If Wills Had Fought Tunney?

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Well, yes and no. Of course size can make a difference. If both fightes are of the same quality and at the same/similar stage in their careers the smallest advantages can make the difference. Weight place a role there. Of course. It doesn´t however when a you compare an average fighter to an excellent one. Or, in this case, an excellent fighter in the midth of his prime against an excellent fighter who was past it. Or at least not much.
My poblem with the whole thing is that there are many people who think that´s THE most important factor, see Mendoza or in the current Louis-thread mr.magoo to a certain extent. As if the size of a fighter is more important than his quality. Size is just one of many factors that can add to the quality of a fighter. Not the most important one, not the most un-important one. Just one of many.
Also people always just look at the benefits of size but never on the throwbacks - at the hws. The bigger you are the worse you coordination will be, the worse your stamina will be, you´ll be slower and so on. Fighters like Lewis and Wlad are so outstanding because they are exceptions to the rule. Because while they suffer fom those limitations they do less than other big men and make up for it with other qualities. But you know that already anyway.
And then you have today´s big hws - weight-wise - who actually aren´t that big. Sorry but 20 pounds of fat or even muscle are not necessarily an advantage.

We neither have a proof for the opposite. It´s unknown territory and as such IMO not a worthy argument. It´s as much speculation saying he can´t deal with it as saying he can. Both is equally right and wrong. We can´t know and thus it isn´t much worth as an argument.

 

The rest I pretty much agree with but I'll respond to this:

By the same logic we might say for example that Henry Armstrong would not have a problem with Billy Conn's size because he never fought a light heavyweight so we do not know whether fighting one would have been detrimental to his chances.

We should know that giving away weight to a bigger man who also has skill is a disadvantage. It would be logical to assume that a size disadvantage could take away from a fighter's effectiveness unless the fighter in question has proven that he can take on bigger opponents without suffering from any ill-effects.

Tunney throughout his career fought opponents his size or smaller. We have no idea how he would deal with Wills in the clinches nor if he could take his punch. A boxing career in retrospect is all about proving your abilities against all comers, and in Tunney's case he did not prove his ability against bigger opponents.

 

I think that even with no film, it would be obvious to schollars of the era that Ruiz benefited from a lot of questionable decisions.

In fact he is a prime example of a fighter that a skilled historian could pick apart based on newspaper clippings.

 

This.

 

That´s not what I said. I said we don´t know that´s why it´s speculation and thus not a good argument.
In this case, what´s next Canto against Ali? It´s common sense that I´m talking about reasonable match-ups, i.e. fighters who fought in the same weight-class.

Not necessarily, you can compansate this "disadvantage" or even turn it into an advantage, see Marciano. I don´t agree that beeing smaller is a disadvantage from the get go.

He could take Dempsey´s punches and even so he was past it, power is the last thing to go. I think it´s save to assume he could take Wills punches. Tunney was never one to stay long in clinches and could avoid them pretty well, Wills was also rather slow on his feet, especially this version, I think Tunney would do pretty well not getting into clinches in the fist place.

 

The example I used was an exaggeration but only for the purposes of pointing out the flaws of the logic used.

The heavyweight division used to be 175+ lb and above which covers a lot of weight and Tunney did not take on any 200 lbers. It makes sense to question his ability to fight an opponent of that size when he never proved he could.

Marciano did not exactly face many weight disadvantages himself though, did he? I would point out Harry Greb here, but he was not necessarily willing to face Wills or Fulton.

Tunney was able to avoid Dempsey's punches except for one occasion when he was nearly flattened. He was tough and game but I think we could say that his chin was not invulnerable based on that event.

I have little doubt that Tunney would beat Wills by 1927, he has a horrible style for an older guy to fight against, but I'm speculating a possible prime match-up which is far more interesting. Wills was able to make it a rough contest with everyone he fought and it's very possible that he would spoil Tunney's boxing attempts. In the clinches, his size advantage would tell.

As for a 1926 match-up, I would say the factor of age would overshadow any other advantages Wills may have had over Tunney in his prime.

 

It makes sense to question it but its not a good argument to come to the conclusion that he can´t and count it as an advantage for Wills though. IMO.

Enough to say that he could compensate the disadvantage and even turn into into an advantage.

His chin was dentable but I think it would need someone like Louis, Tyson, prime Dempsey to knock him out. Someone who lands fast combinations repeatedly. I don´t think one shot would do the trick and I don´t think Wills is the man to do that either.

Prime for prime would be quite interesting. I think their feet would decide that one more than their size though. Agree with the 1926/7 thing.

 

We wouldn't be so adamant about Tunney having to avoid Wills's clinch if Wills was 6 feet tall and weighed 185 pounds though.

 

Depends on how good that Wills would be in the clinches/short range. If he was like Dempsey or Joe Louis he Tunney should avoid beeing there as well

 

Wills was still going strong in his early 30s. He was 37 when he finally lost.

We can see on film that Langford was very competent against Jeannette in their 10th fight. His series with Wills began a few months after this fight. Up until 1917 or 1918 I would call Langford a legitimate contender at heavyweight.

Jeannette was not a big win. Wills also beat Fred Fulton, Luis Firpo and Charley Weinert among others. I'd say he has a fair track record of beating opponents of his size along with smaller, quicker opponents. Tunney would probably represent the most difficult match-up for him though.

He KO'd Kid Norfolk with what he called a "six-inch punch" from the clinch.

It's tough to say without any film on the man though in his prime.

 

Size is irrelevant Bowe beat Holyfield on pure skill and being in great shape............

Partly true, Ruiz isn't historically as impressive resume wise and had close fights but not flat out robberies, in fact the Chagaev/Valuev fights could have gone his way.

However I'm still not 100% convinced Wills is better than Ruiz, I'm also not convinced he isn't light years better and the equal of Ali. Without film I can't make such a judgement. That's why I always laugh at people trying to analyse him

 

http://www.britishpathe.com/record.php?id=21124

Wills in training.