Boxing
The History of Boxing
Boxing as a sport seems to have begun in ancient Greece as part of the “original” Olympic games. There are many variants of boxing around the world, but the one that seems to get the most exposure these days is called English boxing. The first modern English boxing was conducted without gloves, and was actually part of a multi-even fighting contest. By 1743, a boxer named James Broughton introduced a set of rules to help cut down on the carnage that often occurred.
Another set of rules was promulgated 95 years later. Here, not only was the boxers’ behavior codified, but so were the specifications of boxing rings. These were called the London Prize Ring Rules.
It was a third set of rules that currently form the groundwork of contemporary boxing. These rules were invented by the Marquess of Queensberry. He specified the dimensions of a ring, as well as boxing gloves closer to modern design. Hand coverings had been used in previous versions of boxing, but those under the Queensberry rules could now be used as a protection against an opponent’s blows. Interestingly, the Marquess of Queensberry was also a driving force behind the trial, conviction, and quick-following death of Oscar Wilde (his son had been Wilde’s lover).
The 1908 modern Olympics saw the introduction of boxing to the games. It is interesting to note that even now, with more professionalized Olympics, a boxing career at the Olympics is still seen as a stepping stone to an even more professional boxing career, and not necessarily an ultimate goal.
How Dangerous is Boxing?
This question has been on the minds of many casual fans and aficionados of boxing betting at one time or another, particularly after the famous case of Muhammad Ali, who got Parkinson’s Disease at the very young age of 40. Boxing is also often portrayed as highly dangerous in popular media, as it was in Clint Eastwood’s movie Million Dollar Baby. However, the arguments about the danger of boxing—or even to ban boxing, in the case of the World Medical Association—are not unassailable. For one, it is possible that something else was the deciding factor in Ali’s early onset of Parkinson’s Disease. Some say that not enough medical studies have been done to lay the blame firmly at the door of his boxing career. As for fictional depictions of boxing, it has been argued that the ultimately fatal match shown in Eastwood’s movie was particularly exaggerated and unrealistic.
It is true that at least some medical studies have been done to study how boxing affects the brain. Such was the case with the Heidelberg Boxing Study, which compared brain scans of amateur boxers with those of people who did not box, particularly emphasizing the presence of tiny hemorrhages. No statistically significant difference was found, though 3/42 boxers had hemorrhages while none of the 37 non-boxers did. In addition, the group of boxers may have been too diverse. Some were relative novices, while others had been boxing for over two decades. It looks like the jury is still out on this question, at least until we see more data from professional boxers.