Customer Reviews

The Arc of Boxing: The Rise and Decline of the Sweet Science

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1 star:		(1)

 

 

The basic premise of The Arc Of Boxing is this - once a upon a time there was a Golden Age in Boxing which was analogous to the Renaissance period in art and music. During that period there was perfection and beauty and artistry in the Manly Art. Modern Boxing, by contrast, is a joke and an embarrassement to what was once termed "The Sweet Science". Old curmudgeon stuff, for sure, but unlike your average barroom debater, Silver and his team of trainers, fighters and assorted pros explain to you in detail just exactly why they feel modern boxing is a travesty.

The arguments presented in this book are both solid and compelling. They will make you think much deeper about what Boxing is and how it has veered off course. Silver and his team delve into intricate detail as to why the "Golden Age" really was golden - more fighters, more fights, tougher competition and much more. Backing up the weighty arguments, though, are what I consider to be the book's strongest characteristic - the technical detail. The old school trainers tell you exactly how the old timers were trained and what's missing today. For example, there are six different ways to block a left jab, yet only one is taught nowadays as modern trainers aren't even aware of the other five. Another example is the use of punch pads in gyms, dismissed here as little more than a gimmick as they give way too easily thereby not allowing a fighter to develop his punching power. Yet another example is the poor stance that modern boxers are taught which results in the delivery of weak "arm punches" instead of strong punches based on the ability to utilise one's full body strength, an outgrowth of posturing oneself correctly. There's literally tons of stuff like this and it is truly invaluable. Insider knowledge like this has really changed the way I percieve the fight films of Louis, Robinson, Moore, Pep, Gavilan, Carter etc. I feel that I can now appreciate the intelligence, craftsmanship and improvisatory talents of the old greats to a far greater degree than before. These attributes also become glaringly amiss now when I watch the modern "greats".

There are also two killer chapters that absolutely EVERYONE who professess an interest in boxing must read. The first is "The Bigger They Are, The Harder They Fall" - a powerful indictment of the misguided notion that yesterday's smaller heavyweights would be no match for today's ogres. This chapter demolishes all such nonsense once and for all. The second is "Boxing's Death By Alphabet" - a lament on the rise of the phony sanctioning organisations, again argued with such robust clarity that surely no one who truly cares about this game could disagree with.

The retort to all this, however, is obvious. If I were a modern trainer, I'd say to Silver "Why should I care about this stuff? My guy's winning all the time and we're making a big ton of money". And there's the problem. Even if you accept that Boxing has become "dumbed down" (which I do), the point is that a lot of the old skills are probably no longer relevant to the modern game. Boxing has mutated into something that older generations find hard to relate to (I'm one). The modern version of the game may be a pale imitation of the real thing but it is what it is which makes me question the usefulness of a work like this other than to reminisce dreamily over obsolete skills and talents that may never be called upon again.

So ultimately as a polemic it's something of a cul-de-sac. But as a piece of boxing literature, it's first rate - supremely executed and passionately heartfelt. I believe this will become a classic in years to come.

To understand what boxing has become, you need to know where it has been. With great detail and expert analysis, Silver carefully breaks down why the golden agers of boxing (1920s thru the 1950s) were much better than any group of boxers since. Some of the many reasons include: During that era there were many, many more boxing gyms, fight clubs, and registered pro boxers than today and significantly more than the decades that followed (60s thru to today). You don't have to be a sport scientist to know more competition equals a better crop of athletes. Boxing as a sport did not progress like other sports, like football, basketball, track, soccer etc. It de-volved. He breaks all of this down. This book completely changed how I understand boxing as a fan and as a boxer.

If you care about boxing at all, read this book.

This jeremiad against contemporary professional boxing is a clean body blow to devoted boxing fans like myself. Except for the courageous boxers, no area is spared from incisive, merciless, and (for the most part) convincing criticism. Still, it is clear that this book is a labor of love for boxing expert Mr. Silver.
It is full of observations from leading trainers, commentators, and even the celebrated ballet dancer and impresario Edwin Vallela.
Boxing fans like myself will learn a great deal, if only (what we call in my field) "Socratic ignorance," knowing that we know nothing of real importance.
It deserves a still wider audience, for it addresses a decline in decency, intelligence, and values that has produced so much cynicism into our political life, and into so many areas of our culture.

