When did the modern boxer come about?

[Bundana]

Different eras have had different expectations and rules, different ways of scoring, number of rounds, ring size, glove characteristics, and so forth. And therefore different skills to some degree.

“Modern” to me suggests Ray Robinson and after. Roughly speaking.

That's pretty much how I look at it! As far as heavyweights go, I'm thinking before and after Joe louis.

For boxing as a whole... yes, Robinson (and Pep!) is the dividing line for me as well.

[ShoulderRoll]

So the question is: With nearly all of the best boxers being part of the North American talent pool, where everybody almost exclusively fought each other… was this a better breeding ground for producing great fighters? Compared to today, where we have a huge international talent pool, not just fighting in a closed society?

And can it really be true, that trainers were more knowledgeable and therefore developed the best boxers back then… and that much of this knowledge has died out along with the great trainers? So that today, as a consequence, boxing is DEvolving… and we now see lesser talented fighters posing as "world" champions?

It's pretty obvious that boxing has devolved. There's hardly anyone around anymore that can teach the shoulder roll defensive posture correctly. Something that was fairly commonplace in the past.

Or look at all the subtle in-fighting tactics that Roberto Duran learned from Ray Arcel and Freddie Brown. What fighter today is anywhere close to mastering that bag of tricks?

As for the North American talent pool back then vs the international talent pool now...I would argue that the rugged frontier culture and poverty of those times produced hardier and more creative fighting men. Out of necessity.

[Bundana]

It's pretty obvious that boxing has devolved. There's hardly anyone around anymore that can teach the shoulder roll defensive posture correctly. Something that was fairly commonplace in the past.

Or look at all the subtle in-fighting tactics that Roberto Duran learned from Ray Arcel and Freddie Brown. What fighter today is anywhere close to mastering that bag of tricks?

As for the North American talent pool back then vs the international talent pool now...I would argue that the rugged frontier culture and poverty of those times produced hardier and more creative fighting men. Out of necessity.

There is no one correct way to box. You see all kinds of styles, building on what comes natural for the individual boxer.

Why did Ali hardly ever punch to the body? Was it because no one was knowledgeable enough to teach him - or was it simply not in him to do that?

Just because you're old an wrinkled, doesn't mean you have a monopoly on knowledge. I find it hard to believe, the trainers of today do not learn anything from the 1000s of hours of old-time boxing available to them on film. Are they really all too stupid to take advantage of that?

I don't understand how a closed society, where the same boxers are meeting each other over and over again, is supposed to create better boxers than an open society, where you meet different (most of the time, anyway!) opponents from all over the world.

Also, I bet many of today's boxers from East Europe, Africa, Asia, Latin America, grew up under similar hard conditions as Americans pre-WW2. So why do you assume, they lack the toughness of the old Americans?

I know, you're one of those posters, who believe today's boxers are inferior to those from the "good old days". And that's perfectly ok... It's all a matter of opinion.

But if you're being honest… don't you think we have great fighters even today? I'm not saying boxers today are better than Louis, Robinson, Pep... but I do believe guys like Pacquiao, Mayweather, Ward, Usyk, Inoue, Lomachenko, Golovkin, Canelo, etc. would hold their own in any era.

[ShoulderRoll]

I find it hard to believe, the trainers of today do not learn anything from the 1000s of hours of old-time boxing available to them on film. Are they really all too stupid to take advantage of that?

Of course trainers today can take advantage of all the old-time boxing film available to them. And they would be smart to do so since the old-time boxers were usually far more clever and skilled than what is around today.

It's why Bill Miller had James Toney watch film of Ezzard Charles. You can't go wrong by studying the old masters.

[Bundana]

Of course trainers today can take advantage of all the old-time boxing film available to them. And they would be smart to do so since the old-time boxers were usually far more clever and skilled than what is around today.

It's why Bill Miller had James Toney watch film of Ezzard Charles. You can't go wrong by studying the old masters.

