Boxing Information

About Boxing, Boxing Legends, Hall of Fame

About Boxing
Boxing, nicknamed the "sweet science" and also called pugilism or prizefighting, is a sport where two participants of similar weight attack each other with their fists in a series of two to three-minute intervals called "rounds". In both Amateur and Professional divisions, the combatants (called boxers or fighters) avoid their opponent's punches whilst trying to land punches of their own. Points are awarded for clean, solid blows to the legal area on the front of the opponent's body above the waistline, with hits to the head and torso especially valuable. The fighter with the most points after the scheduled number of rounds is declared the winner. Victory may also be achieved if the opponent is knocked down and unable get up before the referee counts to ten (a Knockout, or KO) or if the opponent is deemed too injured to continue (a Technical Knockout, or TKO).

Boxing legends
The boxing world has produced talented and world famous personalities in both the amateur and professional realms. Famous amateur boxers have usually been Olympic medallists. The Olympics have long been considered a springboard for professional entry, though some Olympic champions prefer to retain their amateur status, including two Cuban three-time gold medalists, Teófilo Stevenson and Félix Savón.

It is the professional side of boxing, however, that has produced the celebrities whose activities the public have generally followed. In the period between bare-knuckle pugilism and post-Queensberry boxing, Jem Mace was important. He carried many of the traditions of the old London Prize-Ring, but promoted the use of gloves and helped to popularize the sport in the United States and Australia. In the post-Queensberry era, the first British fighter to achieve superstar status was Bob Fitzsimmons. He weighed less than 12 stone but won world titles at Middleweight (1892), Light Heavyweight (1903), and Heavyweight (1897). He fought his last bout at the age of fifty-two.

Great Britain, the birth place of modern boxing, has produced numerous boxing legends. Among British amateur boxers, only those who won Olympic gold medals tended to achieve recognition beyond the limits of boxing enthusiasts. They included Harry Mallin (Middleweight), 1920 and 1924), Terry Spinks (Flyweight, 1956), Dick McTaggart (Lightweight, 1956) and Chris Finnegan (Middleweight, 1968).

London rules and pre-Queensberry era
The bareknuckle era produced legends like John L. Sullivan, the first world heavyweight champion. Sullivan has been called the first great American sports hero.

1900s to 1920s
It is the post-Queensberry (or Modern) era that has the greatest number of legendary boxers, such as world heavyweight champions Jim Jeffries (the first Great White Hope) and Jack Johnson (the first black world heavyweight champion), who fought each other in 1910 in the first "Fight of the Century".

Successful fighters have provoked fierce local pride. The best example was Jimmy Wilde, a Welsh flyweight who won the world Flyweight Championship in 1916 and held it until 1923. He once had a sequence of eighty-eight fights without defeat. Between 1911 and 1923, he won seventy-five of his fights by a knockout. He was idolized in Wales, where they commonly believed him to be the best boxer, pound-for-pound, that ever lived. He was described as the "Mighty Atom" and "the ghost with a hammer in his hand".

1920s to 1940s
Jack Dempsey was one of the most important athletes of roaring twenties and became the World heavyweight champion after defeating Jess Willard. Joe Louis dominated the heavyweight scene for 12 years before retiring as world champion in 1949. Shortly before the beginning of WW2, the battles between Louis and Max Schmeling were seen as battles between America and Nazi Germany. Louis is considered by many one of the best boxers of the Depression and possibly of all time. Another famous boxer, James Braddock (better known as the Cinderella Man) inspired many with his rags to riches story. He eventually fought his way to the heavyweight title and won against Max Baer who had 10 to 1 odds in his favor. Braddock finally lost his title to Joe Louis but made financial arrangements with him to receive 10% of the profits from the rest of Louis's fights.

Britain has had other popular world champions. In the 1930s, Jackie Berg won the light welterweight title. In the 1940s, Freddie Mills won the light heavyweight title. In the 1950s and 1960s, Randy Turpin and Terry Downes won middleweight titles. and in the 1970s, John Conteh and John Stracey won the light heavyweight and welterweight titles respectively. With so many title-awarding bodies in the 1980s and 1990s, the public became unsure about who actually was the champion. Nevertheless, the successes of Nigel Benn, Naseem Hamed, Chris Eubank, Joe Calzaghe, and Ricky Hatton continued to bring extensive media coverage to boxing and sustained a considerable public following.

The Scots had a similar pride in Benny Lynch, a flyweight from Glasgow, who held the world flyweight title in 1935 and again in 1937. Over the years, Scots have had great success at this weight; Jackie Paterson won the title in 1943 and Walter McGowan in 1966. Scots have also had success in the lightweight division. Ken Buchanan won the title in 1971 and Jim Watt in 1980.

