Why is Tunney a great heavyweight?

[Willie Pep 229]

Q I hope I am not be presumptuous . . .

Harry Frazee made Dempsey the $350,00 offer in spring 1922 (NYT March 5th 1922), the article made no mention of Wills' end, but Paddy Mullins had never before balked at any offer so it is unlikely that money would have been an issue, Wills/Mullins just wanted their shot.

The problem was venue.

The very next day (NYT March 6th 1922) the Massachusetts State Athletic Commission stabbed Harry Farzees in the back, announcing that no 'mixed bouts' * would be licensed in Boston. This meant Fenway Park was off limits, and without the Park as a foundation for the fight, Frazee's offer collapsed.

Then on the 7th (March 7th 1922) Doc Kearns replied to Frazee's offer through the newspapers, but quickly pointed out that Boston is already out, and that New Jersey had already announced it wouldn't accept any "mixed bouts" (New Jersey's words) ** and then added a vague statement that "New York is out of the question" ***

Harry Frazee then went silent!

Finding a venue for a Dempsey-Wills fight was considerably more difficult than we today appreciate.

______________________________________________

* The Commission's actual words were "such a bout."

** Frazee had also hinted that maybe Boyle's Thirty Acres could be used as the site.

*** Kearns vagueness regarding New York IMO wasn't based on a New York refusal of the fight, but was instead based on Kearns' determination not to let Tex Rickard or the NYSAC near what he considered his fight. He was at war with both.
_____________________________________________

A side note for Ghost of Dempsey and Travesty NY, guess who at this time was working as Kearns' PR mouth piece? None other than Dan McKettrick [SIC] After all of that Johnson-Jeannette mess it looks like Danny boy dumped on Jeannette and threw in with Dempsey/Kearns.

[Tom Cruise]

Uh...

Is that a joke?

Can you show me where Charles or Walcott EVER looked as good as Conn did that night? Can you show me when either man ever fought anyone as Louis in '41? Conn, who was 23 and still a natural Light Heavyweight.

It was a great performance by Conn, but Louis almost certainly underestimated him. If you watch the fight, Louis fights him hard in the early rounds, before he gasses and Conn takes over. Rumours are that Louis tried to cut weight so as to not make the size difference too pronounced on the scales. Whether thats true or he just didnt train as hard idk, but he didn't fight a good fight. The second fight, Louis smashed him to bits and knocks him out (again). Conn also has very little depth to his resume. Like Tunney, he has only a handful of fights at the weight, whereas Charles, like I said earlier, has a much deeper HW ledger.

Walcott would avenge those losses, BTW. To include by knockout, no less. Charles definitely didn't have Conn's beard or heart. He didn't have his wheels or bag of tricks, either. It seems his power was coming on par with Charles' best.

Charles was exceptionally skilled what are you talking about? He didnt fight the same as Conn, but his skill set is up there with the best to have done it. Charles was stopped a few times, but he also fought on way past his best, with 4 of his stoppage losses coming after his shell was knocked out by Marciano. Other than Walcotts perfect left hook he had been stopped once before that, when injured, in one of the toughest resumes in the sports history. Questioning Charles' chin and toughness? Just, no. Not gonna fly.

OK, so he fought a lot. So did Carnera. Carnera's record is a veritable list of "who's who".

Loughran fought a lot and won a lot, too. I NEVER see him on any Heavyweight lists. He's as consistent as anyone from the 70's onward, not named Larry Holmes (look it up) until the arrival of Wladimir Klitchko.

Charles won a lot as well though so not sure what you are arguing here

Loughran is one of my favourite fighters ever, with a decent HW resume for sure, but he was about 50/50 vs decent fighters at the weight. Charles has better top level wins and is more consistent too.

If you feel Charles is underrated, OK. But that era was particularly weak. (None of those guys was as good as Bob Pastor, for example). But in the world of the blind, the man with one eye is king.

Lots of HW eras are weak. Actually the majority of them are.

Then you need to watch Dempsey fight. There's plenty of footage which has been refurbished. It's clear he's a full tier above any of them. Shorter punches. Better head movement. Quicker feet. Busier. Better punch selection. Better chin. Reckless, and a sucker for a persistent well-used jab, but that's not any of them. They'd get ****d.

