Originally Posted by
greynotsoold
I haven't seen Moore v Marciano in ages but, from what you describe, I can see what he is trying to do. And you are spot on when you say that it is easier to anticipate and counter when you make him throw the punch you want. Personally I think you can do the same thing by stepping with the left foot only as you jab, then stepping back. But Moore was in the ring and I would never dare to question his tactics. Do you know if he fought Durelle, or anybody else, that way?
One of my closest friends has sparred many rounds with Mayweather and we have talked about this often. He rock's up on the jab, which stops the guy over there, you know? Then he rock's back to his right foot, creating distance and leaving him ready to land the right when you try to close. My thought is that you need to time his jab with your own, his rock forward with a push off. You land a jarring punch or you close on him as he rock's back; as you slip his jab you take your head away from his right and control his left shoulder.
My friend pointed out that,1, Floyd plots each move well in advance,2, when you do outsmart him he is very fast and elusive and,3, it is very difficult to fool him the same way twice.
You are dead right when you say that there is more than one way to do things. Ultimately the 'right' way is the one that works. When you are teaching it to somebody starting out, you teach to an ideal. As the boxer gains experience he developed ways of doing things based on his strengths and weaknesses. As his trainer you have to observe this, keep working on weaknesses so they don't become limitations, and help him learn his style.
I don't feel comfortable, in many situations, working with an experienced fighter until I see him in the ring. Then I can get a feel for what he is trying to do And how he is looking to do it. Then I can tighten his footwork, work on his right hand, or, most important, talk strategy.
If that makes sense.
i know that archie moore was taught how to do a cross arm defense by a heavyweight named monroe harrison, who was a sparring partner for joe louis, before moore turned pro. when you see moore doing this in a fight he has his body weight over his front foot. i would say that moore was probably fighting from a stance that would have his body weight over his front foot when he started boxing or at least by the time that he encountered harrison. moore said that harrison was the greatest teacher he ever had in boxing and it was harrison who taught him his defensive techniques. moore said harrison rarely ever took a punch and didnt have a scar on him. thats not bad for a fighter that, like moore, was probably throwing jabs from his front foot. i think moore does do at least one thing from his back foot. when you throw a right hand at moore, he rocks from front foot to back foot, the way that your friend has described mayweather to rock from front foot to back foot, to take your right hand on his shoulder. i don't know when this move started being called a shoulder roll. bill miller called this move a twist. i like the way miller describes it. i think that way makes more sense. i think most boxing fans think floyd mayweather invented this move, or maybe george benton, but it is a move that has probably always existed in boxing, like the way that jabs and right hands have always existed in boxing.
the way that your friend is describing floyd mayweather sounds about right to me. he does not want to hit you with his jab so much as he wants to just hang you out on the end of it and then steal you as you try coming in. this is poison for a lot of fighters because they dont know how to get past his jab, and because they cant get past his jab, they cant do anything.
i think its hard to counter his jab because of the way he jabs from his front foot. when you try to counter it, he pushes off of his front foot, moving out of the way very suddenly. you know that he has pushed off of his front foot by the way his body twists and jerks away from a punch like a fish jumping out of the water. it is a very violent and sudden movement because of the force that can be created by pushing off of the front foot. it throws your entire body out of the way. this move is not exclusive to floyd mayweather. muhammad ali would do it constantly because of the way he fought with his body weight always over his front foot. when you would throw a punch at ali he would push off of it and move out of the way very suddenly with the same violent, twisting, jerking movement that floyd is doing.
when fighters try to jab with floyd mayweather you start to see this movement a lot. mayweather is setting up his pull counter which he throws from the same motion. that is to say that every time floyd pushes off of his front foot to get away from your jab, he can steal you with a right hand from the same motion, making a fighter become very tenative to continue to jab with mayweather because you are now always risking being hit by a pull counter. when carlos baldomir fought mayweather he countered it in the second round by throwing a jab, thereby creating a pull counter with it, and countering the pull counter he had just created with a right hand, with the motion of his right hand naturally slipping the pull counter he created through the space that he has next to his right ear and over his right shoulder. this punch stunned mayweather. when marcos maidana fought mayweather he countered it the same way baldomir countered it at the end of the third round of their rematch by creating a pull counter with a jab and countering it with a right hand, with the motion of his right hand naturally slipping it through the space that he has next to his right ear and over his right shoulder. this punch hurt mayweather but the round ends in the nick of time for mayweather and to the misfortune of maidana.
this is one of the ways that mayweather can be hit and i think a fighter that is going to fight mayweather should know it intimately. but this is hard to do, because for every pull counter that you create with your jab to counter with your right hand, there are many more times that you would only make mayweather push off of his front foot to safety with no pull counter to accompany it, and for every ten jabs you throw you may only ever make mayweather throw just one pull counter, therefore devolving your endeavor into a game of chance.
i think a good way to try to get past his jab would be to get your body weight over your back foot and to lean down and away from it. this would force mayweather to over extend his jab to hit you to overcompensate for the extra space that you are creating by leaning away from it and to jab down at you to do it. that is to say that you want to force mayweather to be coming in to you to jab. when mayweather is coming in to jab, you come over it with a counter right hand, sending your body weight from back foot to front foot, and slipping his jab through the space that you have next to your right ear and over your right shoulder in one smooth motion. your body weight is now going to be over your front foot loading that body weight into a left hook. this would do two things. it can reset your body back to your stance (emmanuel steward called this a clean up left hook because of the way it can be used to reset your body back to your stance when you have just thrown a right hand) and it would be scored as two punches to mayweather's one jab. you may not have hit mayweather but you would have just won this exchange in this part of the round. continue to repeat this kind of exchange again and again enough times and you would have won the round. continue to repeat these kinds of rounds enough times and you would win the fight. that is the way dwight muhammad qawi won a lot of rounds and the way he won a lot of fights.
there is one more thing. when you throw a right hand at mayweather and he takes it on his shoulder and comes back with a right uppercut, remember to throw you left hook under it to his body. that was how antonio margarito knocked out kermit cintron.
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