Heavyweight talk not about Lewis..

It's a given that Cuba has produced some of the best amateur boxers ever witnessed. No more so, than two heavy weight Legends: Felix Savon and Teofilo Stevenson.

Both men were 6ft 5" and both won, an unprecedented, three successive heavy weight Gold Medals.


Stevenson and Ali are often mentioned in the same breath and a debate often ensues centered around a mythical match-up between the two. Feel free to debate this.....

However, I'm more interested in a match-up between Stevenson and his Cuban successor, Savon.

Stevenson, used range brilliantly, had a great jab, and a bomb that could take down a city, on the down side, he was very upright, lacked head movement and held his lead hand away from his chin, exposing him to an overhand right from an orthodox boxer, or right hook from a southpaw.

Savon, was more svelt and mobile and even faster than Teo, he too, also had great power.

Felix, in addition to his 3 successive Olympic Titles, won an unmatched (i think?) 6 successive World Amateur Titles. That's some going.

However, it's a fact that Stevenson may have surpassed Savon's Olympics acheivements and won a fourth Gold Medal at the "84 Olympics (and his first at Super-heavyweight) had it not been for a political wrangle.... (he did
however beat the eventual champion, Tyrell Biggs, that same year).

It really is a pick'em.

I hate to discredit what Stevenson achieved but people must realise the advantages that Stevenson held over his opponents were not afforded to Savon. Stevenson, standing 6ft 5", and i'd guess, weighing something like 215lb, fought in an era when amateur heavyweight boxing was 178lb and over (with no limit). By today's standards it's like a Anthony Joshua fighting a slightly overweight Kenny Egan. With those kind of size advantages, it's no wonder Teo could dictate the range like no other. However, in Teo's defence, when superheavyweight was introduced for the "84 olympics, he would go on to beat the champion. He also won a world title at superheavyweight in "86.

Savon, on the other hand, fought in the modern Olympic Heavyweight Category of 81-91kg. Therefore, even if he had the height advantage he would, almost always, fight opponents of comparative weight. Does this make Felix's achievements better than Teo's?

When considering a hypothetical match-up between the two, opinions concerning the legitimacy of their acheivements with respect to the advantages they held over their respective opponents has no bearing on the result between a proposed match-up. (Nowadays, I'm aware Savon would be a heavyweight and Teo would be Super-Heavyweight (in championships) however there'd be nothing stopping them fighting at a club show (where weight similarity take precedence over weight category). I'd expect there'd only be a kilogram or so between the two; Savon wouldn't be restricting his diet to make weight, and Teo, mostly always, fought at his optimum fighting weight).

Who wins? Why?

I've not seen enough of Stevenson to make a serious claim for either boxer over the other.

I do know that Stevenson tended to dominate everyone in his era regardless of size and that facing off against someone of comparable size (e.g. Savon) wouldn't have been a major issue. I recall reading somewhere that a relatively small Soviet or East German fighter who was a bit of a swarmer (his name escapes me) used to give Stevenson all kinds of problems and many thought that this showed a weakness that more fighters in the pro ranks may have been able to exploit.

If you haven't already read it, I can recommend "In the Red Corner"by John Duncan. It follows the author's attempts to convince Savon to turn professional to fight Tyson but also spends a large part of the book looking at the history of Cuban boxing with detailed biographies of a number of fighters, including Stevenson and Savon.

The rules and circumstances were quite different for both I think so its hard to say. Is it taking place using current computerised scoring system with headguards that savon would be more used to or under the Stevenson era rules of round scoring and no protective guards? Id probably go with the safe option of favouring the fighter the rules suit more.

Also, cant remember if this is true or not but didn’t Savon shaft Solis out of an Olympics when Solis actually beat him? Seem to remember reading something along those lines.

Don't know a lot about Cuban boxers. I dropped out of Communism classes due to lousy Marx........

SFW, the only reason i wrote the above is that I found out a few hours ago that Teo mostly fought in the old 81kg+ rather than the modern Super-heavyweight 91kg+ (so potentially a 22lb difference). I haven't seen a great deal of Stevenson either to be fair, but I'll be watching as much as i can this coming week (fights rather than a documentaries with an agenda, as I find the narrators are too persuasive when I'm trying to formulate an opinion on a fighter).

Other than that, I've only read a handful of boxing books but that interests me. Cheers for the recommendation.

I think after the Cubans win their first gold medal then golds two and three are not so impressive. I wrote about this a while ago and basically Stevenson and Savon were men fighting boys for the large part of their careers as the majority of their foes would have quit the amatuer ranks in their early twenties.

In terms of technique I think Stevenson was too classic in his style and Savon too svelte and given the poor showing some of the recent pro Cubans have shown at heavyweight, Gomez, Solis, the other one, especially in terms of the conditioning needed to fight 12/15 rounds then I'm gonna go out on a limb and say with some degree of conviction that Stevenson would have got caned aginst Ali, Frazier, Foreman and the like. Similarly Savon would have been destroyed by Bowe, Lewis and Holyfield.

As for who would win. It depends on what era they fight in.

