Eddie Futch was considered one of the greatest boxing trainers we have ever seen, many would say he was the best ever and I would certainly have him in my top bracket and wouldn’t argue with anyone who said he was the best ever. As a sparring partner to the heavyweight great Joe Louis, Futch grew up in the same gym and no doubt picked up countless pointers from Joe Louis and his boxing trainer, another of the best ever – Jack Blackburn. Futch’s legacy still runs today because from Futch we had Freddie Roach who is still active in the boxing world and trains current legend Manny Pacquiao. Eddie Futch is most known for training Joe Frazier who had arguably the greatest and most famous trilogy in boxing with Muhammad Ali. In this video I will have a look at just two of the counters Eddie Futch trained fighters liked to use against the right hand.

Both of these counters involve the uppercut and both involve attacking the body, it is the timing of these shots which make them such effective shots, hitting you in soft spots when you have committed to throw the punch, in this case the right hand. These counters are great because they give you little chance to brace for impact and of course, body shots break you down and wear you down as the fight goes on.

The first counter was one I have included before in a video of mine I did on Riddick Bowe, who was trained by Eddie Futch in the 90’s and became heavyweight champion of the world. In this clip Bowe rolls under the right cross of his opponent but instead of simply just rolling and avoiding the punch, Bowe punches as he rolls, directing his right uppercut to the mid-section of his opponent and landing a solid blow. Make them miss make them pay certainly comes to mind here.

The second counter is a lot more advanced and as I mention in the video, do not try this without first drilling it in excessively. This means countless technical drills before you even attempt it in sparring. This is an advanced skill so you must practice this repeatedly before you even hope to try this in sparring or an actual competitive bout. The counter involves lowering your lead hand in order to bait your opponent to throw a punch as they see the opening created from you dropping your lead hand. Commonly the punch thrown will be either a jab or right hand. You must keep your chin tucked in and behind the lead shoulder, when you anticipate the punch coming in you turn or roll your lead shoulder inwards deflecting the punch off your shoulder and counter back with a right uppercut to the body(orthodox fighters). One of the best to do this was Mike McCallum. Not surprisingly he was nicknamed the body snatcher and was featured in my book Forgotten Legends of the Ring.

Here is the video where I breakdown how you can perform these moves and included are the clips of Riddick Bowe and Mike McCallum.