Muhammad Ali -vs- Joe Louis

#52
#52
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?
Click to expand...


Once Tyson fired Kevin Rooney, he was no longer invincible. He wasn't being properly trained, and was regressing from the hyper-technical style that Cus D'Amato taught him and that made him great. If Buster Douglas hadn't beaten him then the next guy would have. Or maybe the next guy. But it wouldnt' have been long.

But this is a complete separate topic in and of itself.
 
#53
#53
n_huffhines said:
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.
Click to expand...


Foreman was in shape. The guys had been in Africa for like 8 weeks at that point. They had nothing else to do but train. And Foreman was only 24.

Any fighter can punch themselves out in three rounds. They don't because they don't throw incessant haymakers in a blind rage for three rounds.

Foreman was in shape. And Foreman was a freaking beast. He just got outsmarted. That was a brilliant fight by Ali, and one of my favorites of all time.

Ali won every single round of the fight. Every. Single. Round. He was probably throwing a quarter of the punches that Foreman was throwing, but he was landing them all.
 
#54
#54
NochNoch said:
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.
Click to expand...

I agree.

Foreman would have been a bad matchup for Tyson.
 
#56
#56
Frank Sinatra sat in that chair right there and I asked him how old Joe Louis was. He said Joe Louis was 137 years old.

Oh man, you lyin. You ain't never met no Frank Sinatra.
 
#57
#57
kidbourbon said:
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.
Click to expand...

Why do you think that's fair? Do you have any justification, or it just sounds good?

They never fight anybody outside of the top 10.
 
#59
#59
NochNoch said:
So the story goes, there wouldn't have been a 15th round if Frazier could have continued because Ali wasn't getting off his stool.
Click to expand...

This one of those things where everybody has a different story. And the version that says he wasn't getting off his stool come from Frazier's camp. I'm not buying it. I saw an interview with Ferdie Pachecho where he said emphatically that Ali would have fought the 15th.

During the first Liston fight, Clay had gotten some kind of ointment in his eyes from Liston's glove* and his eyes were burning and he couldn't see a thing. In the corner before the 5th round he was screaming for the fight to be stopped, and if you watch the tape, you can see him get off his stool and hold his hands up above his head as if to say "I can't fight". Angelo Dundee was blocking the ref's view so he didn't see what was going on with Ali. When the bell sounded, Dundee shoved Ali in the ring and told him to run.

He did run. For that entire round, he rather brilliantly just keeps his left hand out in Liston's face to feel where he is while constantly moving backwards, but then tying him up when he can. He starts to be able to see again with 30 seconds to a minute left in the round.

And then of course he wins the 6th round rather decisively, and Liston doesn't get off his stool for the 7th.

I got off on a tangent there. My point is that if in fact Ali didn't want to get off his stool for that round, Dundee would have grabbed him by the waist, pulled him up, and shoved him into the ring. But I don't even think he would have needed to. I can't imagine Ali quitting in his corner. Not after that 14th round. Frazier couldn't even raise his arms.


*Nobody knows whether Liston's people did this intentionally
 
#60
#60
n_huffhines said:
Why do you think that's fair? Do you have any justification, or it just sounds good?

They never fight anybody outside of the top 10.
Click to expand...

It sounds good, and it's true.

There is a reason they don't fight anybody outside the top ten, and it's rather simple: they instead fight guys that are among the top ten.

If a guy outside the top ten is good enough to beat the heavyweight champion, he'll be in the top ten in short order.
 
#61
#61
n_huffhines said:
Why do you think that's fair? Do you have any justification, or it just sounds good?

They never fight anybody outside of the top 10.
Click to expand...

I think I may have misinterpreted what you were asking when I wrote the above response. Let me try this again.

You question is: why do I think it is fair to assume that the 10-50 fighters do not deviate substantially from generation to generation? Am I understanding that right?

Because this is essentially akin to saying; "I'll tell you what, these minor league baseball players these days, they just ain't what they used to be".

I mean, how in the heck would that happen? With fighters, the 10-50 are the middle of the bell curve. The only way that the quality of those guys is going to be either appreciably better or worse from generation to generation is as a result of either a massive increase or decrease in the number of young people going into the sport.

So, if it turns out that baseball participation in the little leagues and up through middle school is 50% less now than it was was 30 years ago, then you would see a consequent general decline in the quality of play of minor league baseball players. This would make perfect sense because some percentage among the pool of kids that played another sport instead baseball are better athletes than the kids that played baseball. And because that better athlete isn't playing, a worse athlete has to fill that spot in the minor leagues.

But in the absent of general increase of decrease in participation in the sport at the youth level, I can't come up with anything that would explain why your average fighters would be different from era to era.
 
Last edited:
#62
#62
kidbourbon said:
This one of those things where everybody has a different story. And the version that says he wasn't getting off his stool come from Frazier's camp. I'm not buying it. I saw an interview with Ferdie Pachecho where he said emphatically that Ali would have fought the 15th.
Click to expand...

I'm not trying to convince anyone of anything because I still have no clue if it's true or not but the stories saying that Ali wasn't going to fight the 15th don't all come from the Frazier camp. According to Thomas Hauser, one of the guys in Ali's corner (unidentified who specifically) said that Ali was yelling to "cut 'em off" after 14.

Like you said, it wouldn't have been the first time that Dundee had pushed Ali out of the corner when he didn't want to go so he probably does go out if it continued. I do, however, think there's enough stories out there that lend credence to the fact that he seriously wanted to quit that fight. For his own good, Frazier needed to quit but there's no one from either side that says he wanted to quit the fight, even if it cost him his other eye.
 
#63
#63
NochNoch said:
I'm not trying to convince anyone of anything because I still have no clue if it's true or not but the stories saying that Ali wasn't going to fight the 15th don't all come from the Frazier camp.

(1)
According to Thomas Hauser, one of the guys in Ali's corner (unidentified who specifically) said that Ali was yelling to "cut 'em off" after 14.

Like you said, it wouldn't have been the first time that Dundee had pushed Ali out of the corner when he didn't want to go so he probably does go out if it continued. I do, however, think there's enough stories out there that lend credence to the fact that he seriously wanted to quit that fight.

(2)
For his own good, Frazier needed to quit but there's no one from either side that says he wanted to quit the fight, even if it cost him his other eye.
Click to expand...

(1)
Interesting. I still think he would have fought the 15th round -- again, even if it was Dundee pushing him out there -- if the fight hadn't been stopped. But that's interesting. I've never heard Hauser say that.

(2)
I can't disagree with this. Frazier definitely definitely wanted to go on. You can watch him in the corner arguing with Eddie Futch. Frazier actually remained angry at Futch for years for stopping the fight. But I've never heard anybody question Futch's decision to stop it. And Futch himself always said he would do the same thing again.

I hate that fight, btw. It isn't fun for me to watch.

I mentioned it before, but "Ghosts of Manilla" is a book I would recommend reading. Here is a Bill Simmons essay on the book and the fight.

Bill Simmons breaks down the epic book Ghosts of Manila, on a legendary battle between boxers - Grantland
 
New posts
You must log in or register to reply here.

VN Store



Back
Top