Norton loss to his final retirement was basically 4 fights vs hopeless fighters in about 16 years.

Quarry went from being always on the verge of a either a title-shot or a title-win to being completely shot, in the space of about 6 months.

Probably one of the most gracious displays of magnanimity I've ever seen in a prizefight- Frazier could have done what he wanted but refused to take advantage.

 

I think the difference in Charles post and pre Marciano is extremely tangible. He went from being an all-time great and a threat to anyone that size - even though, he was already past his best - to getting stopped by John Holman.

 

I think frampton was mainly just out of his element at 130.

Seems like Terry Norris hit a wall.

Forrest, maybe because of injuries, seemed to trun ordinary overnight.

 

the thing is that after the Marciano beatings you could imagine a former 175lbr with a long career to go downhill.

For Quarry, he was coming off a career-best win and his previous loss had been to Ali, he lost clearly but other fighters had taken worst beatings.

And the Frazier he lost to had a lot of wear and tear on him- he lost worse to a worse-version of Frazier.

Maybe he was drinking, and the accumulation of gym wars/booze/hard fights.

 

Norris for sure- he was on the verge of a touted $4.5m payday vs Oscar [Remember the Oscar-Lottery??] and then he just fell apart vs club-fighter Mullings and then lost his next two before qutting.

He was given Dana Rosenblatt as a comeback opponent, which made loads of sense. Rosneblatt was a big southpaw who was chinny but Norris punch was long gone.

Then, finally, he was brought over to Europe as a name-opponent for Boudouani to beat up.

He literally went from the verge of $$$ payday vs Oscar to getting $100,000 vs a guy he'd have been a 10-1 favourite with a year or two previously.

 

SOmetimes the collapse has already happened- and in a reasonable fashion too.

JC Chavez losing to Willy Wise was a big "upset" but Chavez was totally finished and whatever reserves he had were all used up vs MAG and Tszyu.

 

That reminds me - Mosley took on Wise after that. On HBO. How the hell did that fight get approved? Mosley defending his P4P title against Willy Wise.

 

One of the things I used to rant about here was how circular the arguments were about who was a "good fighter" and how "strong" a division was.

Wise beat Chavez, suddenly be became the sort of guy you could fight as part of a PFP resume. Joke.

 

Rj is the clear answer

 

That's simply not true. Everybody knew Wise was a journeyman that lucked up

 

Not everybody at HBO.

For a decade or more, 147 was a merry go around of guys losing to each other, with all of them claiming a shared-common-ancestor like Oscar as proof of their brilliance and their magnificence.

Examples?

Oscar loses to Shane, Shane is the gratest. Shane loses to Forrest, Forrest is the new gratest. Forest makes, 1 defence, maybe, he loses to Mayorga, Mayorga is now the gratest most dangrus puncher from Central America. It went on and on until Zab Judah was holding the same undisputed WW title as Sugar Ray Robinson.



And it was all sponsored by MAXBOXING and friends. They kept this shit going.

Them and, in what perhaps is the GRATEST FORESHADOWING OF ARE TIMES, the New York Times:-

"Ricardo Mayorga, the fighter from Managua, Nicaragua, who was seemingly on his way to becoming fighter of the year, stumbled badly on Saturday night when Cory Spinks scored a shocking 12-round majority decision to become the undisputed welterweight champion."

 

10 years and an entire division of bedwetting gatekeepers.......

Oscar loses to Shane
Shane loses to Forrest
Forrest loses to Mayorga
Mayorga loses to Stinks
Stinks loses to Bumdomir

Total time elapsed: 6 years......and there was an awful lot of other shit involved along the way.

 

I think Stinks lost to Judah. But point taken.

 

The sad thing is, if Chavez had won, the plan was most likely for Mosley to face Chavez. That at least would've made sense financially. But when Chavez lost, Mosley should've broadened his search. Nobody wanted to watch him face Wise.

 

That whole division of Welters from 1999-2009 didn't go downhill as much as they just went around and around and around in a gigantic fucking circle all taking chances to lose to one another.

It all got passed off as some insanely tough division where anybody could lose to anybody.

And that "anybody" was usually somebody coming UP in weight from a lower division

In 2005 Cotto damn near lost to Torres, then he got beaten down by Margarito, illegally, but by 2009 was fighting for the Welter title at 147 vs former Flyweight Manny Pac.

And the flyweight won!

WELTER!!

 

Chavez had been beaten up by Tszyu and failed to beat MAG. He was shot to shit. But he's a legend!! A LEGEND.

I can just smell Lampley right now............."If it makes us money, it makes sense to you, so shut up and get your credit card out, plebs, we are bringing you HISTORY here tonight".

