Pro boxing - How much experience do you really need?

[Controversial]

What are your thoughts on this? You clearly don't need a great amateur career to be a success in the pro ranks. Some great fighters (even ATGs) had zero amateur experience or only a handful of amateur bouts. We have seen a MMA fighter making his debut take Tyson Fury the distance, drop him and some would even argue beat him when you would've expected Fury to have boxed his head off. Wardley had no amateur fights and just 4 white collar bouts (three ended in the 1st and one in the 2nd) who just stopped arguably the second best HW in the world.

So are HWs more likely to make it with little amateur career or do you think its a sport you can be good at regardless of experience, its just down to things you are born with like determination, will to win etc..

[margaret thatcher]

this seems like a bit of a cherrypick. guys like wardley are exceptions for a reason, you wont hear of most others with such little experience who never got nearly as far because they hadnt developed the tools. who are the next highest rated guys who turned pro in their 20s with no am or pro combat experience? do you think these guys are more heavily represented near the top or bottom of the ranks?

experience is very important, doesnt mean you wont have guys like wardley now and then. and id add on ngganou - his 2nd fight looked very much like world class boxer vs guy with hardly any boxing experience

[margaret thatcher]

also with wardley - he's been boxing like 10 years and pro 8 years now, so he's not some beginner any more. its not like he's just some guy off the streets knocking out world ranked boxers. he will have had thousands of rounds sparring and/or fighting quality boxers by now

[Controversial]

this seems like a bit of a cherrypick. guys like wardley are exceptions for a reason, you wont hear of most others with such little experience who never got nearly as far because they hadnt developed the tools. who are the next highest rated guys who turned pro in their 20s with no am or pro combat experience? do you think these guys are more heavily represented near the top or bottom of the ranks?

experience is very important, doesnt mean you wont have guys like wardley now and then.

There are others with limited experience, Marciano and Larry Holmes only had a handful of fights. Dwight Muhammad Qawi had zero fights. There are others too. I wasn’t talking of Wardley specifically but he did prompt my post as on paper Parker should’ve boxed his ears off.

[margaret thatcher]

this seems like a bit of a cherrypick. guys like wardley are exceptions for a reason, you wont hear of most others with such little experience who never got nearly as far because they hadnt developed the tools. who are the next highest rated guys who turned pro in their 20s with no am or pro combat experience? do you think these guys are more heavily represented near the top or bottom of the ranks?

experience is very important, doesnt mean you wont have guys like wardley now and then.

There are others with limited experience, Marciano and Larry Holmes only had a handful of fights. Dwight Muhammad Qawi had zero fights. There are others too. I wasn’t talking of Wardley specifically but he did prompt my post as in paper Parker should’ve boxed his ears off.

ya look how far back youre going for those examples. holmes also had 20+ am bouts and fought in the us olympic trials.

you simply wont hear about most guys with no experience because they dont go anywhere

i'd pose the questions again: who are the next best guys atm who went pro with no am or pro experience in their 20s?

[margaret thatcher]

this seems like a bit of a cherrypick. guys like wardley are exceptions for a reason, you wont hear of most others with such little experience who never got nearly as far because they hadnt developed the tools. who are the next highest rated guys who turned pro in their 20s with no am or pro combat experience? do you think these guys are more heavily represented near the top or bottom of the ranks?

experience is very important, doesnt mean you wont have guys like wardley now and then.

There are others with limited experience, Marciano and Larry Holmes only had a handful of fights. Dwight Muhammad Qawi had zero fights. There are others too. I wasn’t talking of Wardley specifically but he did prompt my post as on paper Parker should’ve boxed his ears off.

well you pose it as if parker was fighting some rando tough guy off the streets. wardley has boxed for a decade and been a pro with high level support for 8 years now (he lucked out in being so heavily backed from the start). it's been his full time career, he's sparred and/fought thousands of rounds vs quality boxers.

that, along with wardley being an anomaly, make me not too surprised he beat parker

[Boxerbeetle]

I definitely think boxing is one of the very few sports where raw power / athleticism can count for a great deal, probably due to the fundamental nature of it, i.e. one on one, limited grappling, no takedowns, etc.

Obviously still incredibly rare for someone with limited experience to be competitive, particularly at the top levels, but not impossible. Compare to a complex team sport like NFL where you literally wouldn’t be able to get a sniff in a real game, and you can see why boxing would potentially lend itself to people with limited experience making an impact.

[Boxerbeetle]

Plus the whole ‘punchers chance’ doesn’t really exist in most other sports. In boxing, you can literally turn around a fight in a split second.

