Young George was one of the legit physical freaks of boxing history to be sure Old George too in a different but probably even more impressive way
Nice to see. Young George actually had a bit of decent head movement. Liked the way he started throwing uppercuts to the body when he realised his opponent liked to get his head down low.
I've always thought there was a lot of method to what Foreman did on his dominant run pre-Ali. He was very good at cutting the ring, had an excellent jab, and parried and picked off shots relatively well. When he abandoned the structure and the style that Saddler gave him and just tried to brawl relying on his power and chin, he wasn't really that good. Ron Lyle almost blasted him out of there when they went toe-to-toe.
Interesting to know. I haven't seen much of pre-Ali Foreman apart from the odd clip so I'm more familiar with the walk forward and slug it out Foreman.
The Norton fight, albeit very brief, showcases Foreman breaking him down behind a jab before he KOs him.
Yeah obviously. It's just weird seeing him with the pittypat shots and attempting agility based defence. Bully style boxers rarely go out of style even in sparring.
Foreman had such a weird style. At times it made him look like wild and brutish, but there was more subtlety to his boxing than a quick glance would suggest.
He used his size to keep his hands out there, to block/parry shots and dictate distance. Works very well vs undersized HWs of that era. People forget Ali was very big himself for the times, so that didnt work quite as well vs Ali.
he had skills but no grace whatsoever, that's why ali called him "the mummy" ali found out that George cut off the ring better than anyone he ever faced. George did look wierd anytime he tried to force any real movement into his legs, the footage of him imitating ali in the night he fought five looked even wierder. By that time ali fucked his head up so bad that he was trying to be ali.
I've probably seen like a handful of Foreman's fights and never saw him use much head movement or angles like he did here, so I was kinda surprised even a little humored when I came across this footage
Those smothering techniques he uses actually work, but I guess it's just a style nobody uses anymore or maybe the gloves were different back then and allowed you to open your hands better.