I find Dempsey tricky to rate because on paper it looks like he was a better fighter pre title, but there is very little (if any?) footage of him from that time. Willard onwards he fought little, just 8 times in 8 years, with 2 of those against LHWs, two clear losses to Tunney, and a war with a pretty average looking Firpo. Sharkey is a good win but even that is controversial. He, or his team, also drew the colour line which drastically cuts the depth of talent in his division.

Skill wise he could clearly crack, and he is one of those fighters who could get power from awkward positions and short punches which makes him very dangerous, but he wasnt the most sophisticated fighter ever, he got caught far too easily, struggled with good movement and a good jab like you say. In H2H terms I certainly wouldnt put him much ahead of Walcott, whos awkward movement and powerful counterpunching would give Dempsey absolute hell, or Charles who is one of the great boxer punchers of all time, a brilliant inside fighter, and also very slick too. Past prime versions of both gave Marciano all he could handle.

[Tom Cruise]

- - Jack easily out pointed a Ez facsimile in Tommy Gibbons who was all defense to keep from getting KOed.

I rate Ez at his best in his title defenses high enough to possibly beat Dempsey, but Walcott gets KOed.

Possibly is not probably though. Had not Wills not turned down that title eliminator against Tunney and had one of the dozen attempts prior to fight Dempsey had come to fruition, the best being the $350K offer by Red Sox owner Frazee in 1920, we'd have more evidence and footage to go on.

Nonetheless, Jack one of the rare legends of The West cannot be denied.

Charles didnt fight like Gibbons, though he could box at range like he did vs an old Louis as he was extremely versatile. The fights Ive seen, at HW, as thats what got filmed, he spent a lot of time on the front foot throwing drawing leads to counter, throwing aggressive combinations, and was extremely happy with his head buried in his opponents chest.

If Marciano couldnt put a past prime Charles purely on the defensive, what makes us think that Dempsey would? Even if you pick Dempsey to win, I dont see the fight playing out like that.

[Rusty Tromboni]

It was a great performance by Conn, but Louis almost certainly underestimated him. If you watch the fight, Louis fights him hard in the early rounds, before he gasses and Conn takes over.

Nope.

He does fight Conn hard, but there's no report of him having taken Conn lightly. Obviously Conn was a much smaller man, still short of his prime, but Joe's fighting at his best every minute of that fight. Conn offered him something different from his typical fare, which caused him frustration.

No offense, but the fact that you made this comment signals that you aren't very familiar with Louis' career. Go back and watch his fights, then try and tell me this.

Rumours are that Louis tried to cut weight so as to not make the size difference too pronounced on the scales. Whether thats true or he just didnt train as hard idk, but he didn't fight a good fight.

You're making things up.

The consensus is that Louis was at his best against Conn. He looked worse against Braddock, Buddy Baer, Galento and Walcott - all fights which he also won.

He DID arrive trimmer than usual, but that was to keep up with Conn. The reported weights were fudged to make the fight appear less of a mismatch.

The second fight, Louis smashed him to bits and knocks him out (again).

No one takes that fight seriously. Everyone knows Conn was done. Joe was the first to say it. If you'd actually seen the fight, you wouldn't have even bothered to make the point.

Conn also has very little depth to his resume. Like Tunney, he has only a handful of fights at the weight, whereas Charles, like I said earlier, has a much deeper HW ledger.

Well, he was one of two men to stop Bob Pastor (Joe being the other), a bigger better version of Joey Maxim - whom Charles couldn't stop in 5 attempts.

No one is dis*****g that Charles fought more. The simple fact, though, is that he and his competition weren't as good. Otherwise, you would have provided me footage proving me wrong.

Most likely, you got as far as Louis-Charles and you realized a prime Charles, although victorious, looked worse against an old Louis than a green, undersized Conn looked against Joe at his absolute peak.

Conn also has very little depth to his resume. Like Tunney, he has only a handful of fights at the weight, whereas Charles, like I said earlier, has a much deeper HW ledger.

While I did just address this as it regards Tunney and Conn compared to Charles, I am actually curious what this means, big picture.