[Ruthless-RKO]

also with wardley - he's been boxing like 10 years and pro 8 years now, so he's not some beginner any more. its not like he's just some guy off the streets knocking out world ranked boxers. he will have had thousands of rounds sparring and/or fighting quality boxers by now

It’s like when AJ says he’s still learning.. I mean you learn every fight. But it seemed like an excuse for him.

Mans an Olympic gold medalist.

[Controversial]

this seems like a bit of a cherrypick. guys like wardley are exceptions for a reason, you wont hear of most others with such little experience who never got nearly as far because they hadnt developed the tools. who are the next highest rated guys who turned pro in their 20s with no am or pro combat experience? do you think these guys are more heavily represented near the top or bottom of the ranks?

experience is very important, doesnt mean you wont have guys like wardley now and then.

There are others with limited experience, Marciano and Larry Holmes only had a handful of fights. Dwight Muhammad Qawi had zero fights. There are others too. I wasn’t talking of Wardley specifically but he did prompt my post as in paper Parker should’ve boxed his ears off.

ya look how far back youre going for those examples. holmes also had 20+ am bouts and fought in the us olympic trials.

you simply wont hear about most guys with no experience because they dont go anywhere

i'd pose the questions again: who are the next best guys atm who went pro with no am or pro experience in their 20s?

I don’t believe Moses Itouma had any senior amateur fights and only around 20 junior ones.

[margaret thatcher]

There are others with limited experience, Marciano and Larry Holmes only had a handful of fights. Dwight Muhammad Qawi had zero fights. There are others too. I wasn’t talking of Wardley specifically but he did prompt my post as in paper Parker should’ve boxed his ears off.

ya look how far back youre going for those examples. holmes also had 20+ am bouts and fought in the us olympic trials.

you simply wont hear about most guys with no experience because they dont go anywhere

i'd pose the questions again: who are the next best guys atm who went pro with no am or pro experience in their 20s?

I don’t believe Moses Itouma had any senior amateur fights and only around 20 junior ones.

moses started boxing at 9 and has been sparring good pros since like 15

[Controversial]

ya look how far back youre going for those examples. holmes also had 20+ am bouts and fought in the us olympic trials.

you simply wont hear about most guys with no experience because they dont go anywhere

i'd pose the questions again: who are the next best guys atm who went pro with no am or pro experience in their 20s?

I don’t believe Moses Itouma had any senior amateur fights and only around 20 junior ones.

moses started boxing at 9 and has been sparring good pros since like 15

Still didn’t have many amateur fights. On the flip side there are many great amateurs who flopped as pros so experience didn’t make any difference to them, which suggests your inbuilt qualities are far more important and some of those you can’t teach like mental strength and resilience.

[margaret thatcher]

I don’t believe Moses Itouma had any senior amateur fights and only around 20 junior ones.

moses started boxing at 9 and has been sparring good pros since like 15

Still didn’t have many amateur fights. On the flip side there are many great amateurs who flopped as pros so experience didn’t make any difference to them, which suggests your inbuilt qualities are far more important and some of those you can’t teach like mental strength and resilience.

boxing since age 9, sparring top pros since 15, fighting best juniors in the world ... .already able to be a full time pro with a top team at 19. im simply not following if this is someone you think is an example of what youre trying to prove

when great amateurs flop, it's usually still a lot better than what guys with no amateur careers could ever achieve.....as i said, you wont even hear of most of them ever.

[mickey1975]

I don’t believe Moses Itouma had any senior amateur fights and only around 20 junior ones.

moses started boxing at 9 and has been sparring good pros since like 15

Still didn’t have many amateur fights. On the flip side there are many great amateurs who flopped as pros so experience didn’t make any difference to them, which suggests your inbuilt qualities are far more important and some of those you can’t teach like mental strength and resilience.

He had several England camps and international experience. He was immersed in boxing from childhood.

[margaret thatcher]

also lets not forget that wardley was down on the cards late vs parker. waaay down on the cards late vs huni. and drew the first time with clarke, who was much less explosive but more steady and had that deep am background.

even with his success, his lack of refinement has still showed. he's got some amazing physcial attributes that allow him to achieve far beyond most could, but lately he's still looked like the less seasoned (but much more explosive) guy pretty consistently. i will say he boxed better vs parker than he did vs huni.

you do once in a while get these natural freaks, qawi is my fave of them, but very much exception and id suspect theyd have been even better with 25 am fights rather than 0

wardley was also very fortunate in that he had whyte on his side during whyte' peak popularity, so very early on was hooked up to great opportunities to develop as a pro despite virtually no credentials. that early support will have helped lessen the blow of inexperience.

