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It is always P4P that getes the headline. But what about the inch for inch category?
A 5'11" welterweight rightfully owns the P4P title, but he would not be a winner in the all time inch for inch category.
Inch for inch there was no better than Sam Langford, and you might even throw Barbados Joe Walcott into that picture.
The Boston Tar Baby was 5'7" and fought everyone from 6'3" Harry Wills to Jack Johnnycakes, the Galveston Giant. He did not just fight them, mind you. He managed to KO Wills twice.
Once Johnson escaped that black murderer's row of those condemned to fight among themselves over and over, he never looked back for a championship challenger other than Jim Johnson, the weakest of that bunch and who Langford beat thirteen or fourteen times. Jack understood he had to fight a white man every time out. That is where the money was, and Jack loved money. A close decision win or loss to Langford was about as unappealing as raw turkey. Why risk the title against a guy who could really fight and would not draw much of a crowd?
Why not Langford rather than Jim Johnson, you may ask yourself? Sam had already given Lil' Arthur a close fight in 1906.
The public might tolerate one defense against another black, but let's not kid ourselves into believing they would have tolerated a second such defense...against...oh, say even Lil' Sam Langford.
Langford, who had the demeanor of a train porter, was not a complainer or a troublemaker, so he was well liked by the white public. The same way they liked their train porters named George for handiness, since you really could not tell them apart anyway. Let's put it this way: Lanfgord was never the public's first choice for a defense--white or black--and not their third, either, yet he was in 1910 the single fighter in the world with the best chance of dethroning Johnson. Both men would have brought their A games, for they would have known it was necessary.
Only a handful of smaller men in the histroy of the sport managed to bring something like their original power with them when they moved to higher weight divisions. One thinks of Wilde, Robinson and Sam Langford. Knocking out guys who had 40-50 pounds and 6-8 inches on him was all in a day's work for the Boston Tar Baby.
In fact, he could have been and should have been and would have been fighting middlweights in today's game. How he might have done in the middleweight division is suggested by his lone ring encounter in 1910 with the great Stanley Ketchel. The six round exhibition affair at the National Athletic Club in Phildelphia was hotly anticipated, for both men were already considered greats and Ketchel was world's middleweight champion. Sam, who could fight as a middleweight, was currently the world's colored heavyweight champion.
The boxing public hoped with whetted appetites that this bout was a prelude to a full championship bout for the middlweight title out in California later that year.
Ketchel had strategic flexibility. He could attack full bore, knowing the negro was unlikely to respond in kind and risk the future bout. Or he could take it easy on the black boy, knowing the favor would be returned, as long as they gave the Athletic Club attendees enough to satisfy them. If he got the chance, he could KO Langford and get rid of someone his camp considered dangerous.
Newspaper accounts of this fight bring to mind Mayweather/Castillo I. Sam's job was to contain the Michigan assassain without hurting him too badly, and build interest toward California in the summer.
If Sam had known there would never be a championship fight with Stanley, he might have done more than just contain the storming Ketchel that evening. He bloodied his nose, jabbed him, clinched him on the ropes, parried and out maneuvered him and emerged unscathed. Interest for California was duly built. Stanely, of course, had a date with a bullet.
In a just world the world probably had itself a middleweight champion who might have reigned twelve to fifteen years in Sam Langford. In truth, neither Ketchel or Papke was a reasonable match for him if he wanted to turn the pressure on. Those guys punched light compared to Johnson, Jeanette, McVea and Harry Wills.
As Sam started to age (who wouldn't?) Harry Wills started to beat him every time they fought. But if you look at the record before Langford became half blind and shopworn, big Harry Wills got KO'd twice by the Boston Tar Baby.
Joe Gans was a teacher of Langford's, and sometimes even worked his corner and helped train him.
Langford is often overlooked in contemporary P4P rankings, because where to place him is obscure. In the inch for inch rankings his status is more clear where he is one of if not the greatest I4I fighters ever.
