Why is Jack Johnson rated so high...

[Southpaw16BF]

I certainly consider it a good win, and Im not going to pretend Im an expert on McVea, but I have a hard time believing he was more in his prime when he was a teenager than when he was in his mid twenties. not even Pipino Cuevas or Benitez were in their primes then.

and I dont think he was quite 20 for their last fight, but it was close.

Well Benitez peaked twice first at light welter when yes he was a teenager beating Antonio Cervantes for the WBA title,(17 yeras of age) making two title defences at the weight and going 12-0 also, then stepping up to welterweight to beat Carlos Palomino for the WBC title and making one defence of that beofre under training and getting stopped by Ray Leanord in 79.He had done all this and was only aged 21, Unbeliveable. But after getting stooped by leanord he also peaked again this time at jr middle, were he knocked out Marice Hope for the WBC,made one defence of that beating the great Roberto Duran Convincely before giving dropping a close decision to Tommy Hearns, and after that just going down hill.

[Steak]

Well Benitez peaked twice first at light welter when yes he was a teenager beating Antonio Cervantes for the WBA title,(17 yeras of age) making two title defences at the weight and going 12-0 also, then stepping up to welterweight to beat Carlos Palomino for the WBC title and making one defence of that beofre under training and getting stopped by Ray Leanord in 79.He had done all this and was only aged 21, Unbeliveable. But after getting stooped by leanord he also peaked again this time at jr middle, were he knocked out Marice Hope for the WBC,made one defence of that beating the great Roberto Duran Convincely before giving dropping a close decision to Tommy Hearns, and after that just going down hill.

there is no way that Benitez 'peaked' at 140lbs. he was still struggling with Bruce Curry and Harold Weston Jr at that time, and while the Cervantes win was amazing, it was still a close fight and not Benitez's best performance.
to me, he looked the best at 154lbs, by far. his performances against Hope and Duran were ridiculous, although I didnt think the Hearns fight was as close as the scorecards indicated.

[Southpaw16BF]

there is no way that Benitez 'peaked' at 140lbs. he was still struggling with Bruce Curry and Harold Weston Jr at that time, and while the Cervantes win was amazing, it was still a close fight and not Benitez's best performance.
to me, he looked the best at 154lbs, by far. his performances against Hope and Duran were ridiculous, although I didnt think the Hearns fight was as close as the scorecards indicated.

I think he was probaly better at 154 becuase he was older and more exprienced, when he was beating the likes of Cervantes he was still a pup,and Cervantes was a crafty vetran but just to be winning world titles at 17 was breath taking and also for most fights Benitez found it hard to get motivation to train for the likes of Curry he also never really trained for Leanord either.

[Southpaw16BF]

I certainly consider it a good win, and Im not going to pretend Im an expert on McVea, but I have a hard time believing he was more in his prime when he was a teenager than when he was in his mid twenties. not even Pipino Cuevas or Benitez were in their primes then.

and I dont think he was quite 20 for their last fight, but it was close.

Yes you can peak at a very early age Pipeno Cuevas won the world title at 19
and when he was 20 had made 3 defences and stopped all of them.This was Cuevas at his peak.

[Southpaw16BF]

Also here's a bit of a prodigy story, at the age of 14 Tony Ayala Jr and Pipeno Cuevas had a sparring session when Cuevas was world champ by the way with witness's there and Ayala is belived to have not just got the better of him but actually put a bit of a beatin on him.Insane!
Here's ya source!

http://www.thesweetscience.com/boxing-article/2228/tony-ayala-best-prospect-all-time/

[j]

unbelievable!!! asking why jack was ranked so high!!!! that is borderline ******ed.

why he fought no blacks in major fights? who do you think a majority white crowd who wanted nothing more but to see johnson KO'd would've paid to see?

jack johnson is one of the few fighters i have thoroughly researched to a high degree. even went to buy his autobiography. he is a fascinating fighter. one who was gifted with inside fighting, outside fighting, and had the juice in both hands.