[margaret thatcher]

also with wardley - he's been boxing like 10 years and pro 8 years now, so he's not some beginner any more. its not like he's just some guy off the streets knocking out world ranked boxers. he will have had thousands of rounds sparring and/or fighting quality boxers by now

It’s like when AJ says he’s still learning.. I mean you learn every fight. But it seemed like an excuse for him.

Mans an Olympic gold medalist.

ya similar with wilder, both had 40+ am fights and were in training camps with top coaches and training partners. they started late but definitely not the same thing as just entering pro boxing as a beginner. then as pros, they both had great support from the very start.

if you turn pro young and are with a top team from the start, you can improve a lot and its defo not farfetched to become a respectable pro even if you had very little am background. defo not denying that. heck look at jake paul and what he can do with boxing as a full time job and quality sparring (although even then tommy fury, who been around the sport since little, reminded us of his limits).

but becoming a top fighter is very rare. and more often guys who drop in to pro boxing with no experience will be lacking in tools, be getting beaten up or beat regularly, and we'll never hear of them. i imagine many guys with no/very little am experience would laugh at the thought of them going pro.

[Miguello]

If this is about Wardley, you have to remember that the heavyweight division has been rubbish for going over a decade.

Statistically, not enough big lads do boxing anymore so if you're even half decent you'll go far.

There is a clear difference between someone like Usyk, and the rest of the division.

[leftrightleft]

Tbh, if you dont have an amatuer career its very hard, you have to spar with good level guys to gain experience and of course if you sell alot of tickets you'll do alot better

[Coco]

Wardley is the exception rather than the rule.

Furthermore it's tough to get the crucial support at promotional level without amateur credentials.

What has happened with Wardley wouldn't have been possible without Dillian Whyte

[Controversial]

Of course I didn't mean anyone can walk into a gym and be a success. Maybe it's more unique to HWs but if you can punch and take a punch you seem to be half way there. Of course you need things like fitness, dedication and heart but all those things you either have or you don't. Wilder and AJ are examples of HWs that reached the top with pretty limited ability but had a big punch, if either couldn't crack an egg they wouldn't have done anything. I appreciate you need backing and support too but was more thinking about actual ability in this instance. Earnie Shavers started at 22, had around 20 amateur fights and ended up a top contender in the toughest era in HW history all because he could punch. Same for Ron Lyle, was around 30 when he turned pro, very little amateur experience but could bang.

[gilgamesh]

Jameel McCline was 1-0 as an Amateur. He was good enough to get a title shot, but he wasn't good enough to win it. Which is possibly what we're looking at again in Wardley, albeit in a more exciting form.

I don't know if anybody remembers Teddy Reid. He was a fun action fighter in the early 2000's. I think he was like 3-0 or 4-0 as an amateur, and he wound up getting as high as I guess Top 15 or thereabouts?

[gilgamesh]

If this is about Wardley, you have to remember that the heavyweight division has been rubbish for going over a decade.

Statistically, not enough big lads do boxing anymore so if you're even half decent you'll go far.

There is a clear difference between someone like Usyk, and the rest of the division.

I do think Usyk's defensive skill is going to all but shut Wardley's offense completely down.

[knockout]

Definitely more wiggle room at heavyweight it seems when pure skill seems to be less important than just having incredible physical attributes ( great punch and chin)

Add Ray Mercer to your list. Started boxing at 23 , Olympic champion and WBO champion

[gilgamesh]

Definitely more wiggle room at heavyweight it seems when pure skill seems to be less important than just having incredible physical attributes ( great punch and chin)

Add Ray Mercer to your list. Started boxing at 23 , Olympic champion and WBO champion

Yeah that's a big thing that's helping Wardley out so far is the great chin.

Duane Bobick had a sh*t load of Amateur experience, but he had no chin. Wardley with no amateur experience, and a terrific chin seems to be better off.

[knockout]

Definitely more wiggle room at heavyweight it seems when pure skill seems to be less important than just having incredible physical attributes ( great punch and chin)

Add Ray Mercer to your list. Started boxing at 23 , Olympic champion and WBO champion

Yeah that's a big thing that's helping Wardley out so far is the great chin.

Duane Bobick had a sh*t load of Amateur experience, but he had no chin. Wardley with no amateur experience, and a terrific chin seems to be better off.

Yes chin and punch with limited skill can do the trick at heavyweight level.
Fabio also has a set of balls on him and self belief to take a beating but still believe he can pull out a Hail Mary. Impressive for sure