Your Top 5 Heavyweights Ever?

dmar5143 wrote:

i agree babe ruth today would hit 30 home runs.the major reason is today the babe would be about 115 years old...

lol

Wolfgangsta wrote:

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The nostalgia argument is the last refuge of someone who has no data to work with.

Every sport has crazies that declare alcoholic undertrained part time tobacco using athletes of yesteryear would hold a candle to today's athletes. There is a reason nearly every record in sports has been set in recent years.

Still no data huh? Let me provide some.

-60+ years ago extraordinary athletes had two ways to make good livings as athletes. Boxing and baseball and that's it. So boxing got the absolute cream of the athletic crop. Today athletes can make livings as cyclists, gymnasts, soccer players, tennis players, golfers, swimmers, runners, throwers, jumpers and I can go on and on. So boxing gets a relatively lower quality athlete than ever before. Who would choose to get hit in the face for a living if they have a choice?

-50 years ago we had TWICE as many fighters as we have today. Can you name another sport where that is true? Those half as many fighters are spread across twice as many divisions. That means mathematically the sport is now FOUR TIMES less competitive than it was back then.

-In addition fighters today fight half as often. Do you want to make the argument that boxing is the one human endeavor where doing something less somehow makes one more proficient?

-Boxing is weight restricted. The revolution that has so impacted other sports is SIZE driven. Why are point guards better and faster today? A large part is because they are 6'5 rather than 6 feet tall as they were 50 years ago. Why are offensive tackles better? Because they are 6'7 and 330 pounds rather than Forrest Gregg's 6'5 and 250. But except for the heavies boxing is weight restricted. 147 is 147. One simply cannot take a man fit enough to fight 15 rounds at a torrid pace and find excess flesh on him. It's not possible. Can you make him biger and stronger? Sure. But it necessarily means turning him into a middleweight. So now he's fighting bigger and stronger men with all the implications of that. Is that really advantageous? There is a reason big welters 110 years ago were 5'11, they were 5'11 in Ray Robinson's time and they are 5'11 today. If one could really improve things the way one can in non-weight restricted sports we'd have a whole bunch of 6'2 147's running around.

-Fighters get trained largely the same way they were trained 110 years ago. Running, jumping rope, heavy bag, speed bag, plyometrics, some weightlifting, interval work and sparring. It hasn't changed much. Why? Because unlike other sports where training came in 30-40 years ago? Fighters have been being trained for 300 years and boxing, as a result, was ahead of the curve. If the new magic training methods matterred so much in boxing we'd have the best heavyweight division ever, instead of the catastrophe we have today.

-Overall resources and teaching. Can you name another sport where 90% of the facilities once devoted to it are gone along with the teachers who taught there? Boxing is a craft, a set of skills, Now we have fewer men teaching and practicing those skills than we've had for a century. How could today's fighters POSSIBLY be better?

marble amen..even if your talking to a brick wall there should be some cracks of realistic logic based on facts..or examples provided..

dmar5143 wrote:

marble amen..even if your talking to a brick wall there should be some cracks of realistic logic based on facts..or examples provided..

The thing is I WANT boxing to move the way the other sports have. I WANT to see better athletes than in the past. I WANT to see technically superior fighters than those of the 1930's. I WANT to watch the greatest boxers of all-time as they happen.

Those are some great points and some things I'd never thought about, but when did boxers start to really earn above middle class wages?

Vitali outpointing Ali, come on how is Vitali suppose to deal with the constant movement and jab being plodded in his face ? you saw what happened when Lewis put leather on him, a vagina spawned above his eye.

It is a bad stylistic matchup for Vitali.


Ali's speed is something he hasn't dealt with. The jab and the right hand would get in early and often.

What is Vitali's defense going to be? In his last 4-5 fights he has used a very unorthodox style. He has his hands down and when you go to throw he just leans way back, almost as if he was leaning on some invisible ropes.

That defense is fine against guys like Peter, Gomez, Arreola, Johnson, and Sosnowski. It isn't going to work against someone that is much faster than him.

Wolfgangsta wrote:

Those are some great points and some things I'd never thought about, but when did boxers start to really earn above middle class wages?

125 years ago when John L. Sullivan was making hundreds of thousands a year when the average worker made perhaps $1000.

Jack Demspey made several hundred thousand dollars a fight.

Top fighters have ALWAYS made big money. Even when the sport was illegal.

I might consider myself corrected on that.

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That defense is fine against guys like Peter, Gomez, Arreola, Johnson, and Sosnowski. It isn't going to work against someone that is much faster than him.

I might concede that too.

