Muhammad Ali -vs- Joe Louis

#26
#26
kidbourbon said:
I agree.

I love Ali as a sportsman, but he gets romanticized way too much for the stuff outside the ring. Nothing that he did was of his own volition. It was Elijah Muhammad. Ali was puppet.

I would urge everybody to read "Ghosts of Manilla"
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I'll just stick with my opinion of Ali. Thanks.
 
#29
#29
kidbourbon said:
You know nothing about boxing then. Seriously. Saying that Marciano would beat Ali is silly, and can't even be taken seriously.

Ali would have made Marciano look like an amateur. Do you really think that a 5-10 188lb man could beat Ali in a boxing match? Keeping in mind that this 5-10 188lb man is also *appreciably* slower than Ali. He would have had difficulty landing a solid punch. Watch Ali v. Chuvalo and then imagine Ali fighting a smaller version of Chuvalo. That's what it would look like.

Ali was 6-3 1/2 and 214 and moved better than any heavyweight before or since.

Also, Marciano never fought any better worth a crap. His best win was against Walcott. When he fought Joe Louis, Louis was 123 years old.
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You can say that all day, but that's simply not true. Marciano's measureables is not what made him great.

Take Clay's fight with Chuck Wepner and multiply Wepner's ability by about 50x and you get Marciano. if Wepner can get the best of Ali for even 1 knockdown, Marciano would have had alot more success.
 
#30
#30
shelbyvillevol said:
Take Clay's fight with Chuck Wepner and multiply Wepner's ability by about 50x and you get Marciano. if Wepner can get the best of Ali for even 1 knockdown, Marciano would have had alot more success.
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Wepner probably weighed somewhere between 220 and 230 when he fought Ali.
 
#31
#31
NochNoch said:
Wepner probably weighed somewhere between 220 and 230 when he fought Ali.
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Very true, but that and the ability to take a punch was all he had going for him. He was a below average puncher. You take somebody who could take punishment in the capacity that Wepner could, and add top-notch punching power, and you get Marciano.
 
#33
#33
shelbyvillevol said:
Very true, but that and the ability to take a punch was all he had going for him. He was a below average puncher. You take somebody who could take punishment in the capacity that Wepner could, and add top-notch punching power, and you get Marciano.
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Except for the part where you have to subtract close to 40 pounds to make that equation accurate. Nine times out of ten, significantly smaller fighters will get overwhelmed throughout the course of a fight. Nine times out of ten, slower fighters will get overwhelmed throughout the course of a fight. In a fight with Ali, Marciano would have been the smaller fighter and the slower fighter. Not good odds.
 
#34
#34
NochNoch said:
Except for the part where you have to subtract close to 40 pounds to make that equation accurate. Nine times out of ten, significantly smaller fighters will get overwhelmed throughout the course of a fight. Nine times out of ten, slower fighters will get overwhelmed throughout the course of a fight. In a fight with Ali, Marciano would have been the smaller fighter and the slower fighter. Not good odds.
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And the main thing you left out is, Heart. Rocky had enough of that for ten people. We all know Ali is one of the best skilled fighters, but sometimes that will not carry you to the win.
 
#36
#36
NochNoch said:
Except for the part where you have to subtract close to 40 pounds to make that equation accurate. Nine times out of ten, significantly smaller fighters will get overwhelmed throughout the course of a fight. Nine times out of ten, slower fighters will get overwhelmed throughout the course of a fight. In a fight with Ali, Marciano would have been the smaller fighter and the slower fighter. Not good odds.
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I think Marciano's weight was partly due to the size of his competition. I assume he probably would have packed on some weight had he felt the need to, although his 5'11" frame probably would not have allowed him to gain too much. I think he did fight in the low 190's at least a couple times.
 
#37
#37
volinreallife said:
And the main thing you left out is, Heart. Rocky had enough of that for ten people. We all know Ali is one of the best skilled fighters, but sometimes that will not carry you to the win.
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This is actually strange for me because I am the one defending Ali and I would have never rooted for him if I'd been around to see his fights, but you make it sound like heart was something Ali didn't also possess.

