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Here's something that's never mentioned when speaking of Joe Louis. He lost 4 full years of prime age because of WW2.
When evaluating a skill level it helps to have a wide variety of opponents but when you don't you actually need to know techniques and then add in desire and attitude! If you NEED to have opponents to make a judgement chances are your limited when it comes to knowledge of the sport.
Louis at 6'2" 200lbs would easily fight at 215-220 if projected to the 2000 era.
Back then heavyweights trained down to lighter weight because of the length of rounds and over all more activity.
If you watch Louis you can actually see boxing evolve as he matures!
He had Mr. Blackburn as his mentor and every trainer today is still using Mr. Blackburns techniques, at least the good ones do.
There were alot of fighters through the 30's into the 50's that were outstanding boxers in technique and conditioning. Benny Leonard was fantastic, Willie Pep remains one the greatest pure boxer who ever lived. Billy Conn and Tunney were outstanding boxers along with Louis.
Sugar Ray Robinson remains TBE and p4p King, no one comes close!
The reason Wlad and men like Fury are dominate today is because there are NO outstanding talents in the sport right now! Wilder is a game young man but his technique suffers, Fury has his size to help him but technique wise he's sloppy and has no right hand to speak of. Joe Louis had a weak era but wiped it clean but he had talent if you knew techniques you could see it on film. Wlad has a weak era also but he's a one/two stand tall and lean away and hold guy. Not much dimension and a shaky chin too!
Heres a few good fighters that I'm sure are not very well known who fought Louis;
Max Baer
Charley Retzloff
Max Schmeling
Bob Pastor
John Henry Lewis
Buddy Baer--(who was the big guy then 6'6" 240lbs)
Billy Conn
Lou Nova
past Louis prime were a few good ones also;
Joe Walcott
Ezzard Charles
Lee Savold
Jimmy Bivens
Back then records could be deceiving when you had newspaper decisions, traveling into an opponents turf and both were contenders. Different times brought about different circumstances. There was a "waiting order" for contenders and it often meant dropping a decision or two. Not throwing the fight just getting the short end if it went the distance.
The fact that anyone could think that Wlad has more technical ability or knowledge over Louis is a sad state of affairs for boxing fans!
Ray
When evaluating a skill level it helps to have a wide variety of opponents but when you don't you actually need to know techniques and then add in desire and attitude! If you NEED to have opponents to make a judgement chances are your limited when it comes to knowledge of the sport.
Louis at 6'2" 200lbs would easily fight at 215-220 if projected to the 2000 era.
Back then heavyweights trained down to lighter weight because of the length of rounds and over all more activity.
If you watch Louis you can actually see boxing evolve as he matures!
He had Mr. Blackburn as his mentor and every trainer today is still using Mr. Blackburns techniques, at least the good ones do.
There were alot of fighters through the 30's into the 50's that were outstanding boxers in technique and conditioning. Benny Leonard was fantastic, Willie Pep remains one the greatest pure boxer who ever lived. Billy Conn and Tunney were outstanding boxers along with Louis.
Sugar Ray Robinson remains TBE and p4p King, no one comes close!
The reason Wlad and men like Fury are dominate today is because there are NO outstanding talents in the sport right now! Wilder is a game young man but his technique suffers, Fury has his size to help him but technique wise he's sloppy and has no right hand to speak of. Joe Louis had a weak era but wiped it clean but he had talent if you knew techniques you could see it on film. Wlad has a weak era also but he's a one/two stand tall and lean away and hold guy. Not much dimension and a shaky chin too!
Heres a few good fighters that I'm sure are not very well known who fought Louis;
Max Baer
Charley Retzloff
Max Schmeling
Bob Pastor
John Henry Lewis
Buddy Baer--(who was the big guy then 6'6" 240lbs)
Billy Conn
Lou Nova
past Louis prime were a few good ones also;
Joe Walcott
Ezzard Charles
Lee Savold
Jimmy Bivens
Back then records could be deceiving when you had newspaper decisions, traveling into an opponents turf and both were contenders. Different times brought about different circumstances. There was a "waiting order" for contenders and it often meant dropping a decision or two. Not throwing the fight just getting the short end if it went the distance.
The fact that anyone could think that Wlad has more technical ability or knowledge over Louis is a sad state of affairs for boxing fans!
Ray
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