BoxRec

of course the great smokin' joe frazier is not
the greatest of all time. it is a nice title for a
thread and an amusing thought, but it is by no
doubt an outlier opinion, that would not find too
much resonance with boxing historians.

man wrote:

yancey wrote:The first fight Joe took him lightly, came in unprepared

on a side note ... really? he took the big bad
terrifying olympic champion with the devastating
record lightly? and smokin' joe frazier of all people,
the boxer with the perfect work ethic came in
unprepared?

i respect defending your man. it is an honorable
endeavor, but that seems a stretch of a stretch.

Hardly.

Foreman was a pretty significant underdog because he had been matched extremely soft after he struggled with former LH contender Peralta again in their second fight. Foreman’s opponents after the second Peralta fight leading up to Kingston almost make Wilders competition look tough. His handlers recognized his shortcomings and matched him accordingly.

Unfortunately for Joe, I don’t think he or his handlers fully understood just how powerful the crude Foreman actually was. That’s not to say that Joe would have ever been able to outfight George, but he certainly showed the ability to adapt when he was younger as he fought much better in the second Bonavena fight against an opponent that dropped him a few times in their first fight.

The Great John L wrote:Hardly.

Foreman was a pretty significant underdog because he had been matched extremely soft after he struggled with former LH contender Peralta again in their second fight. Foreman’s opponents after the second Peralta fight leading up to Kingston almost make Wilders competition look tough. His handlers recognized his shortcomings and matched him accordingly.

Unfortunately for Joe, I don’t think he or his handlers fully understood just how powerful the crude Foreman actually was.

i do not deny at all that foreman's famous
early run sounded more impressive than it
was at second glance. but frazier was not
the type to be in any way ever unprepared.
so i think whatever he thought pre-fight did
not have much influence on the outcome of
their first meeting.

but never get me wrong, i am only disputing
the GOAT status, not his greatness.

man wrote:

The Great John L wrote:Hardly.

Foreman was a pretty significant underdog because he had been matched extremely soft after he struggled with former LH contender Peralta again in their second fight. Foreman’s opponents after the second Peralta fight leading up to Kingston almost make Wilders competition look tough. His handlers recognized his shortcomings and matched him accordingly.

Unfortunately for Joe, I don’t think he or his handlers fully understood just how powerful the crude Foreman actually was.

i do not deny at all that foreman's famous
early run sounded more impressive than it
was at second glance. but frazier was not
the type to be in any way ever unprepared.
so i think whatever he thought pre-fight did
not have much influence on the outcome of
their first meeting.

but never get me wrong, i am only disputing
the GOAT status, not his greatness.

We definitely agree on Frazier as an ATG but not the GOAT. However, what I’m saying is that he and his handlers totally under-estimated what George brought to the ring. And if you’ve ever seen the Kingston fight, Joe appeared to be in Daniels/Stander shape and not Ali/Bonavena shape. He looked to be in much better shape against Bugner later that year and for the second Ali fight after that.

Just because you’re an ATG doesn’t mean you can’t under-estimate an opponent. In his second career Ali did it frequently.

The Great John L wrote:We definitely agree on Frazier as an ATG but not the GOAT.

oh sorry, that was all i was talking about.
your knowledge of boxing surpasses mine
by far, so i will not pretend i know details
of joe's bouts any better than you do.

as for underestimating opponents. i think
in ali's case that is definitely true. but for
many fighters i believe it is more a case of
pre-fight talk. if you fight at top level and
you are a top professional you do take your
opponents seriously. doesn't mean you talk
like that of course. of course joe thought
he was way better. he was undefeated, even
had beat a pretty.prime ali. but that it is not
the same as taking someone too lightly,
meaning not preparing properly IMO.

as for ali underestimating opponents i agree.
at the latest after zaire, ali thought he could
do anything. it still puzzles me though why
in the FOTC he didn't do anything to avoid
the left hook. i understand that having hands
that low was his style and all that, but he ate
so many of these hooks and it just looked like
he should at least try to avoid them by having
his right up there. i do not know enough of
boxing to judge whether it was possible for him
to adapt to that punch, but whenever i see him
standing there and taking time and time again
the very same hand i do think this was simply a
tactical mistake on his part.