Holyfield fought longer than almost any Heavyweight. He has about the deepest resume. Do we rank him over Ali, Foreman, Frazier?

Charles was exceptionally skilled what are you talking about? He didnt fight the same as Conn, but his skill set is up there with the best to have done it. Charles was stopped a few times, but he also fought on way past his best, with 4 of his stoppage losses coming after his shell was knocked out by Marciano. Other than Walcotts perfect left hook he had been stopped once before that, when injured, in one of the toughest resumes in the sports history. Questioning Charles' chin and toughness? Just, no. Not gonna fly.

No one's dis*****g that he was an exceptionally skilled fighter with a lot of pop, and who really turned on the pressure.

He fought virtually undefeated. Before Marciano, only Walcott had beat him in his prime. When he lost to Bivins, Marshall and Turnero he was still short of his best, although already a very skilled and promising fighter.

But we have footage of Charles from the Marshall rematch, in his reported prime. A helluva fight, but also a sloppy reckless one. And that fits very much with what we've seen of Marshall. We have footage of Marshall, Bivins, Oma, Maxim. These weren't greats, or near greats. Definitely not when Charles met them. If anything, Charles built his career beating once-great/promising fighters on their way out.

Pretty much the OPPOSITE of Loughran, who was a natural Light Heavyweight who moved into Heavywight to take on rising stars; Charles was a natural Heavyweight who built (I almost said "padded") his career on fighters on their way out.

Loughran is one of my favourite fighters ever, with a decent HW resume for sure, but he was about 50/50 vs decent fighters at the weight. Charles has better top level wins and is more consistent too.

No. God, no.

Let's look at Loughran's scalps:
Risko
Schaaf
Baer
Godoy
Sharkey
Levinsky
Uzcudun
Farr
Carnera

Many of those men several times. Obviously, some of those wins show up as official losses due to the politics of Boxing, but the small print tells the full story.
And those are only the names that flash neon-bright. Guys like McCoy, Ray Imp, Delaney, etc. were almost all top tier Heavyweights. Their memory has faded, but this was a much more competitive era than the graveyard which Charles fought it. Keep in mind, many of these fights were fought by Loughran at an age when Charles (who fought his career with BOTH hands) was finished as a fighter.


Now let's look at Charles':
Bob Satterfield
rex Layne
Joe Walcott (clearly avenged)
Lee Oma

Wow. Astounding. I almost feel the need to genuflect.

We're supposed to forgive Charles for his losses post Marciano, as if it's not his fault he stood there as a human punching bag. What's the excuse for him losing to The Phantom's facsimile, fellow Philadelphian Harold Johnson? Johnson was more sound than Loughran, but he didn't move on skates like Tommy, and he lacked the same beard.

Loughran fought punchers every bit as fearsome as Marciano, and still maintained a level of aptitude to pull off performances like his win over Carnera (can you find footage of Charles looking as good as Tommy did that night?), Godoy (each time as convincing, per reports, as Louis was in their first outing) and Farr (the man Louis called his toughest opponent).

Charles doesn't look terrible against Marciano. And to be fair, despite his superior size, skillset, and experience, he was definitely in there with a force of nature. I neither want to diminish the intensity of that fight, nor Charles' performance. But there's nothing about that fight, or how Charles rebounded from it that suggests he would have been an elite Heavyweight in the 30's.

I find Dempsey tricky to rate because on paper it looks like he was a better fighter pre title, but there is very little (if any?) footage of him from that time. Willard onwards he fought little, just 8 times in 8 years, with 2 of those against LHWs, two clear losses to Tunney, and a war with a pretty average looking Firpo. Sharkey is a good win but even that is controversial. He, or his team, also drew the colour line which drastically cuts the depth of talent in his division.

I don't dispute that, like Sullivan before him, or McGregor today, he decided to rest on his laurels. He didn't completely derail, but he definitely lost his edge. Still, his destruction of his opponents speaks for itself.

No other fighter is held to the scrutiny Dempsey is. And when his critics can't get what they want through scrutiny, they make things up/perpetuate unsubstantiated myths.

Show me a performance by Dempsey where you'd pick any Heavyweight before Ali in the FOTC to beat him.

