Ali vs. Robinson

Grimm · Post by **Grimm** » 05 Jul 2005, 20:16

Today I heard that the speed of their jabs were tested and that Ali's was faster.

I don't know if this is true or not but have any of you heard of this before.

Grimm · Post by **Grimm** » 20 Sep 2005, 21:42

Anyone?!

theone · Post by **theone** » 20 Sep 2005, 21:58

Yes, I heard that from a number of sources and even had one of those boxing compliation tapes(you know best of this or that) where they mention it. If i remember the name of the tape I'll pass it along.

BoxBuzz · Post by **BoxBuzz** » 20 Sep 2005, 22:00

I think I heard Ali speak of it in context with the birth of his "float like a butterfly sting like a bee" phrase. I think Brown invented the phrase but it was inspired but some stats of which that was supposedly a part of.

I have no friggin clue if it has any basis in fact or if anyone from a "clinical" viewpoint had delclared it to be true. His jab was state of the art in the early years. I'm sure the majority view point would tend to doubt the veracity of this claim.

I'd still be interested in more info on this "urban myth" which indeed may not be a myth at all.

tiredoldngrey · Post by **tiredoldngrey** » 21 Sep 2005, 00:02

Was this test done in the 1960s, when Ali turned pro and Robinson was in his 40s?

Rory McCloskey · Post by **Rory McCloskey** » 21 Sep 2005, 00:39

maybe they were tested when they were both in their primes and then compared.

silkov · Post by **silkov** » 21 Sep 2005, 05:31

Jim Jacobs who partly managed Tyson and who had the largest fight collection in the world did this. He got film of both Ali and Robinson in their primes and measured the speeds of their jabs frame by frame and Ali's came out faster than Rays. You can find this in the documentry/film 'the Fighters' which is based around the first Ali vs Frazier fight.
I agree with it too... Ray was fast but Ali's hands and jabs were just a blur in his late 60s prime... I think he definately had the fastest hands pound for pound of any boxer.

BoxBuzz · Post by **BoxBuzz** » 21 Sep 2005, 08:31

Thanks for info Silkov, It's not a stretch to beleive just wondered if it really had been studied in some formal fashion.

Ezzard · Post by **Ezzard** » 21 Sep 2005, 08:39

I'd be interested to kow how many of their jabs he measured before coming to his conclusion.

BoxBuzz · Post by **BoxBuzz** » 21 Sep 2005, 08:48

The clinical aspect would be good to know. Cus if it was him and two of his buddies watching the films, drinking beer and making comments, it could lack accuracy. However I have come to many scientific, accurate, very nearly perfect assessments using that exact method. So I know it works.

jyuza · Post by **jyuza** » 21 Sep 2005, 09:24

Is that so ? then Ali was the fastest in all point ?

The Great John L · Post by **The Great John L** » 21 Sep 2005, 09:33

jyuza wrote:Is that so ? then Ali was the fastest in all point ?

Well, it would mean that his jab was faster than Robinsons jab. It would not mean that Ali was the fastest fighter ever.

Tantum · Post by **Tantum** » 21 Sep 2005, 10:11

silkov wrote:Jim Jacobs who partly managed Tyson and who had the largest fight collection in the world did this. He got film of both Ali and Robinson in their primes and measured the speeds of their jabs frame by frame and Ali's came out faster than Rays. You can find this in the documentry/film 'the Fighters' which is based around the first Ali vs Frazier fight.
I agree with it too... Ray was fast but Ali's hands and jabs were just a blur in his late 60s prime... I think he definately had the fastest hands pound for pound of any boxer.

Frame for frame (or any other way) Patterson shits all over Ali's supposed great handspeed. By a large margin.

silkov · Post by **silkov** » 21 Sep 2005, 11:02

Tantum wrote:
silkov wrote:Jim Jacobs who partly managed Tyson and who had the largest fight collection in the world did this. He got film of both Ali and Robinson in their primes and measured the speeds of their jabs frame by frame and Ali's came out faster than Rays. You can find this in the documentry/film 'the Fighters' which is based around the first Ali vs Frazier fight.
I agree with it too... Ray was fast but Ali's hands and jabs were just a blur in his late 60s prime... I think he definately had the fastest hands pound for pound of any boxer.

Frame for frame (or any other way) Patterson shits all over Ali's supposed great handspeed. By a large margin.

I think not.

dws · Post by **dws** » 21 Sep 2005, 12:36

If some think that Patterson was faster than Ali then OK but to say Ali only had supposed fast hands well that's just crazy.By the way I hope whoever measured Ali and Robinson wasn't the same guy who said frame by frame Vinny Pazienza was faster than Ali or Robinson or whoever the fornicate he said,either way he didn't know what he was talking about.

Tantum · Post by **Tantum** » 21 Sep 2005, 14:01

There's nothing to think about.

Ali's jabs are 4-6 frames, and Patterson's power punches are often 3-4 frames.

Not slappy combos like Ali, either. Actual power punches that put people on their asses... Hard.

I posted comparison gifs before, but everyone still wanted to claim their hero (either Ali, or Tyson) was the fastest.

Nile4000 · Post by **Nile4000** » 21 Sep 2005, 15:13

Tantum wrote:There's nothing to think about.