if some of you knew even a bit about johnson, you would not be asking that question.

he was not just a boxer, but also a business man. he made fights with the legends(at the time) of the white race because it made headlines, sold tickets, and to disprove the myth that black fighters were inferior.

he loved to get back at racists. this seems to be somewhat major motivation as to who he fought. even getting down with white women when blacks would be lynched for such a thing seems to indicate that.

but, johnson also seemed far ahead of his time. he was not a racist, despite a majority of the white race rooting against him and doing much more than just booing.
he opened club de champion i think is name of his place. it was open to all races. despite so much hate, he maintained being not racist at all. and all gold teeth, where do we see those? many rappers emulate that golden smile today. but he is the first i have seen with all permanent gold caps.
and his flashy dressing - has been emulated since then.

fighting wise, everything i have seen on jack, which is quite a bit, indicates a highly intelligent, highly capable fighter who preferred to toy with opponents if only to make them eat thier words or cause drama. but, he seemed to have also done so in a non-****** like way. even the article i read that has him beating ali i would highly consider. jack was no joke - as eveident in his one hit KO many have seen.

as far as footage tells, jack didn't use full force much - as he would rather show superior boxing skills rather than brute cuncussive force. he was even a jail house champion. in jail, he met a fellow ***ish boxer named joe choyinski. from chyonski, he learned many tricky defencive tactics. so, willing to learn, and work to where he got(many people may not realize how hard the deal to get his first world title fight was), he rightly deserves to be ranked up there with anyone. regardless of anything.


forgive if i have mispelled, or mixed anything up - i wrote all from memory.

[Steak]

unbelievable!!! asking why jack was ranked so high!!!! that is borderline ******ed.

why he fought no blacks in major fights? who do you think a majority white crowd who wanted nothing more but to see johnson KO'd would've paid to see?

jack johnson is one of the few fighters i have thoroughly researched to a high degree. even went to buy his autobiography. he is a fascinating fighter. one who was gifted with inside fighting, outside fighting, and had the juice in both hands.

if some of you knew even a bit about johnson, you would not be asking that question.

he was not just a boxer, but also a business man. he made fights with the legends(at the time) of the white race because it made headlines, sold tickets, and to disprove the myth that black fighters were inferior.

ok, why the hell should I care at all about this part. thats like saying that De La Hoya should be a top 10 ATG because hes the most successful business man in boxing. I really dont care what you do out of the ring and dont rate you by it...otherwise Ray Robinson wouldnt be considered the #1 so unanimously, since he wasnt the nicest guy ever.

and the excuse that you used for him never fighting blacks in title fights is ridiculous. I mean, you basically said 'because the fights wouldnt sell'. thats nice, unfortuately I dont care, at the end of the day he stopped fighting the best black fighters.

he loved to get back at racists. this seems to be somewhat major motivation as to who he fought. even getting down with white women when blacks would be lynched for such a thing seems to indicate that.

but, johnson also seemed far ahead of his time. he was not a racist, despite a majority of the white race rooting against him and doing much more than just booing.
he opened club de champion i think is name of his place. it was open to all races. despite so much hate, he maintained being not racist at all. and all gold teeth, where do we see those? many rappers emulate that golden smile today. but he is the first i have seen with all permanent gold caps.
and his flashy dressing - has been emulated since then.

yea, I dont really care about any of that. again, I only rate boxers by what they do in the ring.

fighting wise, everything i have seen on jack, which is quite a bit, indicates a highly intelligent, highly capable fighter who preferred to toy with opponents if only to make them eat thier words or cause drama. but, he seemed to have also done so in a non-****** like way. even the article i read that has him beating ali i would highly consider. jack was no joke - as eveident in his one hit KO many have seen.