Skill wise he could clearly crack, and he is one of those fighters who could get power from awkward positions and short punches which makes him very dangerous, but he wasnt the most sophisticated fighter ever, he got caught far too easily, struggled with good movement and a good jab like you say. In H2H terms I certainly wouldnt put him much ahead of Walcott, whos awkward movement and powerful counterpunching would give Dempsey absolute hell, or Charles who is one of the great boxer punchers of all time, a brilliant inside fighter, and also very slick too. Past prime versions of both gave Marciano all he could handle.

LMAO.

Dude, you're a good guy. I am not trying to beat you up here. It's jsut some ofthe stuff you're saying is really ridiculous, and clearly defies the evidence. If you watch the cleaned up versions of his fights you'll better appreciate his greatness.

Marciano was slow and sloppy. He made a lot of mistakes mostly because he could get away with them. He got away with them not simply due to his own talents, but his opponents' short-comings.

Walcott never met anyone with the insane speed, head-movement and combination punching of Dempsey. But still those lesser fighters beat him.

Gibbons was a helluva fighter, the best boxer-puncher Boxing had seen before Leonard and Tunney came of age but his power meant nothing. And he decided simply to try and survive using his famed defense. He still took a pelting which effectively ended his career.

While I definitely do dispute that Charles was post-prime, I don't dispute that he very much benefited from being a more modern fighter: Leonard, Tunney, Loughran, Wolgast, Pep - these are the fighters who pioneered skills Charles had access to and Dempsey did not.
But we see very clearly Charles wasn't a defensive maestro. Skilled, but not impervious to being hit, hurt and bullied.

He was more versatile and refined than Dempsey, but he was basically a poor man's Dempsey. And that's being gracious.

[QueensburyRules]

Charles didnt fight like Gibbons, though he could box at range like he did vs an old Louis as he was extremely versatile. The fights Ive seen, at HW, as thats what got filmed, he spent a lot of time on the front foot throwing drawing leads to counter, throwing aggressive combinations, and was extremely happy with his head buried in his opponents chest.

If Marciano couldnt put a past prime Charles purely on the defensive, what makes us think that Dempsey would? Even if you pick Dempsey to win, I dont see the fight playing out like that.

- -Pt being boxers have different styles as do sluggers. See Charles/Gibbons and Dempsey/Rocky as infinitum.

A rose is a rose by any other name. Jack in his Kid Blackie days seems to have gotten his start at Young Peter Jackson's Gym:

https://boxrec.com/media/index.php/Young_Peter_Jackson

Not Jack drawing the color line. How many unrecorded fights at the gym did he have? This era hardly so cut and dried as you imagine.

[Tom Cruise]

Nope.

He does fight Conn hard, but there's no report of him having taken Conn lightly. Obviously Conn was a much smaller man, still short of his prime, but Joe's fighting at his best every minute of that fight. Conn offered him something different from his typical fare, which caused him frustration.

No offense, but the fact that you made this comment signals that you aren't very familiar with Louis' career. Go back and watch his fights, then try and tell me this.



You're making things up.

The consensus is that Louis was at his best against Conn. He looked worse against Braddock, Buddy Baer, Galento and Walcott - all fights which he also won.

He DID arrive trimmer than usual, but that was to keep up with Conn. The reported weights were fudged to make the fight appear less of a mismatch.

Looked worse vs Buddy Baer? How does this make any sense? You seriously overrate the importance of flash KDs if you think they were bad performances. Other than Walcott, who gave him hell, Braddock, Baer and Galento were completely and utterly destroyed. Beaten up and stopped. No two ways about it. Stop making **** up

You are going against Louis' words when you say that about the weight. Whether true or not idk, but it tallies exactly with the fight I saw, so Im inclined to believe it...

Louis stated that in order to stave off such talk he made the mistake of dehydrating himself prior to the fight so that could weigh in at less than 200 pounds. “I always use to lay off the day before a fight. But the last day I trained, dieted and drank as little water as possible. Chappie (his trainer Jack Blackburn) was mad as hell.” Joe’s sense of fairness left him critically drained as the fight progressed.

No one takes that fight seriously. Everyone knows Conn was done. Joe was the first to say it. If you'd actually seen the fight, you wouldn't have even bothered to make the point.

