Why Is SRR Commonly Ranked Ahead of Harry Greb?

I'd rank Greb as the GOAT, but like someone mentioned.. little exposure means he doesn't get the merits he deserves.

His resume is ridiculous.

P4P
1. Greb
2. SRR
3. Langford

 

Surf, what weight did Tolstoy fight at ?

 

Really, you're gonna put Greb ahead of Jesus?

 

Never claimed you were a wimp, but go ahead and rate a fighter you've never even seen OVER the P4P GOAT.

 

All we can glance at is the training footage of him. The End.

 

This idea that Robinson never beat convincingly a strong middleweight is just wrong. He stopped Lamotta in 13, (amazing), stopped Graziano in three, Graziano is not all-time great but he was a rough and rugged as they come, He stopped Fulmer with one shot in 6, and I think he deserved the draw and possibly the first match. Some of this after his first retirement.

I believe Greb is the epitome of GREAT. I have him second on my list, and if someone wants to rank him ahead of Robinson go ahead but, lets not get carried away. Robinson as a welter or a middleweight was as tough as an opponent as you are ever going to get. If he struggled with them you can believe that that fighter was a solid, solid fighter.

BTW, his MW opponents struggled much, much, more with him than the other way around. I think Greb would have his hand very full with the Robinson that beat Lamotta as a welter and as a MW.

 

Bottom line: SRR fired the imagination (the intangible -- the star quality -- that you either have or ya don't) Greb (mean as a junkyard dog,though he may have been) didn't.

 

I think you misunderstand me. Of course he beat MWs convincingly. But he always struggled with them, whether he was prime or just past it and whether the MW was great or just good. He wasn't the dominant fighter at MW that he was at WW.

Rough, yes. Rugged? Against all the little welterweights he picked on, yes. If you look at the top 10 ranking MWs of the era you'll see that Rocky avoided ALL of them for his undeserved title shot at Zale. Perhaps his management knew something regarding how well Graziano's "ruggedness" would stand up against a ranking MW, eh?

Personally, I'm not in the least bit impressed with SRR's victory over Graziano. The Rock was overrated and SRR showed why, imo.

I agree with all of that. SRR is no walk in the park for any MW. :good

 

Thank you Surf for the helping me understand your perspective a little better. We are squared away. Please allow me to have one last elaboration.

Graziano.

As far as Graziano is concerned (thank you for giving me a opening to talk about him a little). I have a special place in my heart for this fighter after reading is laugh-out-loud, page turning book.

Now look, I have no problem believing that if he were alive fighting in Bernard Hopkins middleweight era he would have gone through them all, most by KO. He would have been outpointed by Hopkins, and maybe some random fighter along the way but, overall I think he would have been a hard man to beat in ANY era, including Greb's.

I don't believe for one moment that East Side, NYC Rocky was scared of anyone. His management might have decided that he shouldn't fight this or that guy because of style issues, but this is same guy who did all of those crazy things, and did time all throughout his life for taking on every street fight that came his way, on top of growing up in that hard-knock-life time period, I have a hard time believing that on his own accord he would duck any fighter including Lamotta, whom I heard he was scared of.

Reading his book, I got the impression that he simply did not take boxing serious. If that is true, then it is a shame to wonder what would have occured if he did take it serious.

Getting in the ring with Robinson at the end of your career is crazy-brave enough for me to give him credit for the fighter he missed, and his win against Zale may not have been deserved but, he KO'ed him in 6 away after taking a reported beating the whole fight. I know this is not pre-war Zale but still Graziano took the title like a challenger is susposed to.

Hopefully this doesn't come off as a rant. This is more so looking to get into little more conversation about Graziano. John G, thanks for chimming in earlier, if you or Burt have any thoughts I/we would love to hear them. Beside being a great fighter, I think he was an all-time great American personallity.

Thanks,
J

 

I think that Greb's fans like that there is no footage of him. They imagine him as some sort of superman and if footage showed up of him struggling with opponents, sweating, or even cut their iron man fantasy gets taken down a notch. Of course, they'd probably switch their allegiance then to someone else with no footage and champion that cause.

 

hyaJLP...Had to answer your post on Rocky Graziano who holds a special place in the boxing pantheon for me...I saw Rocky from his 4 round prelim days when he was a snarling rockem-sockem street fighter til the time he fought the faded Tony Zale in 1946...After the 3 wars between Zale and Graziano, Rocky was never the same....NEVER. But til this day he remains
to me the most exciting colourful fighter I ever saw...Bar none...cheers...

 

He wouldn't look that good on film. He wasn't as picturesquely eye catching as Robinson, and the motion picture technology of the day wasn't advanced enough to capture the subtle nuances of guys like him and Jack Johnson. We'd still be relying most on eyewitness and opponent accounts for the primary information about Greb. As active a perpetual motion machine as he could be, discerning clean scoring would likely be difficult on early and mid 1920s film.

Even Robinson, in his earliest extant television footage, could not be clearly seen by viewers at home to be ravaging Bobby Dykes on the inside during early action like he actually was, and the announcer had to express that "cannonading" to those viewers who weren't able to clearly see it on their screens. Infighting simply doesn't look as good as stylish jabbing and movement on more primitive footage, let alone hand operated movie cameras. Harry didn't typically produce eye catching knockdowns and knockouts, although he had that ability against the right opponent. He wasn't a stylish outside cutie, although he apparently was capable of producing that kind of boxing when the situation suited that approach.

Harry's two middleweight title wins over Johnny Wilson were not scintillating action packed performances by Greb's standards. His objective was to win and retain the title, not entertain the crowd by risking a loss [especially via DQ or deduction penaties]. When he met Wilson a third time over ten rounds, without that championship on the line, they combined for an entertaining battle. As a title challenger or defending champion, Harry appears to have applied a measure of conservatism different from his abandon in most outings.

 

Thanks Burt. I appreciate that. Rocky's book should be read by any fan of NYC boxers with a sense of humor. This guy was nuts, in the good and bad way.

The Rock

 

Great stuff!! :good

And I agree that Rocky feared no one. His management? That's another story. I'll let their record of contender circumvention speak for itself. But Graziano was a fun fighter who brought a ton of excitement to boxing. Of that there is no doubt.