I don't think it's as simple as age. Young guys tend to be very hungry, fit, and out to make a name for themselves. Lots of aging intenational representitives lose their place to youths and either remain amateur or go pro. Other aged fighters keep their place and don't go pro, for instance, Camarrelle.

Was Camarelle a man fighting boys? Either way he was unable to retain his Olympic Gold in his third olympics.

If you a good enough to win a qualifying tournament for the Olympics then you are good enough to fight anyone, regardless of age.

Also, it's much more difficult for an amateur in his 30's to maintain his late-teen-earl- twenties fighting weight, should he choose to do so, putting him at a disadvantage from the get go.


If you think of it this way (although simplistic), you could say medals one and three are impressive, while medal 2 is not as much so.

Medal 1 ....you are the young pretender (impressive)

Medal 2....you are in you prime (not so impressive)

Medal 3....you are on the slide (impressive)

But someone like Savon or Stevenson would be highly experienced amateurs by their second and third Olympics while many of their rivals would generally be very young, relatively inexperienced boxers. Both age and experience would favour the Cubans. Doesnt automatically mean they win of course but I would consider it a strong advantage.

Many young olympians who are not Cubans have had over 100 fights, and most have been boxing since childhood (typically from around 11 year old. Yes there are audlys' and joshuas' but they're the exceptions).

National Level Amateur Boxers (say 50 fights +) fight less frequently than other amateur boxers who fight more regularly for experience. Once an open-class amateur boxer becomes a national champion and international representative then most of his fights are made up of tournament fights, rather than club show bouts. Once you reach the upper echelons of amateur boxing you no longer get fight experience per se, but rather, you get tournament experience (but again you only need so much before you plateau).

If you are a 21yo with 120 fights (many in National and international tournaments, ranging from school boy champs', junior ABA's, european cadets, junior olympics, Senior ABA's, One Off International tournaments, 4 nations, Eurpopean Champs, World game etc) then it's no great shakes facing a 32 year, with 202 fights, at an olympic's.... most likely you will have faced them in at least a couple of international fights already anyway.

Super D Boon wrote:As for who would win. It depends on what era they fight in.

In what way?

Savon won a couple of world titles before the introduction of computer scoring, and fought many many times before the introduction of headguards too?

TheMackemMawler wrote:Many young olympians who are not Cubans have had over 100 fights, and most have been boxing since childhood (typically from around 11 year old. Yes there are audlys' and joshuas' but they're the exceptions).

National Level Amateur Boxers (say 50 fights +) fight less frequently than other amateur boxers who fight more regularly for experience. Once an open-class amateur boxer becomes a national champion and international representative then most of his fights are made up of tournament fights, rather than club show bouts. Once you reach the upper echelons of amateur boxing you no longer get fight experience per se, but rather, you get tournament experience (but again you only need so much before you plateau).

If you are a 21yo with 120 fights (many in National and international tournaments, ranging from school boy champs', junior ABA's, european cadets, junior olympics, Senior ABA's, One Off International tournaments, 4 nations, Eurpopean Champs, World game etc) then it's no great shakes facing a 32 year, with 202 fights, at an olympic's.... most likely you will faced them in at least a couple of international fights already anyway.

I guess sometimes it might not be a huge advantage, depending on each individual case. But take the examples of say Amir Khan or he who must not be named who were teenagers in their first Olympics. Khan in particular was just 17y old and up against a highly experienced and successful Cuban Kindelan. Kindelan won but I definitely think he held all the cards and Khan was still very much developing at the time they fought. Likewise Im sure you know who benefited from the experience he gained second time around.

True Manos, but, in winning titles, Kindelan did not exclusively fight 17year olds.

TheMackemMawler wrote:True Manos, but, in winning titles, Kindelan did not exclusively fight 17year olds.

Certainly wouldn’t dispute that, but I think that in the traditional U.S/Cuban rivalry, the Cubans have tended to hold a stronger advantage in terms of keeping their stars amateur whereas the vast majority of top U.S amatuers move into the pro game. I mean consider the what ifs had all the great U.S gold medalists opted to stay amateur rather than go pro. You could have many U.S versions Stevensons and Savons and I think it has aided the Cubans that they generally only have to put up with their top U.S counterparts for less time. Nowadays however the U.S amateurs appear so mediocre that its probably irrelevant.

Bluntly, cubans win lots of golds because its their national sport and they don't turn pro because they're not allowed to. However many counter arguments of youth against experience that get painted, on balance if you spend your whole career as an amateur, you have the extra years of experience and will be in your physical prime... for most cases, most of the time. So on balance its a huge advantage, and over-states their worth.

However, Judging how cubans who have defected, have done as pro's doesn't tell the whole story either really. They tend to defect late (i.e. they are scouted when they have a name), so have less time to adapt, and they are moved to a country where there are a whole bundle of distractions, that they're not used to. Take the mystery disappearing 'irish cubans' of recent times, who have turned into guiness drinking leprachauns.