Fair point, I shouldnt have used this bout as evidence.

Well, he was one of two men to stop Bob Pastor (Joe being the other), a bigger better version of Joey Maxim - whom Charles couldn't stop in 5 attempts.

No one is dis*****g that Charles fought more. The simple fact, though, is that he and his competition weren't as good. Otherwise, you would have provided me footage proving me wrong.

Conn fought Maxim?

Most likely, you got as far as Louis-Charles and you realized a prime Charles, although victorious, looked worse against an old Louis than a green, undersized Conn looked against Joe at his absolute peak.

Green Conn? Conn had all his best days behind him when he fought Louis. What are you even talking about here? Was he robbed of his actual prime by war? Most likely. But in reality Billy Conn was as prime when Louis fought him as he ever was in the ring. All the good things you are saying about Conn are based on performances that happened pre Louis, yet he was green?Here's the thing as well, winning rounds off Louis wasn't the most impressive thing, you are overrating that as an achievement. Conn did brilliantly well to come through the early onslaught weighing what he did, and he boxed brilliantly like P4P great he is, but he wasnt the first or last fighter to take rounds off Louis before being stopped. While I absolutely accept Louis was done when Charles got to him, saying Conn had a better performance is ridiculous when Conn was stopped brutally, and Charles won a clear decision, outboxing and beating Louis up decisively.

While I did just address this as it regards Tunney and Conn compared to Charles, I am actually curious what this means, big picture.


Holyfield fought longer than almost any Heavyweight. He has about the deepest resume. Do we rank him over Ali, Foreman, Frazier?

Ali has a much deeper resume, Foreman closer but still would edge to Foreman. I do rank Holyfield over Frazier though, and Im not the only one. H2H its more tricky, Holy had a few ups and downs, but he absolutely hangs with all of them even if I wouldn't make him favourite.

No one's dis*****g that he was an exceptionally skilled fighter with a lot of pop, and who really turned on the pressure.

He fought virtually undefeated. Before Marciano, only Walcott had beat him in his prime. When he lost to Bivins, Marshall and Turnero he was still short of his best, although already a very skilled and promising fighter.

But we have footage of Charles from the Marshall rematch, in his reported prime. A helluva fight, but also a sloppy reckless one. And that fits very much with what we've seen of Marshall. We have footage of Marshall, Bivins, Oma, Maxim. These weren't greats, or near greats. Definitely not when Charles met them. If anything, Charles built his career beating once-great/promising fighters on their way out.

There is a big difference between sloppy and scrappy. It was a scrappy fight fought often at close range with high level grappling on the inside, from the grainy footage we have. The thing I love about Charles is that he was just as happy fighting this kind of fight, as he was fighting as a counterpuncher fighting elite opposition. He was one of the most versatile fighters ever.

Bivins and Marshall are certainly greats, though yeah I agree Bivins absolute best came pre war. He did still get several good wins between his losses to Charles though. Maxim Ive never been sure about, he has some solid names on his resume, but watching him ive never been sold 100%. Still a very solid name on his ledger though, especially beating him that many times.

Pretty much the OPPOSITE of Loughran, who was a natural Light Heavyweight who moved into Heavywight to take on rising stars; Charles was a natural Heavyweight who built (I almost said "padded") his career on fighters on their way out.



No. God, no.

Let's look at Loughran's scalps:
Risko 2-2
Schaaf 2-2
Baer 1-0
Godoy 1-1-1
Sharkey 1-1
Levinsky 2-1
Uzcudun 1-0
Farr 0-1
Carnera 0-1

Many of those men several times. Obviously, some of those wins show up as official losses due to the politics of Boxing, but the small print tells the full story.
And those are only the names that flash neon-bright. Guys like McCoy, Ray Imp, Delaney, etc. were almost all top tier Heavyweights. Their memory has faded, but this was a much more competitive era than the graveyard which Charles fought it. Keep in mind, many of these fights were fought by Loughran at an age when Charles (who fought his career with BOTH hands) was finished as a fighter.