Recieved the Book For Christmas.

For me it's a mixed bag. One that weighs more heavily on the positive, but mixed none the less.

There is some wonderful information in the book that is truly invaluable. But there are also quite a few opinions that quite frankly, when offered up in the manner that they are delivered in, they have me tuning out certain contributers to the book.

The book is written in the style that Terry Pluto used in his wonderful books on Basketball, Loose Balls, Tall Tales, Falling from Grace and his book on the Cleveland Browns, When all the World was Browns Town.

In that, he used multiple contributers to give their view points and opinions on various subjects.

Freddie Roach, Teddy Atlas, the Late Hank Kaplan, Manny steward, Chuck Hasson, Sal Rappa, Kevin Smith and Dan Cuoco, I thought gave some great, great insight and opinions. They were not "everything new sucks and no one today or even from the past 30 years could compete with the Golden Agers."

Unfortunately, the book had WAY too much of that type of talk. The aforementioned Eight, were able to explain thier positions and viewpoints without the complete dismissal and arrogant disdain that more than a few of the other contributers clearly had.

Carlos Ortiz also contributed, but even though his comments were indeed biased, they came accross as words from a prideful ex-champion and not an arrogant windbag. And I'm sorry to say, there was far too much of that that seeped out in this book.

When you read comments like:

"Hagler could not beat Rocky Graziano. And beleive me, Graziano was no great fighter."

"Hopkins is an ordinary talent......Maybe he would have been a main event club fighter in the small clubs."

"Duran is overrated. He is a very good fighter, but top 10 (lightweight)? No."

"It's laughable to think of Pernell Whitaker in the same ring with Lou Ambers."

"Roberto Duran, Sugar Ray Leonard, Marvin Hagler, Oscar DLH, Pernell Whitaker.....(in Previous years) They'd be ordinary contenders. Good Prospects. Same with Tyson, althogh I don't think he would get that far Mike Tyson was a built up guy. He was around at the right time."

It's comments like this that portrays a Mindset that quite frankly, that is quite obviously very biased and a tad closed minded.

If this is what they truly think, why would I really want to lend credence to their opinions any more than I would from someone who states that every fighter today is leaps and bounds superior to fighters of the 50's and earlier?

Their Arguement of "well I was there so I know what I saw and I also see what we have had over the past 30 years up through today" holds only a little water with me. How Involved were they or how young were they when they were viewing or involved with fighters in the 50's and earlier? Are they AS involved today? Do they not consider even for an instant that it is human nature to gravitate towards the sport and how it was in one's youth?

That is bias. We all have it. It's how you communicate your point and hold onto the reigns of that bias, that dictates whether your position is worth considering or not.

Listen, this is a wonderful book and I highly recommend it to anyone who even THINKS they are a boxing fan. You WILL learn a ton from it. It will be among the books you will pull out when you want reference material.

But there are several viewpoints in the book that are heavily coated with prejudice and bias. That IMO is a bit tough to stomach at times.

The GOOD definitely outweighs the bad and it should be a must buy (even at the hefty price tag.)

Hawk

When my good friend and fellow boxing fan, Marty Garfield, urged me to read "The Arc Of Boxing", I obliged him gladly as I am familiar with both its author and its central argument; that the boxers of the "Golden Age", the 1920s to the 1950s, were superior to the fighters of today. While I disagree with Silver's views, it is with the book itself that I have the greater problem.

I have been a devoted follower of boxing for almost 50 years and for me to find a book on my beloved sport boring is quite a stretch, but "The Arc of Boxing" doesn't read like a conventional book. TAOB is predominately a collection of monologues by boxing trainers and old-time observers of the sport, which sound suspiciously like taped phone conversations, each one stating and re-stating the book's central argument. I fault the author (actually the compiler) on his technique in that there is little interviewing done here. Each long paragraph continues, unbroken by questions, with each contributor stating the book's case over and over again until the mind-numbing repetition became almost too much for me to continue reading.

