Al Bernstein On Boxing: Sorry To Disagree, But...

[ruckspin]

Teddy Atlas is a comlpete bloody half wit, I mean he really is a cretinous moron. I'm absolutely fed up of his ridiculous analogies about rooms in his house. FFS, "he goes downstairs", "he's up in the utility room", "he doesn't want to spend too much time in the garage with the engine running", "If he doesn't put on the extractor fan whilst cooking curry in the kitchen, the observatory might be a little smelly bit later on".

He does it with other things too. He seems to come up with the most inapplicable, ludicrous metaphor for what he's seeing, then sticks to it resolutely and over-extends it, despite it being dubious to begin with.

There was an example in the Cloud-Woods fight on the weekend about cars, but they usually follow this sort of pattern, "Woods is like an old Mk V Jaguar, that's been down lots of roads and had years of racing. It didn't win every race, but it's reliable, durable and hard working. However, whenever it's raced in the USA, where it has to drive on the other side of the road, it's came up second best. Will Woods be able to fine tune his performance like the engine of this jaguar, and put the final application of turtle wax on it tonight, or will it be shipped back to the UK in deafeat? Or some stuff like that.

He also has a habit of making one or two rudimentary and bleeding obvious points like, "the guy that's got a 6 inch reach advantage wants to fight from the outside". He will then proceed to repeat this over and over and over again, ad nauseam, for the rest of the fight. He'll mention it every time the tall guy fights from the outside. He'll refer to it every time the tall guy gets dragged into a toe to toe brawl. He'll fill the breaks between rounds talking about whether or not the tall guy is or isn't doing what he reckons he should, accompanied by replays showing so much more, He'll sum up by either saying 1. The tall guy did what I said and won, or 2.The tall guy didn't do what I said and lost. The guy bloody repeats himself so much that I usually end up shouting at the TV screen or just turning down the volume.

[JazMerkin]

I think the criticism Teddy makes of writers on the net is valid, however, I feel its a problem that is far more widespread than simply internet writers. Many more mainstream writers seem to follow similar trends when writing often letting their personal interactions with a fighter influence how they write about them & their performances (looking at you, Dougie Fischer & Steve Kim).

It seems a trend that many of these guys choose to write in a style whereby they try & project some kind of literary tough guy image & all too often seem to believe that the odd decent article makes them the heir to the likes of Mailer & Schullberg. Maybe because boxing writers have been so good throughout history, possibly the best across the board compared to any other sport, that now that the standard has dropped it is more noticeable, particularly to someone who has been around as long as Teddy Atlas, hence his criticism.

[Saddo]

The truth is everyone is bias in some way... i have pissed off and lost many a good writer for not publishing somthing i seen as libelus for the site or even a boxers career.

i wish alot of other sites would follow suit, i also have a pet hate on sensationalist who do an interview with a boxer and twist a joke of the cuff comment and turn it into a serious fact or will make up any old shit just to get traffic. the boxing sites that do this i avoid like the plague.

for me its about promoting the sport i love... i aint here to call this or that promoter or fighter. i will however express my opinion on the forum on things but never on the main page of the site.

boxing need the internet BIGTIME... not everyone will get it and not everyone likes but regardless of if your for or against it, its here and its here for good... you need to use it or get left behind watching fights on your betamax.

btw that was a fantastic read Al

[Kel]

Teddy Atlas is a comlpete bloody half wit, I mean he really is a cretinous moron. I'm absolutely fed up of his ridiculous analogies about rooms in his house. FFS, "he goes downstairs", "he's up in the utility room", "he doesn't want to spend too much time in the garage with the engine running", "If he doesn't put on the extractor fan whilst cooking curry in the kitchen, the observatory might be a little smelly bit later on".

He does it with other things too. He seems to come up with the most inapplicable, ludicrous metaphor for what he's seeing, then sticks to it resolutely and over-extends it, despite it being dubious to begin with.

There was an example in the Cloud-Woods fight on the weekend about cars, but they usually follow this sort of pattern, "Woods is like an old Mk V Jaguar, that's been down lots of roads and had years of racing. It didn't win every race, but it's reliable, durable and hard working. However, whenever it's raced in the USA, where it has to drive on the other side of the road, it's came up second best. Will Woods be able to fine tune his performance like the engine of this jaguar, and put the final application of turtle wax on it tonight, or will it be shipped back to the UK in deafeat? Or some stuff like that.

He also has a habit of making one or two rudimentary and bleeding obvious points like, "the guy that's got a 6 inch reach advantage wants to fight from the outside". He will then proceed to repeat this over and over and over again, ad nauseam, for the rest of the fight. He'll mention it every time the tall guy fights from the outside. He'll refer to it every time the tall guy gets dragged into a toe to toe brawl. He'll fill the breaks between rounds talking about whether or not the tall guy is or isn't doing what he reckons he should, accompanied by replays showing so much more, He'll sum up by either saying 1. The tall guy did what I said and won, or 2.The tall guy didn't do what I said and lost. The guy bloody repeats himself so much that I usually end up shouting at the TV screen or just turning down the volume.