Loughran was undoubtedly an ATG and a very good HW, I dont doubt he was hard done by at times, especially Carnera which sounds dodgy as hell. Still clear that over a series of fights with the guys listed, he didnt exactly establish much dominance there. And while we are giving context to wins like you have done for Charles, Baer was several years away from his best, Sharkey was past his, as was Uzcudun and neither had a significant win post Loughran beating them.

Are we really talking about Ray Impellatier as a name on Loughrans resume? Even as a Loughran fan I wouldnt go there.

Now let's look at Charles':
Bob Satterfield 1-0
rex Layne 2-1
Joe Walcott (clearly avenged) 2-2
Lee Oma 1-0

Wow. Astounding. I almost feel the need to genuflect.

Looks good when you miss off a whole bunch of ranked HWs Charles beat doesnt it?

How about no.3 ranked Bivins, No.2 ranked Elmer Ray, no.5 Joe Baksi, no.3/5 ranked Maxim and a whole bunch ranked in the lower top 10, Pat Valentino, Cesar Brion, Charley Norkus etc.

We're supposed to forgive Charles for his losses post Marciano, as if it's not his fault he stood there as a human punching bag. What's the excuse for him losing to The Phantom's facsimile, fellow Philadelphian Harold Johnson? Johnson was more sound than Loughran, but he didn't move on skates like Tommy, and he lacked the same beard.

He was an aggressive boxer puncher at the end of a long career still fighting top opposition, yeah he took some punches, he also dealt out a lot of punishment too. Marciano said that Charles taught him the meaning of pain in their first bout. Johnson is an ATG so no shame in losing a fight with him at any stage let alone when he was nearing the end.

Loughran fought punchers every bit as fearsome as Marciano, and still maintained a level of aptitude to pull off performances like his win over Carnera (can you find footage of Charles looking as good as Tommy did that night?), Godoy (each time as convincing, per reports, as Louis was in their first outing) and Farr (the man Louis called his toughest opponent).

Can I find footage of Charles looking as good as the 3 minutes of grainy footage we have of Loughran fighting Carnera? Is this where we are at? Loughran didn't fight anyone at HW who was as good as prime Marciano, nor who punched as hard. Baer has an argument as a puncher, but not at the stage Loughran fought him, and he was a very inconsistent fighter even at his best.

Charles doesn't look terrible against Marciano. And to be fair, despite his superior size, skillset, and experience, he was definitely in there with a force of nature. I neither want to diminish the intensity of that fight, nor Charles' performance. But there's nothing about that fight, or how Charles rebounded from it that suggests he would have been an elite Heavyweight in the 30's.

Disagree, Charles would absolutely been a top HW in the 30s. Dont see any argument for Carnera beating him, would favour him over Sharkey and Baer, though both present danger. Schmelling idk. He's a bit of a favourite of mine though like a lot of 30s guys his results were inconsisent, he was a brilliant boxer though. I rate his win over Louis as one of the top all time wins at HW.

I don't dispute that, like Sullivan before him, or McGregor today, he decided to rest on his laurels. He didn't completely derail, but he definitely lost his edge. Still, his destruction of his opponents speaks for itself.

No other fighter is held to the scrutiny Dempsey is. And when his critics can't get what they want through scrutiny, they make things up/perpetuate unsubstantiated myths.

Show me a performance by Dempsey where you'd pick any Heavyweight before Ali in the FOTC to beat him.

The problem is his resume doesnt stand up to much scrutiny. He has some good wins pre title, Willard was not a great champion, especially at the time Dempsey fought him, and post title, ive already been through. So as destructive as he was, I dont rank him that highly because he lacks the resume to put him there. He's higher than Charles though, if that makes you feel better.

LMAO.

Dude, you're a good guy. I am not trying to beat you up here. It's jsut some ofthe stuff you're saying is really ridiculous, and clearly defies the evidence. If you watch the cleaned up versions of his fights you'll better appreciate his greatness.

Marciano was slow and sloppy. He made a lot of mistakes mostly because he could get away with them. He got away with them not simply due to his own talents, but his opponents' short-comings.

Walcott never met anyone with the insane speed, head-movement and combination punching of Dempsey. But still those lesser fighters beat him.

Gibbons was a helluva fighter, the best boxer-puncher Boxing had seen before Leonard and Tunney came of age but his power meant nothing. And he decided simply to try and survive using his famed defense. He still took a pelting which effectively ended his career.

