Naseem Hamed - ATG or Fraud

[Sugar Adam Ali]

So there's nobody left?

There are still plenty of good trainers. Maybe not great, but good enough.

Nacho beristain is still da man

[Suckmedry]

It's hilarious that it never occurs to you that YOU are the oddball.

It's like the whole history forum is a lunatic asylum and elroy is the guy in a straight jacket laughing manically calling the rest of us crazy.

[Anthony342]

There are still plenty of good trainers. Maybe not great, but good enough.

Like who? And who do they train?

[Anthony342]

That is a matter of philosophy in some respects. A lot of guys are not known...they can be someone young like Barry Robinson, who you can google. This guy, whether one agrees or not with his philosophy does an incredible amount of study on the subject and is a great film reviewer...he is on Utube. Then you have the Ray Corsos of the world...guys who came up with other trainers, usually from traditional boxing gyms, before MMA.

The name guys are not necessarily the best. before Bruce Lee came to town every martial arts instructor was part of a system. If my style was Shotokan karate, for example, I was probably fighting against Goju Ryu karate guys. Then a funny thing happened, something I call the basement revolution! So in new york city, LA and other big cities there was not a lot of space. in Hong Kong you can watch film of Yip Man (who taught Lee Wing Chun) doing forms in his kitchen as kids are running under his feet, and he tries to avoid the stove! Well...nobody had space in New York either, but there was always a super in the building and a basement. Supers are usually relatively sociopathic individuals who like violence...so if one was nice, said they were a martial artist (which used to be a big deal back in the day!) inevitably the super would let them use the basement to train in! In LA ditto, except instead of a basement it was your garage.

These basements became labratories where martial arts were pulled apart, where young men gained bruised lips and hips...and a scolding from mom/ or wifey as they then put together these martial arts again and again and again. Most film of Bruce lee, including with such legends as Dan Insanto, are in a garage of some sort....not a dojo! The upshot of this was, people became exploratory and sceptical. they wanted to be more well rounded and to understand WHY things did. or did not, work. It was a great time to be a martial artist really and I would imagine a boxer as well, though I can't vouch for that.

Boxing went through a similar process really. Gyms were packed, playgrounds were often used for boxers to set up punching appuratus and people were always doing roadwork. Ali was the champ and everyone wanted to be Ali except the one or two kids who would be frazier in the schoolyard slap fights.

Well today if a teacher does not have a gym, a school and doesnt charge a lot of money they are not taken seriously. The Koreans commercialized the arts at first, but the Gracies really made it about the money. Not that you don't get some great training out of this new way...arts like Sayok Kali and Gracie jiu jitsu are great systems with a real knack for consistancy and weeding out the frauds. But alas something is lost. Today there is a technique that is taught to address the combat scenerio and depending on your belt and training, you will learn those things as part of the system...when i was coming up it was more like, "Listen I want you to grab me as hard as you can, dont let me twist the arm!" and you would see what worked and didn't work. This was the old way...trial and error. There is even a story about two great fighters from two systems who fought each other hammer and tongs with bare hands and with sticks...one fuy had better Ju Jutsu the other guy better bo Jutsu (stick) and out of this came a new system.

My point is that now, we see guys like Roach at their gyms and we know about a trainer through their gyms...and this is how the new guys are trining people, not through reputation.

I'm sure some boxing trainers probably started out of a garage too. Ever see those Gracie in Action tapes? I believe those were challenge matches done from their garage.

[RubenSonny]

Is it only one or the other? An ATG or a dodgy fraud? Can he not be a HOF fighter, but just short of an ATG?

Just short? I would say he was nowhere near all time greatness.

[The Old LefHook]

If he really was that unprepared he would have gone for a rematch to prove it. But as we know he quit after being exposed and humiliated. Barrera managed to kick his and allah's asses in one go, too bad he only got rid of one of them though.

The moslem's metoric rise, adulation and fall reminds me of Popo's ride. He could not deal with fundamentals, ol' Popo. He was a KO sensation, too, but he didn't know how to box either, he just knew how to jump and sprint around the ring like a lot of clowns do who have good athletic talent.

Hey, in all those fights the old timers were fighting--sometimes three per month when they were rolling--they couldn't have learned anything from all those encounters, could they? No, I don't suppose so. I mean, they wouldn't pick up any of those subtlties and instinctive uses and variations of fundamentals Bill spoke of earlier, now would they? Of course not. Why, if you're good you're good, and if you're not you're not. Sounds like Jerry Reed, I know. I mean, you come out of the womb loaded for fast twitch fiber and the promise of some muscularity. You're almost good enough then, right, 'cept you're not big enough, no division will accept you.

Since Ali, people started fighting more on their talent than their skill in fundamentals. To some extent that has to happen in an era where fighters fight less often. Super human specimens like Ali and Roy Jones and Ray Leonard can rise to the top their unique way and stay there as long as their reflexes last. If you had a chin you usually keep it, but only a one notch loss of reflexes and it is good night nurse for the guys not wading deep in fundamentals. Roy Jones and Cassius Ali had chins that were polar opposites.

I feel Willie Pep would have bean-bagged the off balance moslem mericlessly, and Sandy Saddler would have buckshot him. Featherweight has not been a sad division. Morales, now there is a man who literally grew up in a gym, and maybe was born in one. A lot of savvy and a warrior's ticker. He would figure out what he had to do with the range against that nasty old moslem. For Marquez it would be easy as picking berries.

I don't mean the moslem was some kind of absolute slouch--he was not a slouch at all. When that corner I mentioned above got turned, more than just super human fighters tried to make it on mostly talent. Popo and Hamed were part of the second tier of talents of the do-it-yourself method. Then you have the third tier talents of do-it-yourself, like David Hazy Daisy. Let's pass over them, as the channel selector usually does.

[j0zef]

In between. He was a great talent who didn't put in the work and retired way too early due to injuries (which he most likely caused by lack of preparation).

[PivotandRoll]

They are all terrible and always have been. The whole idea of a style is nonsensical. You should be able to do everything.

[Humean]

One of the great featherweights. An obnoxious twat with a ridiculous style and an even more ridiculous level of power in both hands.

[marathonboats]

I like this quote "he's a Hofer, mad talent and some crazy power, one of the best featherweights of the last 30 years."