A 5'11" welterweight rightfully owns the P4P title, but he would not be a winner in the all time inch for inch category.
Inch for inch there was no better than Sam Langford, and you might even throw Barbados Joe Walcott into that picture.
The Boston Tar Baby was 5'7" and fought everyone from 6'3" Harry Wills to Jack Johnnycakes, the Galveston Giant. He did not just fight them, mind you. He managed to KO Wills twice.
Once Johnson escaped that black murderer's row of those condemned to fight among themselves over and over, he never looked back for a championship challenger other than Jim Johnson, the weakest of that bunch and who Langford beat thirteen or fourteen times. Jack understood he had to fight a white man every time out. That is where the money was, and Jack loved money. A close decision win or loss to Langford was about as unappealing as raw turkey. Why risk the title against a guy who could really fight and would not draw much of a crowd?
Why not Langford rather than Jim Johnson, you may ask yourself? Sam had already given Lil' Arthur a close fight in 1906.
The public might tolerate one defense against another black, but let's not kid ourselves into believing they would have tolerated a second such defense...against...oh, say even Lil' Sam Langford.
Langford, who had the demeanor of a train porter, was not a complainer or a troublemaker, so he was well liked by the white public. The same way they liked their train porters named George for handiness, since you really could not tell them apart anyway. Let's put it this way: Lanfgord was never the public's first choice for a defense--white or black--and not their third, either, yet he was in 1910 the single fighter in the world with the best chance of dethroning Johnson. Both men would have brought their A games, for they would have known it was necessary.
Only a handful of smaller men in the histroy of the sport managed to bring something like their original power with them when they moved to higher weight divisions. One thinks of Wilde, Robinson and Sam Langford. Knocking out guys who had 40-50 pounds and 6-8 inches on him was all in a day's work for the Boston Tar Baby.
In fact, he could have been and should have been and would have been fighting middlweights in today's game. How he might have done in the middleweight division is suggested by his lone ring encounter in 1910 with the great Stanley Ketchel. The six round exhibition affair at the National Athletic Club in Phildelphia was hotly anticipated, for both men were already considered greats and Ketchel was world's middleweight champion. Sam, who could fight as a middleweight, was currently the world's colored heavyweight champion.
The boxing public hoped with whetted appetites that this bout was a prelude to a full championship bout for the middlweight title out in California later that year.
Ketchel had strategic flexibility. He could attack full bore, knowing the negro was unlikely to respond in kind and risk the future bout. Or he could take it easy on the black boy, knowing the favor would be returned, as long as they gave the Athletic Club attendees enough to satisfy them. If he got the chance, he could KO Langford and get rid of someone his camp considered dangerous.
Newspaper accounts of this fight bring to mind Mayweather/Castillo I. Sam's job was to contain the Michigan assassain without hurting him too badly, and build interest toward California in the summer.
If Sam had known there would never be a championship fight with Stanley, he might have done more than just contain the storming Ketchel that evening. He bloodied his nose, jabbed him, clinched him on the ropes, parried and out maneuvered him and emerged unscathed. Interest for California was duly built. Stanely, of course, had a date with a bullet.
In a just world the world probably had itself a middleweight champion who might have reigned twelve to fifteen years in Sam Langford. In truth, neither Ketchel or Papke was a reasonable match for him if he wanted to turn the pressure on. Those guys punched light compared to Johnson, Jeanette, McVea and Harry Wills.
As Sam started to age (who wouldn't?) Harry Wills started to beat him every time they fought. But if you look at the record before Langford became half blind and shopworn, big Harry Wills got KO'd twice by the Boston Tar Baby.
Joe Gans was a teacher of Langford's, and sometimes even worked his corner and helped train him.
Langford is often overlooked in contemporary P4P rankings, because where to place him is obscure. In the inch for inch rankings his status is more clear where he is one of if not the greatest I4I fighters ever.
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