Ironically, rules to prevent blood from appearing on our hands, put blood on our hands. Somewhere along the line, someone gave me the impression that boxing gloves made boxing safer. I learned to look down on ignorant ancestors or lowlifes who boxed with bare-knuckles. But in fact, we’ve known for a century that gloves make boxing far more
Very true, although MMA looks more brutal, the fact that fighters don't usually recover from being stunned or knocked down means they don't get punch drunk and don't take as much punishment. Although I'm not a fan of that last punch that always bounces the guy's head on the mat.
I'd say the opposite. The most sure way to win is via KO. You'd be hard pressed to find a coach or boxer not looking for the clearest way to victory. Make no mistake, people love KO artists and are bored by more technical fighters.
I'd just like to say that boxing is not directly focused on knocking people out. The objective in boxing is to win a bout by scoring more points than your opponent, both under the amateur and professional scoring systems. Knock outs actually occur quite rarely because fights are usually stopped via a Technical knock out, retirement, or medical retirement before most boxers are allowed to be actually KO'd. You would also be hard-pressed to find a boxing coach or boxer that will say that their primary goal is to knock people out during a bout.
Interesting discussion and an enjoyable article, but this subject is far beyond the nature of this online forum and requires in-depth research for a fair and accurate analysis. I'm a criminologist and am currentlyccompleting my PhD looking at the commodification of modern bare knuckle boxing. I can say that from my experience of being a boxing coach and boxer for the past 11 years, and a spectator of bare knuckle boxing in my research, that gloved boxing is probably more likely to produce long term brain damage, but less likely to cause short term, bloody and visible injuries such as broken noses and hands, which are fairly common in bare knuckle boxing. However, these short term injuries can lead to long term damage such as arthritis and weakened bones or joints. Also, I should just like to say that there were a number of recorded deaths in bare knuckle boxing between 1797 and 1897, and I'll be sure to give the references for the sources of where these deaths are recorded in my next post.
Really... safer without? I think people did not know how to hit. Risk to injure my hands? Well, I'd hit a softer area - and have more precision without the gloves. Say, the throat. A single punch to the throat can easily kill, so... safer without gloves? nah. I get the brain injury angle, though, that makes sense.
Just a quick addition. the standing 8 count is no longer used in the USA for boxing, or at least it shouldn't be used (it's been outlawed).
There are cases of deaths in the ring of bare knuckle fighters, in both the US and the UK, though does it need to be "in the ring"? Most deaths from boxing injuries aren't deaths "in the ring" but from injuries in the ring? (sorry just picking on a technicality thats been mentioned in the comments.
Also I seem to feel, that deaths in boxing in recent years owe a lot to artificial weights and dehydration, not something that used to occur to the same extent in the past.
Gloves are not the problem; wrapped hands are. MMA fighters are just as free to punch each other in the skull as boxers are due to layers of supporting tape applied to the hands before the fights. Chuck Liddell is already suffering from a nasty case of dementia pugilistica, and many others are sure to follow.
The absurd and dangerous application of boxing rules to MMA is the result of lobbying by the boxing industry. The subsequent interference of politicians (such as John McCain) and athletic commissions nearly destroyed the original sport (NHB), which was then conquered and remade in boxing's corrupt image.
"Professional wrestling", while simulated, is probably (a lot) worse for the performers than boxing. When big men throw each other around there is still impact, and unlike boxers who fight once every few months, wrestlers often perform several times a week.
“In 100 years of bare-knuckle fighting in the United States, which terminated around 1897 … there wasn’t a single ring fatality.” Today, there are three or four every year in the US, and around 15 per cent of professional fighters suffer some form of permanent brain damage during their career.
How do we know that the increased level of fatalities isn't due to enhanced training techniques, or the use of steroids?
It seems to me the most plausible explanation for why people think gloves make boxing safer is that are basically small pillows placed on the hands and people think that the cushion will make the punches softer but miss the fact the cushioning enables repeated headshots.
I wish you would stop trying to fit facts into your Homo Hypocritus narrative. Sometimes people just believe wrong things without thinking about it.
But isn't markedly lower proportion of fatalities about as impressive as zero? This reminds me of one of the more interesting underanalyzed individual and systemic biases: the attentional preference towards phenomena that are 100%.
Bareknuckles fights were short of action since so few punches were thrown. Many rounds would end without a punch thrown. Championship fights could go on for hundreds of rounds. Boxers wouldn't throw a punch unless they were likely to win on a knockout since they often broke their hand on their opponent's skull.
Padded gloves vastly increased the action and led to the golden age of boxing.
Also isn't it obvious that the median modern boxer is going to be stronger than the bareknuckle fighters of 100+ years ago? I don't know much about boxing, but I do know modern training and nutrition advances have vastly changed most sports. Wouldn't this also be true of boxing? And isn't it reasonable to expect that stronger fighters would punch harder and cause more brain damage?
Like I said, I don't know anything about boxing, but there has to be a time component to this as well.
Of course, maybe this is offset advances in medicine?
gloves, besides protecting the knuckles thus allowing for harder punches and with heavier weight than without, also offer good protection in a fight. much easier to block with gloves, so the net effect is not quite clear to me.
The claim in the referenced article was: "In 100 years of bare-knuckle fighting in the United States, which terminated around 1897 with a John L Sullivan heavyweight championship fight, there wasn't a single ring fatality."