Maybe nobody else to ever get in the ring could've gone through those fights with Frazier and somehow come out with 2 wins (albeit, baaaarrrreeelllyyy). Not to mention taking out Foreman when he was thought to be invincible and people were more concerned if his opponents would survive rather than if they had a chance to win.
 
#38
#38
NochNoch said:
This is actually strange for me because I am the one defending Ali and I would have never rooted for him if I'd been around to see his fights, but you make it sound like heart was something Ali didn't also possess.

Maybe nobody else to ever get in the ring could've gone through those fights with Frazier and somehow come out with 2 wins (albeit, baaaarrrreeelllyyy). Not to mention taking out Foreman when he was thought to be invincible and people were more concerned if his opponents would survive rather than if they had a chance to win.
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It's a great win, but if Buster Douglas can beat the invincible Mike Tyson, why is it such a surprise that the supposed GOAT beat the invincible Foreman when he came in unready to go past 4 rounds?
 
#39
#39
NochNoch said:
This is actually strange for me because I am the one defending Ali and I would have never rooted for him if I'd been around to see his fights, but you make it sound like heart was something Ali didn't also possess.

Maybe nobody else to ever get in the ring could've gone through those fights with Frazier and somehow come out with 2 wins (albeit, baaaarrrreeelllyyy). Not to mention taking out Foreman when he was thought to be invincible and people were more concerned if his opponents would survive rather than if they had a chance to win.
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He was smarter than Foreman. Rocky knocked out Joe Louis, so if anybody has a shot at Ali it is Rocky
 
#40
#40
n_huffhines said:
It's a great win, but if Buster Douglas can beat the invincible Mike Tyson, why is it such a surprise that the supposed GOAT beat the invincible Foreman when he came in unready to go past 4 rounds?
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Foreman was ready for more than 4 he just punched himself out in the first 3. He thought he was doing way more damage than he was.
 
#41
#41
volinreallife said:
Foreman was ready for more than 4 he just punched himself out in the first 3. He thought he was doing way more damage than he was.
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Maybe he was ready for more than 4, but if you can punch your way out in 3 rounds, you were in no condition to go close to the distance.
 
#42
#42
n_huffhines said:
It's a great win, but if Buster Douglas can beat the invincible Mike Tyson, why is it such a surprise that the supposed GOAT beat the invincible Foreman when he came in unready to go past 4 rounds?
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George Foreman circa the early 1970's was fighting 3 or 4, and, except for Ali, beating, tougher fighters than Tyson ever fought when he was supposedly "dominant". The watered down heavyweight division of the 1980's made Tyson look a lot more invincible than he ever really was, or at least ever proved by who was beating.
 
#43
#43
NochNoch said:
George Foreman circa the early 1970's was fighting 3 or 4, and, except for Ali, beating, tougher fighters than Tyson ever fought when he was supposedly "dominant". The watered down heavyweight division of the 1980's made Tyson look a lot more invincible than he ever really was, or at least ever proved by who was beating.
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K, I get all that, but if you are the GOAT, I don't think any of your victories that came during your prime should be considered shocking. People seem to still be amazed by it 40 years later.

And Mike Tyson is a lot closer to Foreman (if not better) than Buster Douglas is to Ali. Like I said, if Buster can do it, I'd expect it from the GOAT.
 
#45
#45
n_huffhines said:
And Mike Tyson is a lot closer to Foreman (if not better) than Buster Douglas is to Ali. Like I said, if Buster can do it, I'd expect it from the GOAT.
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I get what you're saying about the comparison but I think that the Foreman that walked into the ring with Ali in that fight woul absolutely walk through Tyson at his peak.
 
#46
#46
n_huffhines said:
This is EXACTLY what I'm talking about. You are looking at just the top 2 or 3 players, and making the comparison. Yeah maybe the guys in spots 1-3 sucked in 2002, but how do you know the players ranked 10-50 aren't way better than the guys today?