Ali's jabs are 4-6 frames, and Patterson's power punches are often 3-4 frames.

Not slappy combos like Ali, either. Actual power punches that put people on their asses... Hard.

I posted comparison gifs before, but everyone still wanted to claim their hero (either Ali, or Tyson) was the fastest.

If Ali is not the fastest, does anyone surpass Patterson's speed?

BoxBuzz · Post by **BoxBuzz** » 21 Sep 2005, 15:34

Tantum I know you have championed that, but there are a lot of variables to determine before you can be sure of that rather generic across the board statement.

There are a few here that would disagree witht the statement that Patterson had Faster handspeed than Ali. I'm not sure it is quite as easily ascertained as you imply.

Frame speed is not always an accurate measure since cameras of the 50's used a drive systems that could be pretty sloppy depending on the camera. Video tape would get the job done if there is that to compare.
Until video tape came along "Standard" frame speed was much worse in measurement than wow and flutter on the old turntables. And when your gauging something that fast it could make for a pretty inaccurate measurement of time. My guess is you probably factored that in.

Another variable could be that on a single occasion Floyd threw the fastest combination or series of combinations ever thrown but did he do it with consistency or just on occasion? Single instance vs chronic routines would have to be factored in.

I have had the impression just from watching that Ali or Clay if you will, was faster most of the time at their comporable ages. I would say your gif approach is probably is more accurate than my "guesses". But I'm not sure your approach settles the matter as clearly as you seem to think it does.

I'm not really taking issue with you as much as you might imagine. I do agree with one assumption is that in all probability the all time heavyweight hand speed record is owned by one of them. They both were lightening fast at their best. I will never take that away from Floyd he was rediculously fast.

Tantum · Post by **Tantum** » 21 Sep 2005, 16:01

For the handspeed research, I watched, timed, and cut & examined frames about 5 or 6 Patterson fights that took place from '55-61... In each of the fights, there were outbursts of amazing speed... Which almost always end with the other fighter on the ground.

For Ali, I watched, timed and cut & examined frames from 4 fights from '62-66.

For Tyson I did about 4 fights as well.

Rounds were timed for inaccuracy, frame rate differences were accounted for.

Patterson was faster than Ali, and Ali was faster than Tyson.

The Great John L · Post by **The Great John L** » 21 Sep 2005, 16:44

Tantum wrote:For the handspeed research, I watched, timed, and cut & examined frames about 5 or 6 Patterson fights that took place from '55-61... In each of the fights, there were outbursts of amazing speed... Which almost always end with the other fighter on the ground.

For Ali, I watched, timed and cut & examined frames from 4 fights from '62-66.

For Tyson I did about 4 fights as well.

Rounds were timed for inaccuracy, frame rate differences were accounted for.

Patterson was faster than Ali, and Ali was faster than Tyson.

I'm glad that's settled. Did you check any others? There have been quite a few HW's in the past 40 years with blazing hand speed who never quite attained the level that Ali, Tyson and Patterson attained.

jwizard · Post by **jwizard** » 21 Sep 2005, 17:16

I would say that the speed of multi-punch combinations would be a better indicator of handspeed than throwing single jabs. No?

Tantum · Post by **Tantum** » 22 Sep 2005, 07:43

The Great John L wrote:Did you check any others? There have been quite a few HW's in the past 40 years with blazing hand speed who never quite attained the level that Ali, Tyson and Patterson attained.

No, I did not, those were 3 of the 4 mentioned, so those were the 3 I checked (Ezzard Charles being the other mentioned, but I only have a few clips of him).

jwizard wrote:I would say that the speed of multi-punch combinations would be a better indicator of handspeed than throwing single jabs. No?

As mentioned before, most of Patterson's speed outbursts were power punch combos that devastated his opponents.

mrbassie · Post by **mrbassie** » 22 Sep 2005, 08:26

Something to think about is that not all that old film was recorded at a decent framerate so measuring Ali's speed against Robinson's speed was more than likely done with two films of different quality

BoxBuzz · Post by **BoxBuzz** » 22 Sep 2005, 08:59

Tantum claims that at least in his case he believes he has properly compensated for any variances. My guess would be that anyone doing that research would do the same. Unless of course the purpose of the research is confirm one's beliefs rather than to discover the truth of the matter.

Hey Tantum while you were doing this did you notice any subtle nuances in terms of different "style" of throwing the punches? In other words It always seemed to me me Ali was a bit more "open" in his delivery where Floyd was a bit more "compact" in his also being smaller probably worked to his advantage speed wise. He used his torso and arms together working out of that "peek-a-boo" just a bit more integrated so as to make it appear just a shade more efficient.

I'm still surprised to find he actually was faster but I have no reason to doubt your work. You've put in the time so I'm not sceptical at this point. The impression one gets that Ali was faster could be due to the combination of footspeed, size and his use of that remarkably long fast jab. He simply "appeared" faster to the naked eye.

Tantum · Post by **Tantum** » 22 Sep 2005, 09:38

BoxBuzz wrote:The impression one gets that Ali was faster could be due to the combination of footspeed, size and his use of that remarkably long fast jab.

I would also say that this is the most likely explanation.