How do you feel about the last part of my post: That even today we have great fighters?

Do you agree with that… or has boxing, in your opinion, devolved so much, that truly exceptional boxers is a thing of the past?

[ShoulderRoll]

How do you feel about the last part of my post: That even today we have great fighters?

Do you agree with that… or has boxing, in your opinion, devolved so much, that truly exceptional boxers is a thing of the past?

I think we have boxers that are exceptional for the era.

But most of them wouldn't hold a candle to the greats of the past. How could they? They only fight a few times a year, compared to guys who sometimes fought a few times per month in order to eat.

It's just a different level of mastering the craft.

[chrisJS]

Joe Gans and then Benny Leonard would probably be the two fighters that were most advanced relative to their era's.

Footwork back in those days was a lot better on average than fighters nowadays where a fighter with good feet is a big deal.

[billeau2]

Yes, we talk a lot about how athletes these days have far more options (than just boxing) in their quest for fame and fortune. How physically talented young men may chose to have a go at sports like football, basketball, baseball, etc... rather than a tough sport like boxing.

However, I believe this is a "problem" only in the US. Football and baseball are barely played outside of North America... and while basketball is played in most countries, only in very few places is it a sport of any great importance.

In the earliest days of gloved boxing (late 19th century) there were 3 boxing "hotspots" in the world: UK, US and Australia. According to the BoxRec database, in 1890, 96% of all known boxing promotions took place in these 3 countries! But, for some reason, in those very early days, world title fights only took place in America!

So if a boxer from Australia or UK (or anywhere else)wanted to go all the way to the top, they basically had to move to the America. This meant, that US soon outgrew everybody else in importance, and by the 1920s was the center of the boxing world. In 1925, 61.3% of all known pro boxing promotions were staged in the US (down to just 11.7% in 2017!). Most of the big fights, and nearly ALL title fights took place there.

So the question is: With nearly all of the best boxers being part of the North American talent pool, where everybody almost exclusively fought each other… was this a better breeding ground for producing great fighters? Compared to today, where we have a huge international talent pool, not just fighting in a closed society?

And can it really be true, that trainers were more knowledgeable and therefore developed the best boxers back then… and that much of this knowledge has died out along with the great trainers? So that today, as a consequence, boxing is DEvolving… and we now see lesser talented fighters posing as "world" champions?

You raise some good points that deserve better treatment than just a post...but I will try to do them justice.

1) Look at the following chart to follow talking points below:
https://ourworldindata.org/world-pop...last-centuries

If you look at this chart, which I picked with the year "1850" because at this time, round about, is when population dynamics that would subsequently change the world, started to appear. What we find is that, while France, experienced a doubling of population, North America experienced a 50 fold increase. Now, when we compare the third world the comparison becomes meaningless, but... if we assume that athletes need an infrastructure to perform at their best, we see that given the growth of cities in the United States, at this time, and even Mexico and Cuba, where a lot of fighters are brought into the professional ranks, we see that there was a population increase that would justify this increase in championship activity.

Hence, while the area for fighting activity may have appeared restrictive, we have to be somewhat careful about assuming that actual population numbers, regarding the number of people involved, and the number of fighters produced, really changed that much when more global entry came about into the sport.

the real question would be the amount of people in boxing, boxing infrastructure, and how it actually changed in North America, where it was substantial, versus the new global amount of boxing establishments from the 1940's, or so and onward.

As far as the talent pool being closed? Hard to say. Many fighters came and fought in the ranks of the professionals, but there is a distinct possability that many fighters never got a chance, because of the demographics, so i think you have a valid point with the caveat, that we can never really know the answer to that, anymore than, we can know if we took all the talented athletes from Brooklyn NY and made them become fighters, if we would find more great talent than before.

I think the sport is deevolving because one simply does not see fighters do the things that they did before, also fighters fought harder (threw more punches a round), fought at more ranges, etc. Also fighters started in the sport at a younger age which makes a big difference. We see this with Floyd and Fury, both men have many skills, both men started younger.