 

In between the Shavers and Frazier fights, Quarry almost got KTFO by clubfighter Joe Alexander. This fight should've served as a warning sign that things were headed south, but sadly, he didn't heed it.

 

What this has to do with Wise?

 

Thad Spencer had one of the most shockingly steep declines in all of boxing history - he went directly from being touted as "the next Ali" (following a schooling of Ernie Terrell) to never winning another fight in his entire career.

LW champ Wallace "Bud" Smith also had a rather sharp decline - he wasn't exactly a great fighter to begin with, but he went directly from being a rugged fighter good enough to beat an aging Jimmy Carter twice to losing (and getting stopped) against seemingly everyone under the Sun.

Lew Jenkins had a notably sharp decline as he went from bombing out world class fighters to being just good enough to win at the clubfighter level in the span of just a few years.

Alfonso Zamora only fought a handful of times after his landmark loss to Zarate and was around .500 in those fights, after starting his career with twenty-something consecutive KO wins.

Pipino Cuevas bombed out top contenders for years, then looked like a faded old man against Roger Stafford only a year after losing his title to Hearns.

 

He did like to imitate Ali verbally, I think he might have been a sort of a KINGRY of this time, a bit of a showpony who knew how to act the part and make himself appealing but lacked the true innate qualities.

Yeah I remember that fight now alright. Quarry looks facially a lot older, probably drinking. Looks really fresh in the Spencer fight, only 5 odd years prior.

 

Saad Muhammad had a rather swift decline from getting worn down by Dwight Qawi over 10 to getting blown out in the rematch to getting bombed out in 3 by Eric Winbush.

 

Quarry vs Spencer for the King of the Downhill Fast Title.



Pause it at 6:09

I am CERTAIN that that is Dick O'Neill of Pelham123 fame.

 

Yeah the facefirsters always seem to go that way. It's so obvious, the accumulative effect of punishment.

Some guys like Gatti get away with it- thanks to selective matchmaking and sympathetic broadcasters who know how to work a gullible audience.

Back then though everybody was tough, so even a soft touch meant fighting a potential killer.

That Joe Young guy who dropped Quarry would probably be a Champion today at 200 or 175 or that Catcherweight shit or whatever its called.

 

Some journeymen seem to stay tough forever and then suddenly begin to not lose- which they always did- but lose badly.

Shane Sutcliffe was one of them.

One guy who had TWO Declines was Oleg Maskaev.

He comes in, looks earmarked to be a journeyman, taking beatings from Oliver McCall and Tua {eventually}. Two really bad KO's in his first 11 fights.

Then he puts together a sort of a run of wins, beating Jefferson, Rahman etc before being iced by Kirk Johnson.

He becomes a punchbag of sorts, losing to Corey Sanders, Mount Whittaker, basically anybody who could hit him.

He then goes on this Bum-Run, where he fights like 10 guys, 2 of whom are barely recognizable names at that point {David Defigabon and Samil-Sam} he scores no big KO's in this run and he's just marking time, but it lands him the Rahman fight by luck after Vitali retires.

He wins that, shockingly, albeit what had happened in their first fight.

He then goes on another decline, losing to Sam Peter and Nagy Aguilera via bludgeoning KO on both occasions. It's only 2 ko losses but both are brutal.

He then starts another comeback, winning 3 straight.......before quitting.

 

Morales fell off pretty quick after the first Pacquiao fight.

Then he came back and looked great, then fell off again after the Cano fight.

 

Kelly Pavlik also became a bit of a joke overnight.........the loss to Hopkins was suprising but it's not like it was a career ending beating.

He just fucked off to become a drinker.......that no-talent midget Marquez wouldn't have beaten him the night he beat Taylor.

Taylor, likewise, went downhill fast but at least in his case it was all due to damage caused by fighting.

In his case it might have been sooner than we thought, you think of how quickly he started to look bad in fights, Winky 12 round draw with Manny losing his mind in the corner.

 

I heard he had been drinking a lot. When he came back for the Maidana fight, he had this pot belly and no arms.

Usually a sign of some sort of non-ageing related physical decline.

 

"Yeah, I made him fall off pretty quick".

 

Jesus..........Danny Williams had 3 losses when he fought Vitali.

One of them was a stoppage to Sinan Samil Sam, when he was diagnosed with Shingles after the fight.

2 others were point losses to Sprott and Julius Francis.

He beats Mike Tyson and then loses to Vitali...........and he's had 25 , yes, 25 losses since then.

I don't know of ANY modern fighter who has gone on to have 25 losses after a title shot.

 

Lol come on, Dany Williams was a journeyman, his ceiling never was high and neither was his fall. I know you like to hype Vitali but if we start listing those caliber of fighters this thread will go nowhere fast