Tszyu gave Vernon Forrest a schooling in the amateurs

[Little Killer]

Vince Phillips viciously KO'd a prime Zoo.

No doubt it was a good win for Kostya against Forrest in the amateurs. But Kostya didn't want none at 147. He knew moving up one weight would have been too much for him because his skills wasn't enough to compensate for the weight disadvantage.

He could have moved up and fought Oscar/Mosley/Forrest/Tito

[Eric Holder]

[TheGreatA]

Tszyu may have seen his best days in the amateurs.

[BennyST]

It was his training habits that changed from his Russian routine when he moved to Australia and Johnny Lewis. He is not what you would call a 'boxers' coach. He focuses on strength and power etc. and when Tszyu realised the power he had and that he didn't have to train for speed, movement as much he ended up relying on it too much and by the time he realised that he should have kept his skills up it was a little too late to change everything back.

He still had absurd skills, but it was tempered too much by his lack of skills training and his focus on power....and of course he went through a long period of very slack training methods up until his loss to Phillips.

Nonetheless, he is without a doubt one of the greatest amateurs the sport has ever seen (as well as one of the great pro fighters ever as well). It may be that he actually had too many amateur fights as well and that it slightly ruined him for the pros. Having three hundred amateur fights ingrains certain muscle memory that can be nearly impossible to get rid of.

[P4P GOAT]

It was his training habits that changed from his Russian routine when he moved to Australia and Johnny Lewis. He is not what you would call a 'boxers' coach. He focuses on strength and power etc. and when Tszyu realised the power he had and that he didn't have to train for speed, movement as much he ended up relying on it too much and by the time he realised that he should have kept his skills up it was a little too late to change everything back.

He still had absurd skills, but it was tempered too much by his lack of skills training and his focus on power....and of course he went through a long period of very slack training methods up until his loss to Phillips.

Nonetheless, he is without a doubt one of the greatest amateurs the sport has ever seen (as well as one of the great pro fighters ever as well). It may be that he actually had too many amateur fights as well and that it slightly ruined him for the pros. Having three hundred amateur fights ingrains certain muscle memory that can be nearly impossible to get rid of.

Yeah i can see that.

Ive watched quite a few of his fights and he does not show that varied range of skills as a pro, he looks much more like a strong/formidable type of fighter who is a hard puncher.

The skill level he had as an amateur really surprised me, that skill is not AS evident as a pro from what ive seen.

[BennyST]

It is evident up to and a little after his fight title win. After that he got very slack with his training and didn't really stick to his old routine and started training more for strength and power rather than stamina, speed etc.

You could see it show up in a couple of fights where he was still able to pull it out on instinctive skill alone but by the Phillips fight he had moved away so far by then that it wasn't enough anymore and he lost. He changed after that of course and kept up more of his old routine and started doing a proper camp again, but it was still too much power and strength because by that stage he had become such a flat-footed fighter that his legs just didn't have the spring anymore and his body was actually already pretty old by then from all his amateur fighting.

Check out his first title fight, he still shows sings of utter brilliance in it dominating a young but highly experienced champion in only his fifteenth fight or something. It shows how skilled he was by the fact that he was fighting and beating great former champs by his fourth pro fight and blowing out future world champs by his seventh or something crazy like that. He was a bit of a freak.

I think he would have possible ended up as one of the greatest modern fighters if he had stayed in Russia with his Russian coach or moved to America where he would have kept up more of his skills, speed etc etc training, but I guess it was so easy for him throughout a lot of his career that he was able to slack off from training so much that he lost a lot of stuff and by the time he lost it was too far gone to get it back.

[P4P GOAT]

It is evident up to and a little after his fight title win. After that he got very slack with his training and didn't really stick to his old routine and started training more for strength and power rather than stamina, speed etc.

You could see it show up in a couple of fights where he was still able to pull it out on instinctive skill alone but by the Phillips fight he had moved away so far by then that it wasn't enough anymore and he lost. He changed after that of course and kept up more of his old routine and started doing a proper camp again, but it was still too much power and strength because by that stage he had become such a flat-footed fighter that his legs just didn't have the spring anymore and his body was actually already pretty old by then from all his amateur fighting.

Check out his first title fight, he still shows sings of utter brilliance in it dominating a young but highly experienced champion in only his fifteenth fight or something. It shows how skilled he was by the fact that he was fighting and beating great former champs by his fourth pro fight and blowing out future world champs by his seventh or something crazy like that. He was a bit of a freak.

I think he would have possible ended up as one of the greatest modern fighters if he had stayed in Russia with his Russian coach or moved to America where he would have kept up more of his skills, speed etc etc training, but I guess it was so easy for him throughout a lot of his career that he was able to slack off from training so much that he lost a lot of stuff and by the time he lost it was too far gone to get it back.

Well i watched the Bramble fight earlier and i did notice a lot more movement handspeed,defence,counter punching.

Thanks for the info