TAOB's argument for the inherent superiority of the old time boxers breaks down along two lines, that:
1."Golden Age" boxers had many more fights then modern boxers, giving them more "seasoning" and:
2. Modern fighters, trainers, managers, promoters, referees, officials and corner men are either incompetent, dishonest, or only in it for the money, as opposed to the wise, forthright and selfless participants of the "Golden Age"

Even though I disagree with his basic argument, I do have great respect and admiration for the abilities of the boxing legends referred to in Silver's book. I just find it amusing that boxing is the only sport where a sizeable number of its fans believe that the practitioners of more than 50 years ago are superior to their modern counterparts. This argument flies in the face of every measureable attribute of athletic ability. The human race is unquestionably bigger, faster, better conditioned, and possess superior training, nutrition and equipment than those athletes of the 1920's though the 1950's.

My quarrel with Silver's book is not with its argument but with its high price, lack of substance and its mean-spirited dismissal of everything and everyone connected with boxing over the last 50 years. Silver pushes me too far, however, when he demands that boxing be banned and asks his readership to join him by turning their collective backs on the sport. It is the coward's way out.

When I became a fan in the early 1960's, a movement to ban boxing had already gathered considerable momentum during the Kefauver hearings, and then subsequently, with the ring deaths of world champions Benny Paret and Sugar Ramos. If that effort had been successful, look what we would have missed! No Muhammad Ali, Roberto Duran or Sugar Ray Leonard, no Mike Tyson or George Foreman, no Oscar De La Hoya or Manny Pacquiao, no Vinny Pazienza for Christ's sake! Would we have been better off, as these old-timers seem to wish, with just our memories and the old fight films to keep us happy? I think not. Just because this thing we love may be old and gray or have put on a few pounds doesn't justify taking her out behind the barn and shooting her. After all, there are some people around who love her still.

A very remarkable book on a subject that, frankly, I have little concern for. However, once having said that, I realized that everything Mike Silver said was interesting and in some cases remarkable. What Silver did for me was bring back memories of growing up in New Jersey in a grade school that paid attention to every important and unimportant boxing match that took place between 1941 and 1949. Joe Louis was a god and Jersey Joe Walcott was a tough call because he was from Jersey, but he also beat the best there was. When we kids fought in the school yard, we all squared off like those fighters. How do they do it today? I imagine it's more like cage fighters, which tells us something about the arc of the sweet science.

Mike delivers his thesis with the punch dexterity of the young Floyd Patterson. This book is exceptionally well researched, with learned commentary from many of those who swim the deep waters of this beautiful and struggling sport.
On the lighter side of his observations, his comparison of boxers to ballet dancers is a long overdue insight into the balance and composite strength necessary to excel at both.
This is great stuff, if it were a movie it would be a black and white number with a great cast of gritty character actors.

This book is an analysis of whether the boxers of yesteryear (1920 to the early 1950's) were better than the fighters of today. The author goes through a list of attributes of fighters (number of fights, conditioning, techniques, quality of trainers etc) and gives a number of experts opinions on why the past was better than today.

Some of the arguments are compelling (the fighters of yesteryear would gain so much experience by fighting every few weeks rather than today when they fight a few times a year) but one could also make the argument that one could not fight top contenders every few weeks without sustaining serious damage. They would have to have fought lesser talent between the fights with the better fighters (nothing wrong with this, great way to hone the skills and keep in shape while earning a payday) but the boxing fan of today won't pay to see a Pacquaio fight a lesser talent who has a limited chance of beating him.

Boxing is much more of a business than it was 80 years ago and today, it is all about the money and less so about the fans and making the best fights.

All in all, Mike Silver's book is a top read, contains some interesting ideas and makes one think.

I guess I should have known by the title but I was hoping more for a book the re-introduced some of the lost art. The author was dead on when showing why boxing is in decline when he showed the statistics of active fighters and the number of rounds they fought and such but the book was horribly redundant in its' claims that "the old guys knew how to do this" or "the old guys knew how to do that" and "nobody teaches this anymore".

What I'd have liked to see him do is approach some of the other guys with more of an attachment to the old school like a Georgie Benton and start to see what it would take to rediscover some of the old techniques rather than whining that boxing isn't like what it was in it's golden years. Guess what, nothing is!!

Comprehensively details exactly how and why the overall quality of Boxing has been steadily declining for the better part of the last 50 years. A must read for any long time fan who wants to know what the heck happened to the sport and how we ended up with the watered down mess that's being passed off as Boxing today.