How about if I said that I believe Frazier was "looking past" Foreman.

The Great John L wrote:How about if I said that I believe Frazier was "looking past" Foreman.

You had it 100% correct the first time.

No need to change anything.

man wrote:

yancey wrote:The first fight Joe took him lightly, came in unprepared

on a side note ... really? he took the big bad
terrifying olympic champion with the devastating
record lightly? and smokin' joe frazier of all people,
the boxer with the perfect work ethic came in
unprepared?

i respect defending your man. it is an honorable
endeavor, but that seems a stretch of a stretch.

Not a stretch at all. I'm not going to make anything up. Frazier took Foreman lightly, which was a big mistake.

Frazier was emotionally done with boxing after he climbed his mountain in 1971. He was much more into his music.

For a man that was limited in physical skills compared to Ali and Foreman, Frazier had to be 110%, eye of the tiger, committed to things in order to prevail.

And please stop equivocating chronological age to correspond with what a fighter has left in the tank. Some fighters are young at 32, some are shot.

Swarmers tend to have very short peaks. Frazier was an absolutely shot fighter post-Manila. I don't even consider that second Foreman fight in the grand scheme of things.

yancey wrote:Not a stretch at all. I'm not going to make anything up. Frazier took Foreman lightly, which was a big mistake.

Frazier was emotionally done with boxing after he climbed his mountain in 1971. He was much more into his music.

For a man that was limited in physical skills compared to Ali and Foreman, Frazier had to be 110%, eye of the tiger, committed to things in order to prevail.

And please stop equivocating chronological age to correspond with what a fighter has left in the tank. Some fighters are young at 32, some are shot.

Swarmers tend to have very short peaks. Frazier was an absolutely shot fighter post-Manila. I don't even consider that second Foreman fight in the grand scheme of things.

we are talking GOAT here. not great fighter
or good fighter, but GOAT. this is all i am
saying. all the ifs and whens and whys may
well be, but if there are too many of these
then the man in question is simply not the
GOAT.

to me the greatest of all time means something
very special. not a brilliant night, not a good
run, not a short peak. this is why on a list for
GOAT there are only very few candidates an
joe frazier is not on mine. and i do not see how
anybody can have him ahead of louis and ali,
just no name the two who are in my book totally
obviously ahead of him.

The Great John L wrote:How about if I said that I believe Frazier was "looking past" Foreman.

my only point is in the context of him
being GOAT. for that to be the case
despite of his loss against foreman,
he must have been terribly shot and
i doubt he was and by terribly i mean
aliversusholmes-like. nobody would
hold this fight against ali. it is for me as
if this fight simply didn't exist on ali's
record. it is totally meaningless when it
comes to determining ali's status as GOAT
or not. i for one find it hard to see frazier
vs foreman I in the same light. and this
is all i am saying. not that there were
no good reasons, not that there wasn't this
and that and the other thing. GOAT at this
stage at this age doesn't lose like that, simply
because other contenders for GOAT ... didn't.

my explanation BTW why he lost is different.
i think there are certain constellations that
are almost impossible to overcome. i think
these are rare but they happen.

manny pacquiao is to me clearly the better
fighter than juan manuel marquez, but for
whatever reason, JMM's timing is just totally
in sync with manny's. whatever manny does,
juan has a remedy.

foreman vs frazier seems similar to me. joe
might not have been in perfect shape, prime
status or whatever, but he got totally outclassed
before that could even have played much of a
role. and it was definitely not the case that his
chin had vanished overnight as he proved very
impressively against ali later on.

i think george was just lucky for being in sync
with joe, for a lack of better word. he would
throw just this fraction of a second into joe's
movements, increasing power this way. this
is my interpretation for a fight that is terrible
to watch for any fighting fan. george was always
this little out of reach for the hook and his own
punches seemed to come right at the perfect
angle at the right time. i do not know if frazier
could have ever beaten george foreman, but
the nature of this loss at this stage of his career
makes GOAT out of reach for me.

man wrote:

yancey wrote:Not a stretch at all. I'm not going to make anything up. Frazier took Foreman lightly, which was a big mistake.

