Is Dempsey Overrated? Is his ATG status questionable

[Zmerai Khan]

Bow down, pvssy boy. You get no respect around these parts.

Oh no! Don't tell me that! However will I sleep at night? Or face myself in the mirror? I can't even live with myself without your approval.

You don't even respect yourself. Why do I care if you respect me?

BTW, how's the weather up there ? Cold enough for you? Today I went to the beach.

[travestyny]

It's a shame Rigo didn't read this before his fight with Lomachenko. And Wilder before fighting Fury. It would've changed everything.

Immigrants from Europe and the former Ottoman empire were almost exclusively cut off from the US after WWII. My parents had to come through Germany and Australia to get the four of us here.

And while post-war changes allowed talented, hardworking people to get rich, they punished anyone who wasn't. Hence less poor urban Whites and more poor urban Blacks.

It's not that Whites stopped playing sports, but they switched to safer more lucrative ones. Your star athletes of today would have been star athletes in the 20s. But they would have mostly been Boxers and sometimes been Baseball players, nothing else. With Whites dominating other sports, you have to assume they'd dominate Boxing, too.

Today Boxing, Kickboxing and MMA have seem to be moving back to the realm of White fighters. But roll back to the 90s and relevant White fighters were a distant memory. But it was a richer time with national and international populations more segregated from each other.

Obviously I was being facetious with Beamish. But it serves to show the post-war era of Boxing was probably the least dynamic.

It's the second time you showed your true, racist colors. You should be banned for your bullshlt. But since no one takes you seriously anyway, I haven't even bothered to hit the report button. Everyone is fully aware that you're nothing but a pitiful moron.

[billeau2]

Marciano did throw occasional short blows but just as many if not more came from left or right field. Dempsey was more akin to a hwt Roberto Duran. Brutal fast puncher with excellent fighting skills. Arcel who watched Dempsey live from ringside stated that Duran as a light weight was the closest thing to Dempsey he had ever seen. Valuable comment when trying to visualize prime Dempsey in living color.

To dovetail on this comment:

There was a time in the early eighties or so where you had trainers alive, some still active, who had seen Dempsey all the way up to Tyson. I believe there might have been one or two that had seen Johnson as well...

Most of them said Dempsey was the best heavy they had ever seen. Some said Louis and a few had Ali.

Also, Dempsey was the first heavy weight to harbinger what would eventually be the punching, squared up style that brought out the great punchers...men like BlackBurn who trained Louis as such, etc. And yes a lot of fighters owe Dempsey a great debt for his renovations in the ring. Dempsey, among other things set up counter punching at a range that previously was considered risky... this involved timing the shoulders, dropping the shoulders and using weight to turn back and into the counter. Dempsey also followed this with a pivot, something done as recently as Fury against Wilder! and something classic Mike Tyson was great at.

I don't know what else someone has to do to be considered ATG...

oh and regarding Marciano: different animal all together. Dempsey versus Marciano? would be like Armstrong versus Duran. People often make the mistake of confusing Marciano with a great puncher when Marciano was great boxer puncher primarily because of skills related to continually applying pressure to the opponent. Marciano got you the way prime Holy beat Bowe (the time he won)...constant pressure with good solid punching skills.

[Bundana]

Yes. Dempsey’s greatness was already determined by those experts of his time who watched him live from ringside. Who are you to try to change expert opinion 100 years later? Ignorant or you have an agenda.

Did you not read what I said on the first page of this thread?: Yes, Dempsey is definitely/undeniably an ATG!

So I agree with you, and am not trying to change anything!

All I did was ask you, if you don't think it's possible, that there could be unbiased posters out there, who don't share your opinions... without them being ignorant morons?

[Joe Beamish]

What IS an “ATG??”

The term is undefined. I prefer clarity.

Dempsey’s greatness is less about what he accomplished in the ring and more about his superstar popularity during a time when boxing was enormous and most of America had been starving for a “great white hope.”

He was a killer in the ring, which added to the attraction, but it was against a bunch of ham and eggers.

Who did he beat?

He lost twice to his one great opponent and didn’t fight the best of his time.

And yes, the best at HW have nearly always been black. How many non-black fighters do you have in your top 20 all time heavies? Two or three max? It’s a kind of athleticism that carries itself well into the upper weights. In addition of course to a strong culture of boxing gyms, a whole community.

Dempsey’s was an overwhelmingly rascist time and his reputation as a “great” has benefitted from it, from not being expected to face black fighters.

I would like the designation “ATG” to depend more on fighting, rather than cultural, criteria. That means beating the best of your time. Dempsey didn’t even get in the ring with them.

[gurhar123]

What IS an “ATG??”

The term is undefined. I prefer clarity.

Dempsey’s greatness is less about what he accomplished in the ring and more about his superstar popularity during a time when boxing was enormous and most of America had been starving for a “great white hope.”

He was a killer in the ring, which added to the attraction, but it was against a bunch of ham and eggers.

Who did he beat?

He lost twice to his one great opponent and didn’t fight the best of his time.

And yes, the best at HW have nearly always been black. How many non-black fighters do you have in your top 20 all time heavies? Two or three max? It’s a kind of athleticism that carries itself well into the upper weights. In addition of course to a strong culture of boxing gyms, a whole community.

Dempsey’s was an overwhelmingly rascist time and his reputation as a “great” has benefitted from it, from not being expected to face black fighters.

I would like the designation “ATG” to depend more on fighting, rather than cultural, criteria. That means beating the best of your time. Dempsey didn’t even get in the ring with them.

I agree that fighting ability should be the criteria we judge ATG status by. Furthermore, I agree that the names that you've beaten are the strongest evidence in favor of your fighting ability. One of the biggest takeaways of this thread seems to be that Dempsey's resume is a bit sparse, from which it follows that a strong claim about his ATG status depends quite a bit on the much less conclusive and reliable eye ball test (looking at film of Dempsey against lower tier fighters and estimating his overall skill by that measure)

[HOUDINI563]

An opinion that Dempsey was not a great fighter would be an uneducated opinion. First it would mean said person is ignoring history. The expert opinion of those who watched Dempsey live would need to be ignored. Secondly one would need to ignore his skills as illustrated within his filmed bouts. This specifically is easy to do as the film quality is not the greatest. There was an article written by a writer a few years ago degrading Dempsey’s abilities. However close examination of his points reveal his bias. The article was written to produce controversy not to be accurate.

I always point to one sequence to illustrate Dempsey’s skills. Watch Dempsey Firpo. The KD prior to the KO. Dempsey weaves, feints and lands a textbook ultra short combination...right to the heart, left hook to the chin flooring his opponent. Beautiful. That combination was Dempsey’s favorite and was considered the most devastating comb in boxing history via Fleischer (50 years at ringside).

[HOUDINI563]

Again Dempsey’s KO in 18 seconds of Fulton may be the greatest win by any future hwt champion.

Dempsey’s KO of Sharkey. Prime Sharkey. Was a incredible win. Sharkey was in agony once Dempsey concentrated on going to the body. It’s one of the greatest displays of body punching in hwt history. And NO Dempsey did not hit Sharkey in the balls to get the KO.

[Joe Beamish]

Again Dempsey did not face black fighters. His opponents were undistinguished except for Tunney, who beat him.

As for Dempsey’s popularity, and the high estimation of his abilities from the men of his own day, and his own rascist culture, who cares? I prefer to think independently rather rely on report, and I look at what happened in the ring, against what competition.

Dempey is often overrated.

[HOUDINI563]

History shows you are 100% incorrect.