Great first post Welcome!

[ryanman]

Teddy Atlas is a comlpete bloody half wit, I mean he really is a cretinous moron. I'm absolutely fed up of his ridiculous analogies about rooms in his house. FFS, "he goes downstairs", "he's up in the utility room", "he doesn't want to spend too much time in the garage with the engine running", "If he doesn't put on the extractor fan whilst cooking curry in the kitchen, the observatory might be a little smelly bit later on".

He does it with other things too. He seems to come up with the most inapplicable, ludicrous metaphor for what he's seeing, then sticks to it resolutely and over-extends it, despite it being dubious to begin with.

There was an example in the Cloud-Woods fight on the weekend about cars, but they usually follow this sort of pattern, "Woods is like an old Mk V Jaguar, that's been down lots of roads and had years of racing. It didn't win every race, but it's reliable, durable and hard working. However, whenever it's raced in the USA, where it has to drive on the other side of the road, it's came up second best. Will Woods be able to fine tune his performance like the engine of this jaguar, and put the final application of turtle wax on it tonight, or will it be shipped back to the UK in deafeat? Or some stuff like that.

He also has a habit of making one or two rudimentary and bleeding obvious points like, "the guy that's got a 6 inch reach advantage wants to fight from the outside". He will then proceed to repeat this over and over and over again, ad nauseam, for the rest of the fight. He'll mention it every time the tall guy fights from the outside. He'll refer to it every time the tall guy gets dragged into a toe to toe brawl. He'll fill the breaks between rounds talking about whether or not the tall guy is or isn't doing what he reckons he should, accompanied by replays showing so much more, He'll sum up by either saying 1. The tall guy did what I said and won, or 2.The tall guy didn't do what I said and lost. The guy bloody repeats himself so much that I usually end up shouting at the TV screen or just turning down the volume.

Great first post Welcome!

I'll second that, nice one. Welcome to the site.

[CFH]

Teddy Atlas is a comlpete bloody half wit, I mean he really is a cretinous moron. I'm absolutely fed up of his ridiculous analogies about rooms in his house. FFS, "he goes downstairs", "he's up in the utility room", "he doesn't want to spend too much time in the garage with the engine running", "If he doesn't put on the extractor fan whilst cooking curry in the kitchen, the observatory might be a little smelly bit later on".

He does it with other things too. He seems to come up with the most inapplicable, ludicrous metaphor for what he's seeing, then sticks to it resolutely and over-extends it, despite it being dubious to begin with.

There was an example in the Cloud-Woods fight on the weekend about cars, but they usually follow this sort of pattern, "Woods is like an old Mk V Jaguar, that's been down lots of roads and had years of racing. It didn't win every race, but it's reliable, durable and hard working. However, whenever it's raced in the USA, where it has to drive on the other side of the road, it's came up second best. Will Woods be able to fine tune his performance like the engine of this jaguar, and put the final application of turtle wax on it tonight, or will it be shipped back to the UK in deafeat? Or some stuff like that.

He also has a habit of making one or two rudimentary and bleeding obvious points like, "the guy that's got a 6 inch reach advantage wants to fight from the outside". He will then proceed to repeat this over and over and over again, ad nauseam, for the rest of the fight. He'll mention it every time the tall guy fights from the outside. He'll refer to it every time the tall guy gets dragged into a toe to toe brawl. He'll fill the breaks between rounds talking about whether or not the tall guy is or isn't doing what he reckons he should, accompanied by replays showing so much more, He'll sum up by either saying 1. The tall guy did what I said and won, or 2.The tall guy didn't do what I said and lost. The guy bloody repeats himself so much that I usually end up shouting at the TV screen or just turning down the volume.

[amat]

A few years ago in one of the FNF threads everyone was making their own Teddy analogies, it was a great thread. Awesome stuff and yeah Al Bernstein is 100% right and an awesome writer.

[Gandalf]

That was a really enjoyable article. Bernstein is right in most of what he says. The Internet is important for boxing as coverage beyond that in the printed press is marginalised or else not covered at all. There might be a lot of dross, especially within message boards, but outside of that credible analysis does exist. The Internet is actually my only source of information for boxing, I have no alternatives...but all in all I think it serves me well and gets the job done.

[Kirkland Laing]

I think it's a fair bet the Teddy Atlas doesn't spend a lot of his life on his computer, if indeed he has one. If he has read any message board postings about himself then it's likely that this won't have made him see the boxing part of the internet in a positive light. He sounds like an old grandad getting upset about how things aren't the same as they used to be. And come on, we all know he's always wrong about fights so why is it a surprise that he's wrong about boxing and the internet?