as far as footage tells, jack didn't use full force much - as he would rather show superior boxing skills rather than brute cuncussive force. he was even a jail house champion. in jail, he met a fellow ***ish boxer named joe choyinski. from chyonski, he learned many tricky defencive tactics. so, willing to learn, and work to where he got(many people may not realize how hard the deal to get his first world title fight was), he rightly deserves to be ranked up there with anyone. regardless of anything.


forgive if i have mispelled, or mixed anything up - i wrote all from memory.

give me a break, Johnson's main strategy was to lean on the smaller man until they were exhausted and then start beating them up.

and as good as Johnson may have been, we can only rank him based on who he beat...thats how it goes for all fighters. and the people he beat were not much better than the people Wills beat. to rate Johnson so high and to rank Wills so low is a joke.

[Poet682006]

give me a break, Johnson's main strategy was to lean on the smaller man until they were exhausted and then start beating them up.

and as good as Johnson may have been, we can only rank him based on who he beat...thats how it goes for all fighters. and the people he beat were not much better than the people Wills beat. to rate Johnson so high and to rank Wills so low is a joke.

OK. This is phenomenon I've seen too many times here on Boxing Scene: The attitude that "if I never heard of his opposition then they must have ******". You simply are NOT going to get a lot of footage from that era so you need to READ about instead of complaining that opponents suck because they ain't on film.

The stategy of "lean(ing) on the smaller man until they were exhausted and then start beating them up." is used by most Heavyweights today, in part because they lack conditioning and want to wear their opponents down before they run out of gas themselves. In Johnson's day when you had 20+ round fights you couldn't just run out there and try to let it all hang out in the first 5 rounds because if your opponent didn't go then it was YOU who were in big trouble. More wrestling was involved as well because this wasn't far removed from when the London Ring Rules were in use and rounds ended when a fighter made contact with ropes. Simple strategy: You muscle your opponent to the ropes, the round ends and the ref separates you, you try and gain a tactical advantage from the separation. Fighters today use clinches to achieve the same thing: Mike Tyson was a past-master at using clinches to get a tactical avantage from the ref separating him and his opponent. As Archie Moore once said: "That's called good thinking."

Poet

[Grand Champ]

OK. This is phenomenon I've seen too many times here on Boxing Scene: The attitude that "if I never heard of his opposition then they must have ******". You simply are NOT going to get a lot of footage from that era so you need to READ about instead of complaining that opponents suck because they ain't on film.

The stategy of "lean(ing) on the smaller man until they were exhausted and then start beating them up." is used by most Heavyweights today, in part because they lack conditioning and want to wear their opponents down before they run out of gas themselves. In Johnson's day when you had 20+ round fights you couldn't just run out there and try to let it all hang out in the first 5 rounds because if your opponent didn't go then it was YOU who were in big trouble. More wrestling was involved as well because this wasn't far removed from when the London Ring Rules were in use and rounds ended when a fighter made contact with ropes. Simple strategy: You muscle your opponent to the ropes, the round ends and the ref separates you, you try and gain a tactical advantage from the separation. Fighters today use clinches to achieve the same thing: Mike Tyson was a past-master at using clinches to get a tactical avantage from the ref separating him and his opponent. As Archie Moore once said: "That's called good thinking."

Poet

What's left to say? The man is absolutely right

[LondonRingRules]

What's left to say? The man is absolutely right

** Except that he left out that Mike was never a clincher with his original team at the top of his game.

He was instead, pure boxer/puncher/swarmer.

He was in fact fairly mediocre at the clinch and grapple, even when he employed it to rest in the final 15 yr 3 ring circus act part of his career.

Johnson was a HOFer, but take away Jeffries where he made a fortune and could afford to coast, and he'd be forced to defend against prime versions of McVey, Wills, Jeannette, and most importantly, Langford......ouch!

Yeah, take away Jeffries, and Johnson would be a trivia footnote, the first black champ quickly forgotten.

Johnson is falling in history no matter how many docs are produced. The only question is how far since as a "brand name" in modern parlance, Jack Johnson has a very high public recognition, at least for now.