While I definitely do dispute that Charles was post-prime, I don't dispute that he very much benefited from being a more modern fighter: Leonard, Tunney, Loughran, Wolgast, Pep - these are the fighters who pioneered skills Charles had access to and Dempsey did not.
But we see very clearly Charles wasn't a defensive maestro. Skilled, but not impervious to being hit, hurt and bullied.

He was more versatile and refined than Dempsey, but he was basically a poor man's Dempsey. And that's being gracious.

to the bold, sure he did, he fought Charles

Gibbons was undoubtedly great, but unlike Charles he never grew into being a proper HW. Charles would not be cowed as easily as Gibbons, he was big enough to hang with Dempsey and skilled enough to fight him in any range Dempsey fancies. Dempseys power and toughness definitely give anyone issues, but Charles in his prime at HW was more than capable of weathering that storm, he was a fghter through and through and tough as they come. He had much more depth to his ring iq than anything Ive seen from Dempsey, he adjusted better, he countered better, he threw more varied combinations, and defensively he was better too.

Id have liked to see more of Dempsey pre title, but I havent. The film Ive seen he doesnt look like he is as good as Charles, and his resume doesnt jump out at me as being that good where I can disregard what I see on film.

[Rusty Tromboni]

Charles didnt fight like Gibbons, though he could box at range like he did vs an old Louis as he was extremely versatile. The fights Ive seen, at HW, as thats what got filmed, he spent a lot of time on the front foot throwing drawing leads to counter, throwing aggressive combinations, and was extremely happy with his head buried in his opponents chest.

Charles is very much like Gibbons in that he's a boxer-puncher.

You're right, when he's on offense he looks more Dempsey.

If Marciano couldnt put a past prime Charles purely on the defensive, what makes us think that Dempsey would? Even if you pick Dempsey to win, I dont see the fight playing out like that.

Hahahaha!


Maybe the fact that Dempsey's a whole lot better than Marciano?

Do you pick Charles to also knock out Foreman? How about Fury?

Charles might be a little bit slippery, but Jack eventually finds him and puts him away.

[Rusty Tromboni]

You seriously overrate the importance of flash KDs if you think they were bad performances.

Now it's a FLASH knockdown?

Other than Walcott, who gave him hell, Braddock, Baer and Galento were completely and utterly destroyed. Beaten up and stopped. No two ways about it. Stop making **** up

Other than? So you admit fighters as limited as those men troubled him...

So how about an old Schmeling, who stopped him.

Farr, who took him the distance.

Godoy, who almost beat him.

I don't want to overly criticize Louis, that's not the point. The point is to illustrate other times where Joe really DID struggle with an opponent. Conn was by far the greatest fighter he fought, and any trouble he experienced was simply owed to that. There was nothing about Joe's performance that looked subpar. NOT perfectly dominant, but certainly not subpar.

You are going against Louis' words when you say that about the weight. Whether true or not idk, but it tallies exactly with the fight I saw, so Im inclined to believe it...

Louis stated that in order to stave off such talk he made the mistake of dehydrating himself prior to the fight so that could weigh in at less than 200 pounds. “I always use to lay off the day before a fight. But the last day I trained, dieted and drank as little water as possible. Chappie (his trainer Jack Blackburn) was mad as hell.” Joe’s sense of fairness left him critically drained as the fight progressed.

Oh wow, how about that. A fighter saying something to cover his ass... something - if not completely disproved by other available facts - completely uncorroborated.

Again, look at the fight, it don't add up. I can tell you from spending years cutting weight, a guy that big shouldn't struggle to shed 5 pounds - even an hour before the fight. Joe was in top form. Billy just didn't fold like he expected, and presented problems he was completely unprepared for.

Very few Light Heavyweights could do what Billy did that night, certainly not Ezzard Charles.

[Anthony342]

Charles didnt fight like Gibbons, though he could box at range like he did vs an old Louis as he was extremely versatile. The fights Ive seen, at HW, as thats what got filmed, he spent a lot of time on the front foot throwing drawing leads to counter, throwing aggressive combinations, and was extremely happy with his head buried in his opponents chest.