To me it is that simple. I just don't see the skills that were taught... But thats an opinion and not anything else.

[billeau2]

Yes, we talk a lot about how athletes these days have far more options (than just boxing) in their quest for fame and fortune. How physically talented young men may chose to have a go at sports like football, basketball, baseball, etc... rather than a tough sport like boxing.

However, I believe this is a "problem" only in the US. Football and baseball are barely played outside of North America... and while basketball is played in most countries, only in very few places is it a sport of any great importance.

In the earliest days of gloved boxing (late 19th century) there were 3 boxing "hotspots" in the world: UK, US and Australia. According to the BoxRec database, in 1890, 96% of all known boxing promotions took place in these 3 countries! But, for some reason, in those very early days, world title fights only took place in America!

So if a boxer from Australia or UK (or anywhere else)wanted to go all the way to the top, they basically had to move to the America. This meant, that US soon outgrew everybody else in importance, and by the 1920s was the center of the boxing world. In 1925, 61.3% of all known pro boxing promotions were staged in the US (down to just 11.7% in 2017!). Most of the big fights, and nearly ALL title fights took place there.

So the question is: With nearly all of the best boxers being part of the North American talent pool, where everybody almost exclusively fought each other… was this a better breeding ground for producing great fighters? Compared to today, where we have a huge international talent pool, not just fighting in a closed society?

And can it really be true, that trainers were more knowledgeable and therefore developed the best boxers back then… and that much of this knowledge has died out along with the great trainers? So that today, as a consequence, boxing is DEvolving… and we now see lesser talented fighters posing as "world" champions?

You raise some good points that deserve better treatment than just a post...but I will try to do them justice.

1) Look at the following chart to follow talking points below:
https://ourworldindata.org/world-pop...last-centuries

If you look at this chart, which I picked with the year "1850" because at this time, round about, is when population dynamics that would subsequently change the world, started to appear. What we find is that, while France, experienced a doubling of population, North America experienced a 50 fold increase. Now, when we compare the third world the comparison becomes meaningless, but... if we assume that athletes need an infrastructure to perform at their best, we see that given the growth of cities in the United States, at this time, and even Mexico and Cuba, where a lot of fighters are brought into the professional ranks, we see that there was a population increase that would justify this increase in championship activity.

Hence, while the area for fighting activity may have appeared restrictive, we have to be somewhat careful about assuming that actual population numbers, regarding the number of people involved, and the number of fighters produced, really changed that much when more global entry came about into the sport.

the real question would be the amount of people in boxing, boxing infrastructure, and how it actually changed in North America, where it was substantial, versus the new global amount of boxing establishments from the 1940's, or so and onward.

As far as the talent pool being closed? Hard to say. Many fighters came and fought in the ranks of the professionals, but there is a distinct possability that many fighters never got a chance, because of the demographics, so i think you have a valid point with the caveat, that we can never really know the answer to that, anymore than, we can know if we took all the talented athletes from Brooklyn NY and made them become fighters, if we would find more great talent than before.

I think the sport is deevolving because one simply does not see fighters do the things that they did before, also fighters fought harder (threw more punches a round), fought at more ranges, etc. Also fighters started in the sport at a younger age which makes a big difference. We see this with Floyd and Fury, both men have many skills, both men started younger.

To me it is that simple. I just don't see the skills that were taught... But thats an opinion and not anything else.

[Bundana]

You raise some good points that deserve better treatment than just a post...but I will try to do them justice.

1) Look at the following chart to follow talking points below:
https://ourworldindata.org/world-pop...last-centuries

If you look at this chart, which I picked with the year "1850" because at this time, round about, is when population dynamics that would subsequently change the world, started to appear. What we find is that, while France, experienced a doubling of population, North America experienced a 50 fold increase. Now, when we compare the third world the comparison becomes meaningless, but... if we assume that athletes need an infrastructure to perform at their best, we see that given the growth of cities in the United States, at this time, and even Mexico and Cuba, where a lot of fighters are brought into the professional ranks, we see that there was a population increase that would justify this increase in championship activity.