Also, we can compare Roddick to Feder because they've played each other. What we can't do is compare Roddick to Arthur Ashe. There's no way to know who would win.
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I think it's fair to say that the guys 10-50 are not going to deviate substantially from generation to generation.

For purposes of this discussion it is the top guys who are relevant. A heavyweight champion good enough to be talked about in a historical sense isn't getting beaten by a guy outside the top ten.
 
#47
#47
n_huffhines said:
(1)
Decades later Ali can't even function. That's attributed to Frazier, mostly.

(2)
Royally kicked his ass? He won, but one judge scored it 6-5-1. It wasn't all that one-sided.

(3)
I agree they needed to stop the third fight, but this is exactly why I think Frazier is the better fighter.
With only one good eye he kicked the supposed GOAT's ass,

(4)
and the GOAT couldn't even finish him when he was down to 0 good eyes.

(5)
There's no way to know who would have won if a fight happened in 1968. Pure speculation.
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(1)
Among others. Ali fought way way way too long.

(2)
What did the other two score it?

(3)
He had one good eye his entire professional career. Methinks he figured out ways to compensate.

(4)
What do you think would have happened in that 15th round? Seriously?

(5)
Of course it's speculation, it's a hypothetical fight. But it's not unsupported speculation.

How was Frazier able to deliver punishment against Ali? In all instances, sustained offensive attacks on the part of Frazier against Ali were done when Ali was against the ropes and had neither the legs nor the wind to keep dancing and moving. This would not have been a problem in 1968 as Ali wouldn't have nearly 4 years of accumulated rust and would have in fact continued improving off his seemingly untouchable 1966-1967 form.

I mean, the guy was on a completely different level. He was a legit 6-3. He was roughly 212 pounds. He moved faster and more effortlessly than any heavyweight -- and really any fighter, regardless of weight division -- has ever moved before or since. His hand speed was such that he could hit you three times as you were falling down (See the end of the second round of the Cleveland Williams fight).

And he was such an obscene athlete that he could do things that no trainer has ever taught a fighter before or since. Things like his commonly used maneuver of dodging a jab by leaning back, and then nailing his opponent with a straight right hand before he has even finished pulling back the jab he just missed (you can see this in any number of fights, but for the sake of consolidation, I'll just post the Cleveland Williams fight where he does it quite conspicuously throughout the fight. He does, for example, with 1:24 left in this video. His athleticism is quite astounding.

Muhammad Ali vs Cleveland Williams - YouTube

More simply, just watch any of his fights from the 60s. He never moved like that in any fight in the 70s. The closest he came was the second Norton fight, and even then there is noticeable difference. Watch the first Sonny Liston fight. Look at how foolish he makes Liston look. And Sonny Liston is widely considered to be a better heavyweight than Joe Frazier. And I would agree.

Also, Ali always won the early rounds against Frazier. It wasn't until he would begin to run out of gas that Frazier was able to grind him out. This simply wouldn't have happened in 1968. Every round would have looked about like, say, the second round of the second fight. Frazier would have trouble landing clean punches. And Ali would constantly be popping him with jabs and 1-2s.

The fights wouldn't have been wars. Ali would have won rather easily on points. It would have been a more competitive -- but stylistically similar -- version of the Chuvalo fight.
 
#49
#49
shelbyvillevol said:
You can say that all day, but that's simply not true. Marciano's measureables is not what made him great.

Take Clay's fight with Chuck Wepner and multiply Wepner's ability by about 50x and you get Marciano. if Wepner can get the best of Ali for even 1 knockdown, Marciano would have had alot more success.
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I'm talking about Ali in his prime. Not in 1975 or 1976.

I've been quite clear about this the whole time.
 
#50
#50
volinreallife said:
And the main thing you left out is, Heart. Rocky had enough of that for ten people. We all know Ali is one of the best skilled fighters, but sometimes that will not carry you to the win.
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I'm not sure if there has ever been a fighter with more heart than Ali.
 
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