If Marciano couldnt put a past prime Charles purely on the defensive, what makes us think that Dempsey would? Even if you pick Dempsey to win, I dont see the fight playing out like that.

So there's no footage of Ezzard Charles at light heavy?

[Rusty Tromboni]

Conn fought Maxim?

I never aid that. Maybe Billeau did?

Green Conn? Conn had all his best days behind him when he fought Louis. What are you even talking about here? Was he robbed of his actual prime by war? Most likely. But in reality Billy Conn was as prime when Louis fought him as he ever was in the ring. All the good things you are saying about Conn are based on performances that happened pre Louis, yet he was green?Here's the thing as well, winning rounds off Louis wasn't the most impressive thing, you are overrating that as an achievement. Conn did brilliantly well to come through the early onslaught weighing what he did, and he boxed brilliantly like P4P great he is, but he wasnt the first or last fighter to take rounds off Louis before being stopped. While I absolutely accept Louis was done when Charles got to him, saying Conn had a better performance is ridiculous when Conn was stopped brutally, and Charles won a clear decision, outboxing and beating Louis up decisively.

Conn was only 23.

Where were Louis, Charles, Marciano, Moore and Walcott at 23? How about Liston? Ali? Holmes? If you want to keep it to Light Heavyweights, Foster was still getting KO'd at 26. Qawi wasn't even a professional at 23. Spinks was 29, and had 10 title defenses, before moving up to beat a FADED Larry Holmes.

And this is Boxing, where fighters are rushed along. When little Modric broke the Messi-Ronaldo monopoly on the Ballon D'Or he was 33! An age when men aren't supposed to still be playing Soccer. You can't play in the NFL without completing college. And Brees, Brady, Rogers - these are all elite QB's now hovering around 40. Some Baseball Pitchers don't really hit their stride until deep in their 30's. Just because a lot of Boxers burn out before legally old enough to rent a car doesn't mean that is how it HAS to happen or is supposed to happen.

Conn clearly had a lot of filling out to do. Although he was usually fighting under the Light Heavyweight limit, he was KO'ing Heavyweights in his build up to the Louis fight. There's a big jump in the performance against Louis from what we saw against Apostoli.

Louis won. Emphatically. No one is dis*****g that. But watching Louis at his best look very human is a remarkable thing. Especially when you're much smaller and not at your best. Charles wouldn't have fared much better than Braddock, if substituted for Conn. Put Conn in there, instead of Charles, and he scores that KO he was after in '41. He certainly doesn't run around with his tail between his legs.

That is really the crux of it. You all but explicitly admit Conn is clearly better than Charles, but try to create an angle for Charles based on his flopping-around there at Heavyweight for such an extended period of time.

I don't deny that the Conn we saw was a true Light Heavyweight, and Charles, at his best, a true Heavyweight. I don't deny that Charles had a longer tenure. But me running further than Usain Bolt doesn't make me FASTER than Usain Bolt, no matter how far I run. Like I asked, are Holyfield, Lewis and Wlad better than Foreman of the 70's? Not according to any Top 10 List I've seen.

Ali has a much deeper resume, Foreman closer but still would edge to Foreman. I do rank Holyfield over Frazier though, and Im not the only one. H2H its more tricky, Holy had a few ups and downs, but he absolutely hangs with all of them even if I wouldn't make him favourite.

Frazier beat Ali when Ali was at his absolute best. The called "The Greatest" and, traditionally, the Division's top-rated fighter, lost when at his greatest. And he lost to one Joe Frazier.

That doesn't include his destruction of: the guy Foreman didn't wanna fight, Jerry Quarry (one of the greatest come-from-behind victories ever), Mathis (the guy SUPPOSED to beat Ali), Chuvalo (so much for indestructible), Ellis and Bonavena (the rematch basically ended Bonavena's career).

Who did Holyfield beat?

When did Frazier struggle with fighters that troubled Holyfield?

I am not trying to go one ANOTHER tangent (conn vs, charles already is one), I'm illustrating how illustrious careers can consume more attention than better careers. Folks tend to conflate: longevity, notable names, and violent finishes with greatness. That's what happens when you try to say Charles was better at Heavyweight than Conn.