From: stark@dwovax.enet.dec.com (Todd I. Stark)
Subject: Re: Boxing and Kicks
Summary: Pros - Adding kicks doesn't make up for the difference in approach.
Organization: Digital Equipment Corporation
Date:  4 SEP 92 14:52:48    


Sorry for tagging some extra stuff onto this topic, but I don't have the
time to go through and respond individually to each post I thought was
interesting, and this seemed like a good summary to use as a springbaord.

I'm not trying to do a style vs. style comparison here, but point out a
difference in approach between a pro boxer and most other martial artists
that may need some emphasizing.

psc@sei.cmu.edu (Peter Capell) writes...
> 
>Well, my sparring partner and I perform one round feet & hands and one round
>just hands in series for about an hour and a half per bout -- seems like good
>training.  He has somewhat of an advantage when we go hands on hands (most
>boxers he fights say he has *very* fast hands), but when we kick, he typically
>can never touch me unless I do something adventurous or just plain stupid.  He
>can basically do nothing against my constant shin kicks, and indeed, I have
>found these to cause him to leave his head inexcusably (by his own standard)
>open.  
> 
>I've never fought with a a professional boxer, but I sincerely doubt there is
>much to do against a good low-line kicker when all you have is your hands.
>I have been very effective with these, and I'm not even very good at them yet.

I noticed that Stephen Northcutt and others here whom I respect answered with
similar experience.  

I certainly won't try to invaidate someone else's personal experience !  But I 
am amazed (even flabbergasted) that so many experienced people responded to 
some of the boxing-related posts equating 'golden gloves' and 'the local 
boxers at the academy' with pro fighting !  That's a little like equating 
Enoeda with the local tournament karate guys, or a legitimate wrestler or 
jiujutsu man with an American TV pro wrestler.  I can easily believe that the 
local amateur boxers are in trouble against a good kicker who can keep them at 
range, but that doesn't establish that kicking as a tactic can reliably keep a 
good boxer at range.  Amateur boxers may use contact, but they are still
by definition, 'point fighters' !  There is no real advantage to being a 
knockout specialist in amateur boxing, and being able to knock someone out 
quickly is one of the critical skills in the 'art' of boxing when it is
applied as a martial art.  

Pros and amateurs simply aren't playing the same game !  Pros aren't doing their
'art' for a hobby or self-actualization, they put bread on the table by
knocking people out and being able to stand being beaten on mercilessly.
I guess the temptation to generalize is similar to when I talk about sport 
karate as being generally awkward against sport boxing in the ring, knowing 
full well that in a bareknuckle minimal rules contest, the properly trained 
'traditional' karateka is often a formidable human weapon to contend with.  
Someone the likes of Johko Ninomiya or Mas Oyama at their prime isn't going to 
be a pushover for anyone, including a pro boxer.

The result in pro fighting is that the people who rise to the top are very, 
very tough, and more often than not, extremely skillful at what they do.  Not 
neccessarily because 'boxing trains them that way,' but because the guys
who don't have what it takes get filtered out in the first few months,
*much* higher dropout rate than any commercial martial arts training could
afford.  Good boxing trainers live on a few top money fighters, not on a 
large number of mediocre students.  Pros are the modern gladiators, the people 
who are willing to fight brutally for other people's entertainment.  The art 
that results from their experiences is, arguably as a side effect, an 
extremely sophiticated product of evolution from the bareknuckle days.   

I think the fighting evolves the art, not the other way around as implied in 
martial arts legends which sometimes imply that some magic secret art 
appeared to someone in a dream, or evolved in some primordial days, and then 
everyone who trained in it was deadly and unbeatable.  Clearly,
the sweet science evolved from practical modern ring experience in fairly
observable way.

I wouldn't suggest that every martial artist try to train like or with 
a pro fighter.  I know *I'm* not cut out for it.  Very very few, I think, would 
enjoy or be able to handle it on a regular basis.  But it would be a sobering 
experience for those that think the experienced pugs would wilt or
become ineffective and be held easily at long range just because 
someone throws some kicks at them.   ANd hitting someone with a kick is very
different from knocking them out with it.  Just because some armchair theory 
says that they shouldn't want to walk into a kick, or that a well placed kick 
should knock most people out.  A pro fighter is where he is partly because
he is someone who doesn't go down easily.  

And a decent 'stepping' jab 
isn't all that much shorter than most kicks, and you're still moving well on 
two feet when it's delivered.   The additional range really isn't that much a 
factor with a real pug.   ANd anyone who hasn't been hit with close range
hooks and uppercuts from someone at this skill level has no idea how
difficult it is to defend against that kind of attack.   Some have suggested
to me in mail that they could slip a jab and duck a hook and move in to tie
up a good boxer, and beat him that way almost every time.  I know beyond a
shadow of a doubt that they haven't been in there with anyone of any
real skill trying to do it yet.  Certainly, it is theoretically possible,
and a few people test themselves in  that kind of challenge.  I doubt that
most of the people I've read here bad mouthing western boxing as an art
or science are truly in that category, though.

People who have commented in various posts about muay thai have made a number
of valid points.  However, Muay Thai and Ler Dit are most definitely not just
'boxing plus kicking,' they are entire art forms in and of themselves,
including elbows, knees, infighting trapping, and other tactics that 
make them much more effective than a fighter who uses body and head kicks
and tries to combine them with karate or boxing hand techniques.
That, plus they 'pay the dues' and weed out the less hardy early on, just like
the western pro boxing training.

I guess that's all I had to add on the topic, I hope it is interesting or
helpful to someone.   I wish every martial artist could visit a pro gym
for a few weeks to see why I emphasize the difference in approach, and why
a pug has a real edge in most 'self-defense' in spite of tactical weaknesses
in theory.    Most MA trainers could probably learn a lot from it.

						kind regards,

						todd
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