Quote Originally Posted by Max Power View Post
Agreed. What a lot of MMA fans think is boxing was always just a limited style of fighting with the fists.

What the idiots don't realise is when it was developed by James Figg it included not only wrestling but even fencing! lol

The bare knucle boxing that emerged pure 20 years later by Jack Broughton all the way through to John Sullivan was close to a no holds barred fight combining wrestling and boxing.

Today as part of boxing preparation, fighters do move around the ring in a clinch still to develop the stamina necessary to withstand the energy sapping that regular clinches will put on the athlete under and train them to go with the flow of the opponent and not resist unncecessarily wasting energy, to look for opportunities to score in the clinch and to accustom them to being in close to their opponents. There is certainly merit to this type of training. I even agree it is more valuable than the weightlifting component to the fighters preparation.

Going back to the MMA enthusiasts it eludes them that we took something similar to what they have now years ago and took out the gay bits, refining the most important, skilful and exciting element of it. The punching!
Some of those boxing trainers out there seem to think it has some merit or we would not be having this conversation. Lets keep an open mind, it might even be better for the boxers which is the most important thing to me.
Povetkin would have been a lot better off with some grappling experience against Wald. You never can tell when you will run into another Luis Pabon.