It has always been interesting to me, the damage done and the resulting furor over padding being removed from the gloves. In the early days, of cousre, there were no gloves, and for years everybody fought with 4oz. gloves. A friend of mine told me that when he made his pro debut in 1969, everybody on the card used the same pair of gloves and they had no padding at all. As late as the early 90s there was a flyweight title fight, with four ounce gloves, and the winner required reconstructive facial surgery and numerous stitches and the loser- an African fighter, tall for the weight but I cannot recall his name- ended up with brain damage and later died, possibly by suicide.