How exactly do fighters get ruined after wars?

your brain doesn't heal like your bones, muscles, soft tissues, etc. christ, i thought you guys were supposed to be boxing fans...

Good post. That's when we get the "gun shy" fighters who are afraid to throw at all after going through a war in his previous fight. Physical trauma can shake a mans spirit and leech away his confidence. I think a lot of it is mental as in confidence. Anyone can get knocked out but to me it's like once an undefeated fighter loses via KO, they typically get shell-shocked and trigger shy. It usually happens as soon as they get tagged hard in the next fight in their "comeback". Lucien Bute is a great example of this. He could and should have smashed Pascal to bits but he froze up and I guess just kept having flashbacks of the Froch fight. The only time he opened up late in the fight, he hurts Pascal and could have dropped him. These other fighters that keep getting KO'd after the initial time, it's like they get hit, freeze up and don't know what to do and they leave themselves open to hard punches while frozen. RJJ is the only fighter I can think of that just got KO'd consistently by a single shot....he really lost something upstairs and you can tell by the way he talks now, slurred speech, gets fighters names wrong all the time, etc.

Your brain is a blob of jelly incased in a spikey hard shell, it's just not designed to withstand repeated concussions.

I don't know, Motocross racers go through the worst injuries imaginable from severe concussions to broken backs and necks including being in coma for days spending months in a wheel chair. They are able to recover and come back to compete at the highest level. Yes, sometimes they get taken out of commission due to the extent of the injuries but they break bones and get concussions over and over and some come back as stronger or stronger(Trey Canard paralyzed for almost a year, multiple concussions and had placed 3rd in the last two races, Villopoto, broken femur and blown knees with multiple concussions and has won the SX championship the last three years). Some will say this is not a good analogy but the fact is their bodies and brain(concussions) take a beating during their careers and they keep coming back. Their bodies are full of plates, screws, rods, pins. They go through "routine" surgeries just to change or adjust some of that hardware. Again, some will never be the same but the majority are able to bounce back. I think we are missing something in this equation, this is just my opinion. Sorry but Motocross is a bad example. They do not go thru consistent head trauma like Boxers, NFL players are a much better example. They are the only sport that rivals the amount of consistent head trauma that boxers experience.

The one guy (can't state who out of respect) who explained it to me had been KO'd in the fight he most felt confident. He said after several years of competitive fighting and at the young age of 28 he felt that his punch resistance was fading, he didn't have problems making weight or any personal disturbances that affected him. He had never been dropped in a fight but after the amount of punches he'd taken in the 10yr span of sparring and fighting he felt his ability to withstand a shot become more serious than before as he was visibly hurt in the last 4 bouts before the unfortunate loss. In his 2nd to last fight he had gone in fully confident feeling that he had just been lacking defense and it was what lead to his vulnerability, he fought a guy not known to be a big puncher with only 5 stoppages in 20wins but on that night he had been knocked out and was out cold. He didn't understand why he was out cold as he never ever thought he was going to be put to sleep like that, and suffering through major depression and anxiety he decided to educate himself on the matter. Now the scientific part he told me, "You're brain is protected by a certain liquid, which stops it from bouncing around. Over time that liquid becomes unable to control the brains movements if your head is facing traumatic blows. Then eventually your brain shakes so hard that the liquid is unable to protect it which results in a blackout. After this the liquids placement in the brain is not the same and it's ability to protect the bouncing around is reduced and weakened which therefore makes you more vulnerable to be blacked out again". I sort of understand the theory and respected his decision to continue just the once after his loss, and although he trained harder than ever he just didn't look the same in his final fight. When people state weak chins, it's this same liquid that's protecting the brain from wobbling that is the core reason to why a fighters punch resistance is weakened. I guess genetically if you're gifted with a durable sturdy jelly like surrounding on the brain you should consider yourself lucky however even the most durable protected noggin will have its limits as just like anything in the human body bruising and damage will occur, and if it's the brain where all the nervous system is travelling through its definitely not the best part.

Like other have said its mental your brain gets damaged causing your reaction timing to be off making you gun shy and appaer slower than usual and older than you are. I remember on The Contender they had the fighters do some type of computer reaction test and one guy had the reaction time of a 80 year old man, and they said its because he was in to many gym wars and sparring ruing his brain causing his reaction time to be off, I forgot the fighter though but they didn't want him to fight because he couldn't pass the test.

Good post. That's when we get the "gun shy" fighters who are afraid to throw at all after going through a war in his previous fight. Physical trauma can shake a mans spirit and leech away his confidence. Got any examples? Speaking of being gun shy, it can happen to a fighter after he seriously injures someone in the ring, two prime examples are Eubank and the great Robinson, both men were never the same again and both spoke extensively about their unwillingness to ever truly try and finish a fighter off, although Eubank seemed more severely affected than SRR. So they would be two examples, and guys who themselves lose the killer instinct due to too many wars...Tyson was never truly the same after his demoralising loss to douglas and just when he seemed to be at his most imposing best again he got humiliated by a past it holyfield, tito after bhop, MAB after Pacquiao and so on. I don't know, Motocross racers go through the worst injuries imaginable from severe concussions to broken backs and necks including being in coma for days spending months in a wheel chair. They are able to recover and come back to compete at the highest level. Yes, sometimes they get taken out of commission due to the extent of the injuries but they break bones and get concussions over and over and some come back as stronger or stronger(Trey Canard paralyzed for almost a year, multiple concussions and had placed 3rd in the last two races, Villopoto, broken femur and blown knees with multiple concussions and has won the SX championship the last three years). Some will say this is not a good analogy but the fact is their bodies and brain(concussions) take a beating during their careers and they keep coming back. Their bodies are full of plates, screws, rods, pins. They go through "routine" surgeries just to change or adjust some of that hardware. Again, some will never be the same but the majority are able to bounce back. I think we are missing something in this equation, this is just my opinion. great points and I dont watch motorcross but i understand the sentiment. its really the same in boxing, some fighters come back, war after war until they just cant anymore. im sure theres no motor cross driver who can carry on at the highest level for eternity. age catches up to even the bravest of athletes.