Solis and gomez were mentioned earlier. Soils and the whole klitschko thing is a weird one, but he was fairly late to the pro game. Gomez is an example of an being early to the pro game... and he was a brilliant cruiser, who turned into a fat and lazy heavy.

Mackem's lovechild rigondeaux was late 20's.

Is there a point to my ramblings? Yes, of sorts....

Teo and Felix were career 3 round fighters, had they turned pro at 20 they would have been different fighters to those we saw, no-one can tell how good they would have been as pro's. And who would have won between them? Its a pickem.

It's very possible that had the American Pro World Champs stayed Amateur, then some of them would have gone on to be multiple Olympic Champions....

Oscar would have boxed a young Kindelan in his 3rd Olympics.(pick 'em).

Ray Leonard would have reigned supreme for some years.

Michael Spink's would have faced off against Gomez in the next Olympics after winning it (Spinks wins)

Ward probably would reigned supreme and won gold in 2012.

Clay Reigns Supreme.

Foreman was succeeded by Teo (mouth watering)

Mercer succeeded by Savon (Savon wins)

Just by looking at this far from exhaustive list we can see there definitely would have been multiple Olympic champions from America.

However, amateur boxing is not, and was not, the two horse race people often imagine. Many other countries could have had one or more multiple olympic champions...Ukraine for instance, Wlad and Lomenchenko.

My point, and it's purely my own anecdotal account (though I'd expect any retired amateur boxer to confirm it) is that amateur boxing does NOT get easier with age. It get's harder.

I think people who compete in multiple Olympics, other than the truly great, tend to get knocked off top spot by a younger contender, though I may be wrong.


I stick by what i said earlier....

If you think of it this way, you could say medals one and three are impressive, while medal 2 is not as much so.

2000, Medal 1 ....you are the young pretender if you get gold it's impressive

2004, Medal 2....you are older, more experienced and in your physical prime, if you get gold it's not so impressive

2008, Medal 3....you are on the slide, if you get gold and see of the young pretender it's impressive.

I've based that on the totally unfounded presumption that the average age for a boxer to win their first olynpic medal is 22-24.

good analysis milky

Loved both guys. Teo in particular. But Savon was a little special. He had it all. Better footwork that Teo and more rangy. I'd pick Savon. But Teo had the massive equaliser.

We are talking as though all Cubans win three gold medals, I'm sure if the experience and physical maturity argument were true then they would.

Stevenson was younger than his opponent when he won his first gold medal.
For his second, Teo was 24 his opponent a year younger, for his third, Teo was 28 his opponent was 27.

A similar story could be said for Savon, except for when he fought the very good Sultan Ibragimov, Savon was 32, Ibragimov was 25. Both men by any standard.

These examples and many more (i.e. Rigo Vs Petchkoom) are hardly the Man Vs Boy that some will have you believe.

Too much is made of the age disparity between Kindelan and Khan. Kindelan himself didn't win his first olympic medal till he was 29. Khan was an outstanding youth.

Poster of 2013 for the title of the thread alone! Great progress!

Mackem, does that actually prove your argument, or does it just show that older guys are more successful whatever their nationality?

The Americans and Brits will turn pro young. Historically, Eastern Europeans and Cubans wouldn't. Now it's just the Cubans and the odd Italian policeman... Who lets be honest got jobbed by Joshua last summer (though not as blatantly as the Cuban!)

Be interesting to see stats on average Age of Olympic medalists including and excluding yanks.

I'm not sure what it proves

I think, I was trying to disprove the argument that Cubans were successful because it was Man vs Boy.

Heavyweights tend to be an anomaly when it comes to peak years, so I wouldn't apply heavyweight and above into what I'm about to say.

Cubans of the past (and some amateurs of the present) were (are) in the luxurious position of being able to train full time, in that case, if they remained amateur then they would reach their "Olympic Physical Peak" at around the ages of 28-29. Therafter, they might remain in their peak condition for a couple of more years, however most, by the time the next games come around, will be on the slide.

One of the reason I say amateur boxing becomes harder when you are older is that life changes. Maybe you get married, maybe you have children, may you lose sponsorship so have to take a full time job. All of these things effect our capacity to box depending on our dedication.

As we get older we tend to become more mellow, we start to feel more comfortable in our own skin, therefore, we are less inclined to want to fight in attempt to prove something to ourselves or the world (how we prove ourselves is dependent on our classes' value system). The psychological aspects such as reckless abandon and hunger often rest with the younger guys.

What I'm trying to saying is; aging's effect on amateur boxers is not only about slowing down it's more complicated than that.

I wouldnt make the argument that the sole reason of Cuban (especially the great ones) success is down to them being older and more experienced. but I must say I consider it to be an advantage.

The fact that Kindelan, for an example, only hit his purple patch around the age of 28 - when most of the would be pro amateurs have long gone pro if anything I think underscores the advantage he would have over a someone like Khan who was 17y old and far less experienced.

Sure, not every fight Kindelan won was against a 17 year old kid, but I do think his experience and maturity around his mid to late 20s is an advantage.

Sometimes, it just proves that life's complicated mackem. Nice philosophical piece though, mate