England, too, had its successes at the lighter weights. Among the flyweights, Jackie Brown won the title in 1932, Peter Kane in 1938 and Terry Allen.

1940s to 1960s
The 1950s had a boxer who would go down in history as the only undefeated world heavyweight champion: Rocky Marciano. The title of the movie Rocky was inspired by this legend. This era also had Sugar Ray Robinson, who most experts rate as the best pound-for-pound boxer of all time. Robinson held the world welterweight title from 1946 to 1951, and the world middleweight title a record five times from 1951 to 1960. Another great of this period was Archie Moore, who held the world light heavyweight title for ten years and scored more knockout victories than any other boxer in history.

In Northern Ireland, Rinty Monahan held the flyweight title from 1947 to 1950, and Barry McGuigan won the W.B.A. featherweight title in 1985.

1960s to 1980s
The decades of the 1960s & 1970s are best remembered by the dominance of a boxer once named Cassius Clay, who said he would "shock the world." He joined the Nation of Islam, changed his name to Muhammad Ali, and declared himself against war. Many sociologists, observers, and critics now view Ali as a reflection of the changing society of that time. Ali had tough opponents like Sonny Liston, Joe Frazier, Ken Norton, and George Foreman, but proved himself to be the best heavyweight of his era, if not of all time. Larry Holmes (a former sparring partner of Ali) and the electric promoter Don King both gained prominence during this time.

After the retirement of Ali, Sugar Ray Leonard became the biggest star in the sport. In the late 1970s and the 1980s, Leonard won world titles in five different weight divisions, and was the first boxer to make 100 million dollars during his career.

1980s to present
If there was ever a bad boy of boxing, the title surely would go to a man who burst into professional boxing like a hurricane; Mike Tyson. Nicknamed "Iron Mike" because of his devastating punching power, Tyson took the world by storm. The most dominant figure on the heavyweight division in the mid-to-late 80s, he ran through his opponents like a wrecking ball, becoming the first undisputed champion in a decade. Both in and out of the ring, he was always in the news. He was jailed multiple times, barred from boxing for a year after biting a chunk out of Evander Holyfield's ear, and going into bankruptcy. When he fought his last title fight, against Lennox Lewis in 2002, he was beaten thoroughly and knocked out. Lewis, a Canadian trained British born heavyweight titleholder, retired as champion.

Roy Jones, Jr. was the most dominant fighter of the 1990s and early 2000s. He won world titles in four different weight divisions, from middleweight to heavyweight. When he defeated John Ruiz to win the WBA heavyweight title, he was the first former middleweight champion to win a heavyweight title since Bob Fitzsimmons accomplished the feat over one hundred years earlier.

Oscar De La Hoya was possibly the most popular American boxer of his era. He won titles from junior lightweight to middleweight. With good looks and charisma, along with plenty of boxing talent, he became the richest non-heavyweight in the history of boxing.

Julio Cesar Chavez was the most dominant fighter of this era. He defeated many big name fighters like: Roger Mayweather, Melderick Taylor, and Hector Camacho. However, his illustrious streak was broken by Frankie Randall. After, the Randall fight the once invincible Chavez was see as vulnerable. Subsequently, he lost to De La Hoya and Costya Tzyu.


Britain had to wait 100 years to have its first heavyweight champion since Bob Fitzsimmons lost his title in 1899. Lennox Lewis became undisputed champion in 1999, having first gained the W.B.C. title in 1993. Frank Bruno held the W.B.C. world heavyweight title from 1995 and 1996, after beating the man who beat Lewis, Oliver McCall. He lost it to Mike Tyson in a rematch of their 1989 title bout.

Sue Atkins (alias Sue Catkins) helped to pioneer women's boxing in Britain in the 1980s, but without any official recognition. The first British woman to be issued with a license was Jane Couch from Fleetwood, who won the Women's International Boxing Federation (W.I.B.F.) welterweight title in 1996.

International Boxing Hall of Fame
For many years, the sport of boxing did not have a hall of fame. The inspiration for the boxing hall of fame evolved from a tribute the town of Canastota, New York held for two local heroes in 1982. The tribute was for Carmen Basilio, who was world welterweight and middleweight champion in the 1950s, and his nephew, Billy Backus, who was world welterweight champion in the early 1970s. The people of Canastota raised money for the tribute, which was so success that some started to look into the idea of creating the sport's first hall of fame and museum. The International Boxing Hall of Fame opened in Canastota in 1989. In 1990, the first group of legends were inducted, which included Jack Johnson, Benny Leonard, Jack Dempsey, Henry Armstrong, Sugar Ray Robinson, Archie Moore, and Muhammad Ali. The Hall of Fame holds it's induction ceremony every June as part of a four day event.