Ali vs Wilt

[Scott9945]

You badly under estimate Muhammad Ali. You also put far to much emphasis on size.

You think?

Only suckers who don't really understand boxing would pick Chamberlain over Ali.

[Elroy1]

You badly under estimate Muhammad Ali. You also put far to much emphasis on size.

T-bear, I propose that I only put as much emphasis on SIZE as it is important and no further.

Let me ask you something, what is it that enabled Ali to win most of his fights?

You'll answer with many things, some factual, some fictional but you'd probably neglect TWO of the MOST IMPORTANT reasons!!

That Muhammad Ali outweighed 70% of his opponents

And that he OUT-TALLED almost ALL of them!

Take away Ali's size, paint him white, and he is Jerry Quarry.

[TBear]

T-bear, I propose that I only put as much emphasis on SIZE as it is important and no further.

Let me ask you something, what is it that enabled Ali to win most of his fights?

You'll answer with many things, some factual, some fictional but you'd probably neglect TWO of the MOST IMPORTANT reasons!!

That Muhammad Ali outweighed 70% of his opponents

And that he OUT-TALLED almost ALL of them!

Take away Ali's size, paint him white, and he is Jerry Quarry.

That is silly. Ali won most of his fights with speed and his amazing skills. Later in his career when the speed and skill slipped away he won with heart, endurance and a tremendous chin.

Wait!, are you suggesting if Quarry was bigger he would have been equal to the Klitschkos?

[Elroy1]

That is silly. Ali won most of his fights with speed and his amazing skills. Later in his career when the speed and skill slipped away he won with heart, endurance and a tremendous chin.

Wait!, are you suggesting if Quarry was bigger he would have been equal to the Klitschkos?

Some of the things you mentioned were PARTIALLY responsible to Ali's success.

Partially because they were only successful because they were ALLIED to his size.

No, of course not, how would Quarry be equalivalent to a Klitschko if he were larger? They fight nothing alike!

I clearly stated that Quarry would be equal to an Ali were he larger (because they fought similarly and had similar relative attributes other than size) and further that Ali and Quarry would be equal to Tyson Fury if they were much MUCH larger for the same reasons.

Ironically "size" played an important role in the latest HW title fight the other night. IT was Tyson's skills, speed, movement etc responsible ALLIED to his reach/height/weight advantage, take the latter away, and it wouldn't be enough.

I don't suppose size is the end of the argument, otherwise there'd be no point to boxing at all. Only that it is extremely important all else equal and that the CHANCES of winning become less and less the larger the opponent is (statisticlly proven), this is why there are weight ranges which also indirectly limit height also.

In fact it's generally nostalgists who NEGLECT the importance of size in boxing altogether.

I merely propose it be allocated it's true place.

And of course the reason it isn't is because if a certain group of boxers admitted how important such things were in boxing, they would suddenly have hardly anything to say about the chances of their old favourites in modern contests.

Worth a thought.

[juggernaut666]

That is silly. Ali won most of his fights with speed and his amazing skills. Later in his career when the speed and skill slipped away he won with heart, endurance and a tremendous chin.

Wait!, are you suggesting if Quarry was bigger he would have been equal to the Klitschkos?

Ali style doesnt work without a height advantage unless the opposition is far inferior , the only real smaller guy able to get a win was Frazier ,not because hes the beytter fighter but because he stayed on him and Alis lack of blocking left hooks.

Vitali Klitchko and Tyson Fury have Ali style like attributes both fight with their hands down ,lean back ,you cannot be small and get away doing this no matter how much footwork you use . Being both are over 6'6 makes the style much more effective and harder to land clean shots on neither is susceptible to any punch .....Ali was not hard to hit at all with jabs or left hooks !

[Elroy1]

Wrong again. It wasn't even the biggest upset in sports in November 2015. Ronda Rousey was a much heavier betting favorite over Holly Holm.

Um, I hardly think a fighter with what, 10 victories in a basically amateur sport losing to a similarly versed fighter ranks as comparable.

We're talking a guy who did questionably nothing prior to winning (like Fury and Douglas) defeated a guy who was considered basically invincible (like Wladimir and Mike).

[Elroy1]

Ali style doesnt work without a height advantage unless the opposition is far inferior , the only real smaller guy able to get a win was Frazier ,not because hes the beytter fighter but because he stayed on him and Alis lack of blocking left hooks.

Vitali Klitchko and Tyson Fury have Ali style like attributes both fight with their hands down ,lean back ,you cannot be small and get away doing this no matter how much footwork you use . Being both are over 6'6 makes the style much more effective and harder to land clean shots on neither is susceptible to any punch .....Ali was not hard to hit at all with jabs or left hooks !

Yes the Ali "reflexes" was one of the myths that I was alluding to.

In fact in absolute terms (relative to the modern HW division), Ali has no reflexes, no chin, no skills and only running style footwork.

He is totally eclipsed in all these things by all the comparable sized cruiser heavies today like David Haye etc AND is also much weaker and less athletic as well.

In my opinion it is impossible for a nostalgist not to understand this. I am certain I can get a person who has suffered multiple strokes to understand it with enough effort.

The only conclusion I can see possible is they don't WANT to understand it because it threatens their closed world view.

[sonnyboyx2]

Not correct.

Chamberlain original take for the 1971 contest would of been $500,000.

He later demanded $1.8 million, which was the reason behind the contest falling through.

From 1967-1972 Chamberlain yearly salary was $250,000 and in 1973 it was $600,000.

Total salary from 1967 to 1973 equals $2.1 million.

Chamberlain was on a salary from 1958, so this figure could increase if we looked further.

you have only included Chamberlains "Fight Purse" which would have been only a fraction of his earnings.

[sonnyboyx2]

Well this sounds far more plausible to me than the "timber" story

Are you making claim Muhammad Ali never shouted, "TIMBER" to Chamberlain???

[Elroy1]

Are you making claim Muhammad Ali never shouted, "TIMBER" to Chamberlain???

Not at all.

I'm making claim that you are simply a ridiculous imbecile if you think that that gape mouth little idiot staring at Wilt saying "Timber" had any bearing on this fight going ahead whatsoever