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Is boxing still a young man’s game?
If I had £1 for every time I’ve heard a pundit say “boxing is a young man’s game” I may not be quite retired, but I’d comfortably be working a three-day week and would have no worries about paying the gas bill every month.
Yet is it though?
A cursory glance at the Ring Magazines latest ‘pound-for-pound’ rankings shows that their top 5 fighters are all on the wrong side of 30, and one - Artur Beterbiev - is actually a quadragenarian.
Terence Crawford, Oleksandr Usyk, Naoya Inoue, Dmitry Bivol and the aforementioned Beterbiev have a combined age of 182. That’s an average age of 36 and that’s a stat that is almost too insane to even comprehend.
When you think about the demands of elite level boxing, the fact that the two most dominant fighters in the sport right now are Crawford (38) and Usyk (38) is a bit of a head-wrecker.
Younger fighters tend to have faster reflexes, greater endurance and recover quicker.
The hard truth is that boxing heavily relies on youthful physical attributes - speed, recovery, and resilience - which inevitably fade with age. Watching a once great fighter operating as a faded force against a rising prospect is a regular occurrence in this unforgiving sport, and for me has always evoked a gut-wrenching pathos. Every fighter eventually runs out of rounds, so why are most contemporary P4P lists front loaded with fighters who are in the winter of their respective careers?
The answer can partly be explained by the fact that as a society we are looking after ourselves more. Scroll through Instagram or TikTok and you’ll find endless posts about mindfulness, breathwork, clean eating, cold water therapy and gym transformations. On the surface, we’re a society chasing health and balance. And we are more aware than ever what we need to do to achieve and preserve genuine wellness. You just do not see Usyk or Crawford experiencing extreme weight fluctuations between fights in the way Roberto Duran and James Toney once did.
The way fighters look after themselves, their diet and nutrition, plus the fact that the majority box just once or twice a year max (Inoue is the exception to this) is extending their longevity. Natural talent, plus the advancement of sports science and a lighter schedule means these men can continue to dominate.
Mike Tyson's 1980s peak was ferocious, characterised by regular activity, devastating highlight reel KO’s, blistering speed, frightening power and a significant psychological edge that made him the dominant and feared force in heavyweight boxing.
Yet due to his equally ferocious appetite for drink and drugs his peak was relatively short. Crawford has been boxing for about 18 years professionally but showed in his masterclass against Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvaraz that he remains almost peerless as a ring technician.
As well as the physical side of things, experience and ring IQ matters. The truly elite fighters adjust as they get older, relying more on ring smarts and timing rather than raw speed.
Usyk will have known perhaps even before he moved up to heavyweight that he could not compete with most of his biggest rivals when it came to punching power, so he elected to set traps and use veteran savvy. The Ukrainian maestro turned his biggest fights against Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua into “thinking contests”, proving himself to be a generational talent. Youth fight with fire. Yet men like Usyk and Crawford fight with purpose.
But even the smartest veterans can only compensate so far once physical decline sets in. And for some context, it would be remiss of us not to mention the fact that the next three fighters on the Ring’s current ‘pound-for-pound’ list are Jesse ‘Bam’ Rodriguez (25), Junto Nakatani (27) and Shakur Stevenson (28).
The truth is the sweet science is not an exact science. Nigel Benn looked old and shopworn when he lost to Steve Collins for the second time on a sad night at the Nynex Arena in Manchester in 1996. When he announced his retirement in the ring after that sixth-round retirement loss, Benn was just 32 years old.
In contrast Bernard Hopkins was a sprightly 43 when he beat the then undefeated WBC and WBO world middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik in Atlantic City, New Jersey in 2008. Hopkins was a 3/1 underdog going into their catchweight contest, but won the fight by unanimous decision, making a mockery of many pre-fight predictions and my own pathetic lumpy wager on Pavlik to win on points.
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Benn was a fighter who burned the candle at both ends during his exciting pro career, while Hopkins’ own professional fistic journey was a study in stoicism.
So, is boxing still a young man’s game? Logically, youngers fighters should be able to handle gruelling training schedules better than older athletes. However, the flip side of this is that work ethic, intelligence, discipline, and skill can lead to older boxer competing successfully against younger ones, as we are seeing now atop boxing’s mythical ‘pound-for-pound’ table.
In the end, the ring doesn't care about age. Only truth.
Watch Parker vs. Wardley live on DAZN
Joseph Parker and Fabio Wardley fight on Saturday, October 25, to become the WBO mandatory challenger to Oleksandr Usyk. Watch the fight and undercard live and exclusive on DAZN PPV.