Hence, while the area for fighting activity may have appeared restrictive, we have to be somewhat careful about assuming that actual population numbers, regarding the number of people involved, and the number of fighters produced, really changed that much when more global entry came about into the sport.

the real question would be the amount of people in boxing, boxing infrastructure, and how it actually changed in North America, where it was substantial, versus the new global amount of boxing establishments from the 1940's, or so and onward.

As far as the talent pool being closed? Hard to say. Many fighters came and fought in the ranks of the professionals, but there is a distinct possability that many fighters never got a chance, because of the demographics, so i think you have a valid point with the caveat, that we can never really know the answer to that, anymore than, we can know if we took all the talented athletes from Brooklyn NY and made them become fighters, if we would find more great talent than before.

I think the sport is deevolving because one simply does not see fighters do the things that they did before, also fighters fought harder (threw more punches a round), fought at more ranges, etc. Also fighters started in the sport at a younger age which makes a big difference. We see this with Floyd and Fury, both men have many skills, both men started younger.

To me it is that simple. I just don't see the skills that were taught... But thats an opinion and not anything else.

Thanks for a serious response to my post.

You're right about the population growth from around the middle of the 19th century being far steeper in the US than in other countries. This is hardly surprising, since hundred of thousands of Europeans back then migrated to the US, in search of a better life. UK, Ireland and Italy (I believe... you would probably know much more about this than I do!) were at the forefront of this move, but many other countries were involved. Tiny as it is, even my own country, Denmark, made a small contribution… which, eventually, resulted in two Danish world champions: Battling Nelson and Kid Williams.

As we know, poverty is no small factor when it comes to decide on a career in boxing - especially at a time, when there were few other options to "get ahead". So that the US soon became the center of the boxing world, was only a natural development. Gradually, more and more good boxers became part of the North American talent pool - and if they didn't, they were left on the outside looking in.

Since WW2 several things have combined to gradually put an end to the total American domination: The advent of boxing on US TV (which has been discussed many times), easier travel and many more countries taking up pro boxing around the world. But whatever the reason, there's no getting away from the fact, that boxing today is a much more international sport than pre WW2.

Now, as to the actual ability of boxers... I don't get this idea (and this is not directed at you), that today's boxers can't hold a candle to the old-timers, because they have so few pro fights, and therefore lack experience… compared to the old-timers, who often had 100+ fight careers. Does anyone really think, that Mayweather would have been a better boxers, if he had added an additional 50 "stay busy" fights against nobodies to his record? Or Pacquiao? Or Lomachenko and Usyk?

As for how "good" (not really measurable, of course) the boxers are... well, I guess you see, what your want your eyes to see! Someone here claims that FOOTWORK (I haven't heard that one before!) isn't what it used to be, and that today "a fighter with good feet is a big deal".

Others will point to the lost art of body-punching, feinting, infighting-ability, lack of conditioning, lack of heart and will to win - and then there's of course the always popular notion that today's trainers don't know, what they are doing.

I don't see that at all. How can something be "lost", if it's there for all to see in 100 years of film history? Lack of heart?... just about every Saturday I see a show from the UK (or elsewhere) where even prelim boxers in 6-rounders fight like their lives depend on it.

Also, I don't see any slowing down of the pace, with less punches being thrown today. On the contrary, I see less infighting, with boxers often standing toe-to-toe, trading punches without holding or clinching... often at a ferocious pace. Sure, we can find videos of 12-round clinch fests (Wladimir!)… but I'm talking about the general picture.

All in all, as I've said before… while no one is surpassing Louis, Robinson and Pep, I think we've seen some really fine fighters these past few decades. But that's just my opinion!