Very true, although MMA looks more brutal, the fact that fighters don't usually recover from being stunned or knocked down means they don't get punch drunk and don't take as much punishment. Although I'm not a fan of that last punch that always bounces the guy's head on the mat.
I'd say the opposite. The most sure way to win is via KO. You'd be hard pressed to find a coach or boxer not looking for the clearest way to victory. Make no mistake, people love KO artists and are bored by more technical fighters.
I'd just like to say that boxing is not directly focused on knocking people out. The objective in boxing is to win a bout by scoring more points than your opponent, both under the amateur and professional scoring systems. Knock outs actually occur quite rarely because fights are usually stopped via a Technical knock out, retirement, or medical retirement before most boxers are allowed to be actually KO'd. You would also be hard-pressed to find a boxing coach or boxer that will say that their primary goal is to knock people out during a bout.
Interesting discussion and an enjoyable article, but this subject is far beyond the nature of this online forum and requires in-depth research for a fair and accurate analysis. I'm a criminologist and am currentlyccompleting my PhD looking at the commodification of modern bare knuckle boxing. I can say that from my experience of being a boxing coach and boxer for the past 11 years, and a spectator of bare knuckle boxing in my research, that gloved boxing is probably more likely to produce long term brain damage, but less likely to cause short term, bloody and visible injuries such as broken noses and hands, which are fairly common in bare knuckle boxing. However, these short term injuries can lead to long term damage such as arthritis and weakened bones or joints. Also, I should just like to say that there were a number of recorded deaths in bare knuckle boxing between 1797 and 1897, and I'll be sure to give the references for the sources of where these deaths are recorded in my next post.
Really... safer without? I think people did not know how to hit. Risk to injure my hands? Well, I'd hit a softer area - and have more precision without the gloves. Say, the throat. A single punch to the throat can easily kill, so... safer without gloves? nah. I get the brain injury angle, though, that makes sense.
Just a quick addition. the standing 8 count is no longer used in the USA for boxing, or at least it shouldn't be used (it's been outlawed).
There are cases of deaths in the ring of bare knuckle fighters, in both the US and the UK, though does it need to be "in the ring"? Most deaths from boxing injuries aren't deaths "in the ring" but from injuries in the ring? (sorry just picking on a technicality thats been mentioned in the comments.
Also I seem to feel, that deaths in boxing in recent years owe a lot to artificial weights and dehydration, not something that used to occur to the same extent in the past.
Gloves are not the problem; wrapped hands are. MMA fighters are just as free to punch each other in the skull as boxers are due to layers of supporting tape applied to the hands before the fights. Chuck Liddell is already suffering from a nasty case of dementia pugilistica, and many others are sure to follow.
The absurd and dangerous application of boxing rules to MMA is the result of lobbying by the boxing industry. The subsequent interference of politicians (such as John McCain) and athletic commissions nearly destroyed the original sport (NHB), which was then conquered and remade in boxing's corrupt image.
"Professional wrestling", while simulated, is probably (a lot) worse for the performers than boxing. When big men throw each other around there is still impact, and unlike boxers who fight once every few months, wrestlers often perform several times a week.
“In 100 years of bare-knuckle fighting in the United States, which terminated around 1897 … there wasn’t a single ring fatality.” Today, there are three or four every year in the US, and around 15 per cent of professional fighters suffer some form of permanent brain damage during their career.
How do we know that the increased level of fatalities isn't due to enhanced training techniques, or the use of steroids?
It seems to me the most plausible explanation for why people think gloves make boxing safer is that are basically small pillows placed on the hands and people think that the cushion will make the punches softer but miss the fact the cushioning enables repeated headshots.
I wish you would stop trying to fit facts into your Homo Hypocritus narrative. Sometimes people just believe wrong things without thinking about it.
I vote paragraph #2.
But isn't markedly lower proportion of fatalities about as impressive as zero? This reminds me of one of the more interesting underanalyzed individual and systemic biases: the attentional preference towards phenomena that are 100%.
Bareknuckles fights were short of action since so few punches were thrown. Many rounds would end without a punch thrown. Championship fights could go on for hundreds of rounds. Boxers wouldn't throw a punch unless they were likely to win on a knockout since they often broke their hand on their opponent's skull.
Padded gloves vastly increased the action and led to the golden age of boxing.
Also isn't it obvious that the median modern boxer is going to be stronger than the bareknuckle fighters of 100+ years ago? I don't know much about boxing, but I do know modern training and nutrition advances have vastly changed most sports. Wouldn't this also be true of boxing? And isn't it reasonable to expect that stronger fighters would punch harder and cause more brain damage?
Like I said, I don't know anything about boxing, but there has to be a time component to this as well.
Of course, maybe this is offset advances in medicine?
gloves, besides protecting the knuckles thus allowing for harder punches and with heavier weight than without, also offer good protection in a fight. much easier to block with gloves, so the net effect is not quite clear to me.
Yup, that's how I interpreted it. I say no way. Please see the fight I talk about above (it took place in Hastings, New York).
The claim in the referenced article was: "In 100 years of bare-knuckle fighting in the United States, which terminated around 1897 with a John L Sullivan heavyweight championship fight, there wasn't a single ring fatality."
So: was this 1797-1897, in a USA ring fight?