surprising espn article

[WEASEL45]

article how the hell is boxing the hardest sport. i would have said hockey.

[Clarkmeister]

You've never watched a boxing match in person from close range.

[Diplomat]

I thought boxing was a given. The ranking of baseball over soccer, swimming, cycling, skiing and rugby is pretty wierd though.

-Diplomat

[HDPM]

Boxing is no surprise IMO.

[MMMMMM]

Have you ever tried boxing? Go to the gym and punch the heavy bag at a decent speed for a couple of minutes and see how tired you get.

Boxing tired me out more than wrestling, which tired me out more than sport judo. There is just something about having to execute repeated explosive bursts of energy which is very draining. Just my 2c. But seriously, if you haven't boxed (or boxed recently), go work out on the heavy bag for a session. You'll be glad you did (also a great way to relieve stress from bad beats;-)).

[Kurn, son of Mogh]

Well, soccer, skiing & rugby were close, but trumped by baseball's hand-eye coordination. But to even suggest that cycling or swimming require the anywhere near the complex coordination and skill set of baseball is silly. Swimming and cycling are primarily fitness sports, and while fitness is one factor is how hard a sport is, even a remarkably coordinated and super-fit athlete like Michael Jordan had trouble with baseball.

[swimfan]

/begin rant/

Great, now I have to defend the honor of swimming. Like anything, we must make the best attempt at making a apples:apples discussion. Anyway, at what level of competition are we talking about? If we're talking about the highest level, there's a remarkable amount of coordination involved with swimming. Proper body position, rotation, hand entry, acceleration and deceleration through the stroke take years of conditioning to get right, among other things. Try butterfly sometime. Many people can hit a baseball, many people can swim. There aren't very many people that can hit a baseball at a major-league level. There aren't very many people that possess the coordination to swim at a world-class level. The difference between the two is in baseball you need a fast twitch reflex to hit the ball. If I recall reflex was a separate variable.

In my opinion, boxing is the most difficult sport. I would consider wrestling to be the second. The thing with swimming that many people fail to recognize is the mental discipline it requires. Swimming miles per day back and forth in quite excruciating pain without being provided a verbal release well, sucks. Anyway, I would consider swimming in the top 10, though clearly I'm biased. Eh, but so is Brian Jordan.

/end rant/

[daryn]

i know people already said this, but it really needs to be said again. if someone were to ask me what the hardest sport was, i would have said boxing. i actually had this conversation with my friend a week ago. he mentioned hockey, i mentioned soccer, than we started talking about boxing and came to agreement.

if most people punch a heavy bag for about 30 seconds they will get winded, even people who are in shape. now imagine the bag punches back.

[daryn]

michael jordan hit around .250 playing minor league ball right? i wouldn't call that struggling... maybe compared to major leaguers, but not compared to your average joe.

[Kurn, son of Mogh]

He wasn't a bad AA hitter, but he was a well below average fielder