Wolfgangsta wrote:

I might consider myself corrected on that.

We don't admit errors around here

One question I don't know the answer to is is MMA siphoning off guys who would otherwise have been boxers or is it drawing new guys into broadly defined combat sports?

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One question I don't know the answer to is is MMA siphoning off guys who would otherwise have been boxers or is it drawing new guys into broadly defined combat sports?

It's absolutely going to take fighters away. It's going to damage the US in Olympic wrestling as well. All martial arts that feed into MMA in their pure forms will probably suffer at the championship level.

1. Ali
2. Louis
3. Johnson
4. Marciano
5. Dempsey

But I'm not quite the historian that others here are

Wolfgangsta wrote:

Quote :

One question I don't know the answer to is is MMA siphoning off guys who would otherwise have been boxers or is it drawing new guys into broadly defined combat sports?

It's absolutely going to take fighters away. It's going to damage the US in Olympic wrestling as well. All martial arts that feed into MMA in their pure forms will probably suffer at the championship level.

So you don't think it is adding to the pool in a meaningful way? Kids who would otherwise have played, say, baseball choosing MMA?

NJBeatdown86 wrote:

1. Ali
2. Louis
3. Johnson
4. Marciano
5. Dempsey

But I'm not quite the historian that others here are

Do what the rest of us do...FAKE IT!

marbleheadmaui wrote:

Wolfgangsta wrote:

Those are some great points and some things I'd never thought about, but when did boxers start to really earn above middle class wages?

125 years ago when John L. Sullivan was making hundreds of thousands a year when the average worker made perhaps $1000.

Jack Demspey made several hundred thousand dollars a fight.

Top fighters have ALWAYS made big money. Even when the sport was illegal.

Tunney got a mill for the Dempsey fight

marbleheadmaui wrote:

NJBeatdown86 wrote:

1. Ali
2. Louis
3. Johnson
4. Marciano
5. Dempsey

But I'm not quite the historian that others here are

Do what the rest of us do...FAKE IT!

That's what she said.

Wolf, how many fighters are there in MMA overall? How many in each of the top organizations?

o no wolf didnt bring this horrible argument up for the millionth time

!!!!!!

marbleheadmaui wrote:

dmar5143 wrote:

marble amen..even if your talking to a brick wall there should be some cracks of realistic logic based on facts..or examples provided..

The thing is I WANT boxing to move the way the other sports have. I WANT to see better athletes than in the past. I WANT to see technically superior fighters than those of the 1930's. I WANT to watch the greatest boxers of all-time as they happen.

can you just imagine if boxing would have evolved? imagine the great fighters of the past and now imagine that the fighters now were better. boxing would literally be the best sport hands down! it already is but it would be even better.

What argument Bird?

I think it will add to the pool but I think the guys who would be winning Olympic wrestling medals will be fighting in MMA instead.

Wolfgangsta wrote:

Jack Johnson always ends up on these lists but how would he really stack up against today's HW monsters the Klit bros and the other legends on this list?

Depends ENTIRELY on the rules and glove sizes. A 40 round fight with five ounce gloves? Johnson buries them both. A 12 round fight with ten ounce gloves? I don't know if Johnson fights fast enough.

powerpuncher wrote:

marbleheadmaui wrote:

dmar5143 wrote:

marble amen..even if your talking to a brick wall there should be some cracks of realistic logic based on facts..or examples provided..

The thing is I WANT boxing to move the way the other sports have. I WANT to see better athletes than in the past. I WANT to see technically superior fighters than those of the 1930's. I WANT to watch the greatest boxers of all-time as they happen.

can you just imagine if boxing would have evolved? imagine the great fighters of the past and now imagine that the fighters now were better. boxing would literally be the best sport hands down! it already is but it would be even better.

With regards to boxing people usually make the wrong argument. They say thigs like "Imagine Jack Demspey with today's training methods and Nutrition." The far better question is "Imagine if Roy Jones had come along in the 1930's, been trained at Stillman's by Ray Arcel, had had to fight every month, had had to fight the best over and over again and thefroe would have had to develop craft just to survive, how good would HE have been?"

the this era would own the old eras

gets brought up about 50 times a week and almost everyone that argues the new era is greater realizes how wrong they are

fighters fighting deeper division 10-15 times a year makes for better sharper fighters


Jack Johnson was a defensive amster, great at tieng up opponents, good inside fighter who could go 40 rounds

it kind of makes me depressed just thinking about it. certain fighters now would be considered even greater than they are now. especially fighters like jones (like marb said) and mayweather. so much talent but not enough fights and fights that would have happened if they fought more often.