Frazier was emotionally done with boxing after he climbed his mountain in 1971. He was much more into his music.

For a man that was limited in physical skills compared to Ali and Foreman, Frazier had to be 110%, eye of the tiger, committed to things in order to prevail.

And please stop equivocating chronological age to correspond with what a fighter has left in the tank. Some fighters are young at 32, some are shot.

Swarmers tend to have very short peaks. Frazier was an absolutely shot fighter post-Manila. I don't even consider that second Foreman fight in the grand scheme of things.

we are talking GOAT here. not great fighter
or good fighter, but GOAT. this is all i am
saying. all the ifs and whens and whys may
well be, but if there are too many of these
then the man in question is simply not the
GOAT.

to me the greatest of all time means something
very special. not a brilliant night, not a good
run, not a short peak. this is why on a list for
GOAT there are only very few candidates an
joe frazier is not on mine. and i do not see how
anybody can have him ahead of louis and ali,
just no name the two who are in my book totally
obviously ahead of him.

Are you under the impression that I am making a case for Frazier as the GOAT?

man wrote:my explanation BTW why he lost is different.
i think there are certain constellations that
are almost impossible to overcome. i think
these are rare but they happen.

manny pacquiao is to me clearly the better
fighter than juan manuel marquez, but for
whatever reason, JMM's timing is just totally
in sync with manny's. whatever manny does,
juan has a remedy.

foreman vs frazier seems similar to me. joe
might not have been in perfect shape, prime
status or whatever, but he got totally outclassed
before that could even have played much of a
role. and it was definitely not the case that his
chin had vanished overnight as he proved very
impressively against ali later on.

i think george was just lucky for being in sync
with joe, for a lack of better word. he would
throw just this fraction of a second into joe's
movements, increasing power this way. this
is my interpretation for a fight that is terrible
to watch for any fighting fan. george was always
this little out of reach for the hook and his own
punches seemed to come right at the perfect
angle at the right time. i do not know if frazier
could have ever beaten george foreman, but
the nature of this loss at this stage of his career
makes GOAT out of reach for me.

\
I would love to have seen prime (1969) Frazier go against 1973 Foreman in a fight where Foreman's illegal pushing-shoving tactics were quickly stopped by the referee.

I am NOT saying that Frazier necessarily wins. The style match-up of smaller swarmer wading in against bigger, hard hitting slugger is not a favorable one for Frazier.

I am saying that prime, eye of the tiger Frazier would stand a VIABLE chance of getting inside (no shoving from George) of Foreman's punching radius, staying tight, working the body, exhausting George, and ultimately taking him out.

yancey wrote:I would love to have seen prime (1969) Frazier go against 1973 Foreman in a fight where Foreman's illegal pushing-shoving tactics were quickly stopped by the referee.

I am NOT saying that Frazier necessarily wins. The style match-up of smaller swarmer wading in against bigger, hard hitting slugger is not a favorable one for Frazier.

I am saying that prime, eye of the tiger Frazier would stand a VIABLE chance of getting inside (no shoving from George) of Foreman's punching radius, staying tight, working the body, exhausting George, and ultimately taking him out.

We seem to be in the minority with this opinion, but I would agree, although what I would expect is that Joe loses the first fight and then wins in a rematch as he adjusts his tactics slightly. He certainly showed great improvement in the second Bonavena fight and even the obese, shot, one eyed Frazier was able to extend an improved Foreman in their rematch, although he was still dominated.

yancey wrote:Are you under the impression that I am making a case for Frazier as the GOAT?

i am under the impression that this
is what the thread is about.