Imagine being in a race for 100 miles, getting to 99.9 % of the distance and then the race being called off. Would you want to restart the race again and walk another 100 miles? Most wouldn't, just the same as the desire to fight goes down somewhat. Among other obvious physical signs.

This is a good question actually. Even though we think of recuperation as a passive process ("just lying there") I think it requires a lot of work of the body. A fat person requires their heart to work overtime, and a person who constantly takes beatings requires more of their body by having to constantly recuperate. All this work of the body's might age the person prematurely. This might be why people in the past and in 3rd world countries today have shorter life spans: they have more disease to contend with which means their bodies have to work harder to fight it off. It also why we might hear of people who have had hard lives here in the west, "aging beyond their years". This is just a theory. I don't know the reasons for sure.

Doesn't the human body repair itself? Just take some time off, eat good food, relax, and you'll be 100 percent, right? This topic is very interesting to me. How come boxers can't let their body heal and everything's fine? A lot of people say the first Margarito fight permanently took something out of Cotto. Something he will never get back. every fighter has a number of punches he can take before he cant take a punch anymore. look at mayorga, vargas and julian jackson. iron chinned in their primes and glass jawed towards the end of their respective careers. they just took too many shots. i dont really understand what it is you dont understand tbh. its common knowledge the more punishment a fighter takes the shorter his career will be which makes perfect sense. rest can only get you so far, it wont remove the experience of getting your brain switched of or taking an enormous amount of punishment. you can rest and recuperate from the short term damage, but the long term damage is still there. you cant just make it not happen by resting. its often mental as well.

There's certain things a body can not recover from, too many wars = too much wear and tear, the muscles are damaged, ligaments, joints, they all suffer and as age wears on, the physical ability to push on in a war is no longer there. However, many times, it is the psychological issue, the fact that a fighter may feel he doesn't want to go to that dark place any longer, he has been there too many times and he starts to feel afraid, unwilling to take his body and essentially his life to those limits ever again. I don't know, Motocross racers go through the worst injuries imaginable from severe concussions to broken backs and necks including being in coma for days spending months in a wheel chair. They are able to recover and come back to compete at the highest level. Yes, sometimes they get taken out of commission due to the extent of the injuries but they break bones and get concussions over and over and some come back as stronger or stronger(Trey Canard paralyzed for almost a year, multiple concussions and had placed 3rd in the last two races, Villopoto, broken femur and blown knees with multiple concussions and has won the SX championship the last three years). Some will say this is not a good analogy but the fact is their bodies and brain(concussions) take a beating during their careers and they keep coming back. Their bodies are full of plates, screws, rods, pins. They go through "routine" surgeries just to change or adjust some of that hardware. Again, some will never be the same but the majority are able to bounce back. I think we are missing something in this equation, this is just my opinion.

Good post. That's when we get the "gun shy" fighters who are afraid to throw at all after going through a war in his previous fight. Physical trauma can shake a mans spirit and leech away his confidence. Got any examples?

Doesn't the human body repair itself? Just take some time off, eat good food, relax, and you'll be 100 percent, right? This topic is very interesting to me. How come boxers can't let their body heal and everything's fine? A lot of people say the first Margarito fight permanently took something out of Cotto. Something he will never get back. This is something I have always wonder about. You hear trainers and commentators labeling fighters as "damaged goods" but nobody ever explains it from a scientific stand point. I totally understand the psychological part of it but its hard for me to comprehend the physical side of it.

Most boxing is 90% mental. Once someone breaks your will, its hard to maintain the same level. Like falling out of love with someone...

There's certain things a body can not recover from, too many wars = too much wear and tear, the muscles are damaged, ligaments, joints, they all suffer and as age wears on, the physical ability to push on in a war is no longer there. However, many times, it is the psychological issue, the fact that a fighter may feel he doesn't want to go to that dark place any longer, he has been there too many times and he starts to feel afraid, unwilling to take his body and essentially his life to those limits ever again. Good post. That's when we get the "gun shy" fighters who are afraid to throw at all after going through a war in his previous fight. Physical trauma can shake a mans spirit and leech away his confidence.

In short, the damage is often permanent.

Doesn't the human body repair itself? Just take some time off, eat good food, relax, and you'll be 100 percent, right? This topic is very interesting to me. How come boxers can't let their body heal and everything's fine? A lot of people say the first Margarito fight permanently took something out of Cotto. Something he will never get back. There's certain things a body can not recover from, too many wars = too much wear and tear, the muscles are damaged, ligaments, joints, they all suffer and as age wears on, the physical ability to push on in a war is no longer there. However, many times, it is the psychological issue, the fact that a fighter may feel he doesn't want to go to that dark place any longer, he has been there too many times and he starts to feel afraid, unwilling to take his body and essentially his life to those limits ever again.

Posters have said it all Also confidence goes and doubt kicks in so you cave in more easily

The body is delicate. It can't just take right hands and left hooks like it's nothing. Look at all the MMA fighters who get ruined. Brain damage. Too many blows to the head!

Doesn't the human body repair itself? Just take some time off, eat good food, relax, and you'll be 100 percent, right? This topic is very interesting to me. How come boxers can't let their body heal and everything's fine? A lot of people say the first Margarito fight permanently took something out of Cotto. Something he will never get back. Massive punishment, and they get broken mentally. Look at Broner and Ortiz, two fighters that stepped in the ring with Maidana and will never be the same. Ever.