Dempsey article

[LondonRingRules]

I'm wondering how you rank the A, A-, B, B-.

Could you use heavies from the 90s or 2000s and rank them using those rankings so I could figure out where they stand?

I've also always thought of Willard as a lucky champ who outlasted an old and out of shape Johnson for the title then fought a few stiffs but never actually was anything outside of a low top 10 for his time guy.

Oh, and thanks for mentioning Fulton. I just checked out his record and was quite surprised. He was a very good fighter I had never heard of.

** Obamy was handed down those ratings by his dear ol' mammy. He wouldn't know what they mean since he has no criteria.

At any rate, the fighters are best ranked in their eras as anything else enters the realm of fantasy which is fun if taken in context.

Willard was a formidable fighter and physical speciman. This is nonsense about Johnson being out of shape. He was out of shape for Battling Johnson where he stunk up the joint, but was in excellent condition against Moran in a decent scrap before Willard. You don't go 26 rds at the pace Johnson set against Willard without being in shape. Johnson saw Jess as a big clod and figured on an easy KO. Willard won in strategy, figuring his best chance was later rounds and it worked.

I'd match that KO with any recent highlight KO for athletic ability Willard showed from way outside leaping in with as deadly a result as has ever been exceeded. Willard only had 3 yrs of ring experience combined with a year of ring rust. Brilliant tactical fact he is seldom credited for in spite of relative inexperience and a late start in boxing at age 29.

As far as the Dempsey article goes, it's an OK article, but Lotziero gets full of it at times. He says he's only going on video and 1st hand accounts, but there is no video of Hart that I know of, so strike one.

Then he tries to tell us Greb was not bothered by Gibbons' footwork when there is no Greb footage of any fight. It don't take a rocket scientist to figure Gibbons is gonna fight Greb different than a Dempsey who could take him out. Greb lost his earliest encounters to Gibbons who had nothing to fear in Greb but his reported dirty tactics.

Lotz concedes Dempsey easily handled Gibbons, and then crack on him for not being more aggressive and going for a KO. This is a clear bias against a natural slugger that I see many have. Few complain when Ali goes 15 unless he stinks up the place which he did many times. Maybe Jack wasn't 100% physically or just had an off night. That's classic attribute of great champs being able to persevere when things ain't going their way.

It's just plain inane to crack on Jack for what he was doing in sparring. Clearly he and Tate are going through excercises designed to get him in a specific mode of style for the fight. An experienced writer should know this. Jack wasn't working on his punching, he was working on distance, bodyfoot movement, and clinching.

Lotz is out in left field about the "help" Dempsey recieved against Firpo. First off, he was pushed out of the ring, not punched, a foul. 2nd, his corner was not assisting him, he was naturally being half assisted and half interfered with by shocked sportswriters finding him in their laps. Theirs a completely natural reaction to get him off their table and out of their laps.

The modern rule is a fighter has 20 sec to enter the ring after being knocked out of it. It's unclear what the rule was for that fight. When nonparticipants interfere as happened, that's another ruling which given the complete lack of consistency in boxing could mean a KO loss, a DQ, an NC or ND, or a TD by modern rules. Or let the fight go on so a riot doesn't ensue as happened and the rest typical legendary Dempsey history.

I must add that ol' Obamy is all wet on the Sharkey fight. Every one of Jack's fights was a little different, and for some strange reason he went body crazy against Sharky for 80% of his offense, just a buzzsaw of body hooks and uppercuts, a blizzard of short punches. That some were on the beltline is not an automatic foul. It was a fairly clean fight against a physically superior speciman that Sharkey was in his prime and it worked.

I disagree that Tunney won 19 of 20 rds and Lotz's assessment of that fight. We know now that taking an extended break like the 3 yrs Jack took in Hollywood, he's gonna lose something that he has to work to get back. Vitali is the only heavy to stepped straight away after a long layoff to beat a top ranked fighter, and he may have set the record in that regard for all fighters.

Jack was competitive and took his share of rounds by my scoring both fights. He hurt Tunney plenty, almost having him out on his feet against the ropes in the first fight as well as Tunney checking his teeth after Jack smashed his mouth at another point. Tunney was an exceptional fighter at his peak with young Cassius Clay like footwork whereas Jack's footwork and reflexes had slipped in the layoff. The fight was also in a chilly autumn rain that may have influenced the fight.

For the 2nd fight, Jack's brother had committed suicide a couple weeks before and Jack contracted food poisoning the night before the fight. These are not excuses, just that he was less than 100% physically and mentally going into the 2nd fight. None the less one could argue he won the fight based on the long count. Ironically Tyson modeled his style and appearance on Dempsey would lose his title to an identical 14 sec long count some 65 yrs later.

[Obama]

** Obamy was handed down those ratings by his dear ol' mammy. He wouldn't know what they mean since he has no criteria.

Finally something worth responding to from you:

http://www.sweetboxing.com/showthread.php?t=289

[LondonRingRules]

Finally something worth responding to from you:

http://www.sweetboxing.com/showthread.php?t=289

** Heh, heh.......Credible: Capable of being believed per Websters.

To Wit: I(0bamy) define a credible(Capable of being believed) opponent by the accomplishment of beating 2 or more other credible(Capable of being believed) fighters. Losses are not taken into account when assessing if another fighter is credible(Capable of being believed), unless a win over such a fighter came in a period of which that fighter did nothing but lose. Exceptions can be made for a fighter's credibility(Capable of being believed) (should he not have at least 2 credible(Capable of being believed) wins) if he was a victim of close decision losses or drew with 'A' level opponents. Also, exceptions can also be made that an over the hill former 'A' level fighter merely reduces to A- in the case that he was really 'A+' level to begin with.

Oh, he really was a 'A+' level to begin with, eh? Thats some sweet petard you're hoist upon(Capable of being believed)......

[Kinetic Linking]

Obama, no offense but you're nuts. You're doing too much number crunching and not enough thinking.

While that list of Dempsey opponents is actually somewhat accurate, it misses the mark in a massive way.

While Sharkey may have been dempsey's best opponent, no one gives a **** about the sharkey fight. Dempsey was over the hill trying to make a buck earning another shot at tunney.

Watch some of the videos of the fights you're discussing before making claims about their importance.