The internet is the best thing to happen to boxing as far as creating and maintaining a fan base since Ali. In Britain I'd get exactly zero regular media coverage of any fight that wasn't British apart from megafights like Oscar Floyd. I'd only ever see what Sky can make money out of, there'd be no streams or Youtube or downloads of everything else to watch. But to be fair to Teddy he's involved in the business and isn't able to appreciate this and as far as the net goes I'd be amazed if he even has an email address. Probably in a few years if he's still punditing he'll come out and say, yeah, actually I'm looking at boxing stuff on the internet now and maybe some of it isn't so bad. Or maybe he gets the boot from ESPN and in a few years he's doing a column for Bloody Nose Boxing.

[DaxxKahn]

The truth is everyone is bias in some way... i have pissed off and lost many a good writer for not publishing somthing i seen as libelus for the site or even a boxers career.

i wish alot of other sites would follow suit, i also have a pet hate on sensationalist who do an interview with a boxer and twist a joke of the cuff comment and turn it into a serious fact or will make up any old shit just to get traffic. the boxing sites that do this i avoid like the plague.

for me its about promoting the sport i love... i aint here to call this or that promoter or fighter. i will however express my opinion on the forum on things but never on the main page of the site.

boxing need the internet BIGTIME... not everyone will get it and not everyone likes but regardless of if your for or against it, its here and its here for good... you need to use it or get left behind watching fights on your betamax.

btw that was a fantastic read Al

Agreed on all accounts but I do think that every now and then when there is a wrong done iot should be addressed, though like you said when it comes to just dogging a fighter or promoter in paticular then it becaomes tasteless and the credibility of the whole article just goes to crap because it can be seen through as personal hate.

There is a way to bring up something that is just not correct and a way not to, EG address the situtaion not the people involved directly unless they are dead to rights wrong!!! But even then there is a way to get it across without causing too much static.


Great read AL

[Andre]

To be fair if Teddy did get online and saw what people post about him, it probably wouldn't be pleasant and would definately take it out on Saul in the "fight plan"

This came to mind...
http://www.saddoboxing.com/boxingfor...ing-moron.html


Maybe he did read it and the whole thing is sour grapes.

[Jimanuel Boogustus]

"Woods is like an old Mk V Jaguar, that's been down lots of roads and had years of racing. It didn't win every race, but it's reliable, durable and hard working. However, whenever it's raced in the USA, where it has to drive on the other side of the road, it's came up second best. Will Woods be able to fine tune his performance like the engine of this jaguar, and put the final application of turtle wax on it tonight, or will it be shipped back to the UK in deafeat? Or some stuff like that''.

Haha! See I actually think that's brilliant... Highly amusing.

[The Fightfan]

Hmm.. what you're saying is a bit inconsistent/hypocritical.

Haye comes from a council estate in south-east London (light-years from any sliver spoon treatment), has been boxing since he was nine, won a world amateur silver medal and became the undisputed world cruiserweight champion.

Surely a man with the lower level ring experience you've had respects that?

He has a big mouth. It's part of selling a fight. You must understand that too, right?

Hey my man this started simply as a Bernstein disagreement but like many Haye phanatics do. You have flipped this discussion upside down inside out and made it about Haye. I simply don't like Haye for what he did. I haven't knocked him for his talent I simply do not like him as a person or of him calling out the Klitschko's and then tuck tail run and hide. Then say it was a back injury oh wait it was about him not getting paid enough. That's kids stuff. I hated Tyson but at least when he called his man out he had the balls to fight them.

Phanatics? .. hold up you mean fanatic? That had me stumped for a second

I don't care whether you like Haye or not. Your original post is a little hypocritical considering what you have written about him. You can't accuse people of unjustly slagging fighters off when you are guilty of the same, thats all.

No big deal.

Sorry man I was in a Phillies Phanatic state of mind. My original post also had nothing to do with me. I am trying possibly to think along the lines of Teddy Atlas and I could easily see him saying some of thing's I had mentioned.

[Nameless]

Lots of people in the boxing business, like Teddy, (Where's TM gone?) don't seem to get that the majority of fans don't understand anything about the actual business.

Regulars on internet sites are pure Boxing nerds. True fans. They want to see the best fight the best. They want to see good sportsmanship. They want the fighters to be heroes.

So obviously you get lots of overly critical, colourful, naive opinions. It's all about the love of boxing.

the fact that some websites are quoted on a regular basis now when some peoples are making interviews shows, as far as I am concerned, that they think that the opinions over the internet are starting to be of very good quality and yeah, that's because we're nerds. Matter of fact, internet is making a revolution in the world about everything; NOw, if you want to buy anything, you can find countless very good forums and blogs where they are making reviews about absolutely anything, from airplane companies, digital cameras and such, Boxing definitely doesn't escape to that fact

As for TM, he will come back in a couple of months probably, he's just irritated that peoples mock him for his strange and odd ideas and because we don't worship him enough. We had a fight on myspace as well because he was nuts and stopped writing, he'll be back someday, no worries