Dempsey's greatness.

As per the NY Times odds were 3-1 3 days prior to fight time. By fight time the odds were 7-1 as per the Ring record book from 1977. Why were the odds relatively close in a fight where everyone was aware as you claim that Miske was deathly sick and the fight was a well known joke? Why weren't the odds 50-1 or more?

In fact, Jack Kearns described the fight in 1963 as follows, “I had a feeling we might have been conned about Miske having been sick … Billy started throwing punches that were loaded with pure dynamite."

Looking through the NY Times archives I find no mention that the fight was considered a joke. I do find a few articles from other newspapers that mention Miske being bedridden the year before and one does greatly downplay the bout. I see plenty of articles mentioning Miske in training...looking "peppy" in sparring sessions wearing big headgear....very descriptive to be made up. Miske doing 10 miles of roadwork etc. There is a point a week or two before the bout where Miske stops training saying he was not feeling well but this was only for a short period vs the entire time training for the bout.

Again I am not debating if Miske was sick as he was and in fact died from the condition a few years later. The condition goes in remission and looking at his record after this bout, his weight which was perfect for him and the photos of him prior to the bout which show him lean and muscular I have always wondered just how sick he was?

Regarding Dempsey Wills here is what Dempsey wrote in 1963 as an old man with no great reason to lie about matters 40 years later...

“From the inception of boxing in this country it has been dominated by men who developed out of struggle with life. Our first real heavyweight champion, Tom Molyneaux, was born a slave in Virginia and won his freedom with his fistic talent. Fighting as a freedman in New York he beat all challengers and earned the right to be called the first American heavyweight champion.

All of the great old-time Negro boxers were born under poor and depressing circumstances but rose above their environments to win acclaim wherever they fought. Peter Jackson, Sam Langford, George Dixon, Joe Gans, the immortal “Old Master,” and Jack Johnson all knew what it felt like to be up against the wall and cornered. Their bitter experiences were reflected in their superb endurance and their toughness of spirit. Their early poverty showed itself in the way they handled themselves as men and boxers.

I am personally indebted to a number of Negro boxers who worked as my sparring partners in the years when I was learning how to handle myself in a ring. When I was fighting I had many Negro sparring partners at my training camp. One of these, Bill Tate, became one of my best friends. Now living in Chicago, Illinois, he is one of the finest men I have ever known. Then there was Panama Joe Gans, a great and clever fighter, who taught me a lot. The Jamaica Kid, a very fine heavyweight, worked with me before the famous 1919 fight with Jess Willard. The Kid did a lot to get me into the superb condition that enabled me to beat Willard and win the world’s championship.

Sam Langford, one of the greatest of all heavyweights, is another Negro fighter who showed me some tricks and gave me the benefits of his vast experience. I worked with Old Sam in Chicago when I was a youngster. I never forgot what Langford taught me. He was cool, clever, scientific and a terrific hitter besides a fine man.

Battling Gee and Battling Jim Johnson, both Negroes were also on my payroll as sparring mates. I was a pretty rough customer in those days and my sparring partners had to be good and tough to stay with me. All of these men more than made the grade.

Many times I’ve had the charge hurled at me that I was prejudiced against Negroes. It is time this utter fiction was laid to rest once and for all. All my life I have believed that all men are basically brothers and that differences of color and religion are superficial. I hate prejudice. I hate discrimination. I hate intolerance. Boxing has been guilty of its share of color bias but I categorically deny that I ever practiced it either as a fighter, manager or promoter. The several Negro fighters who have been under my management will testify to my long-held belief in equality of treatment for all men, regardless of color.

Since I am on the subject of the color line in boxing, let me clear the air of the many rumors and suspicions and charges that have been moving around me as a result of my failure to fight Harry Wills. I have never run away from a fight in my life. Ever since I left public school to work in the Colorado mines, my credo has been to fight all comers and may the best man win. Harry Wills was a great fighter in his prime and I would have liked to have been matched with him. But it was not to be. The reasons had nothing to do with color prejudice on my part (which I have never held), nor fear of Wills fighting skill. I wanted to fight Wills badly, but Tex Rickard, who had the final say, never matched us.

Rickard was a Texan. He had a rough time of it out in San Francisco, California, after the Johnson-Jeffries fight which he promoted in Reno. The repercussions of that fight swirled about Rick’s head for a long time after the fight and he was a victim of ugly charges and a wicked smear campaign. This experience soured him on mixed fights for the heavyweight crown. As a result he was never anxious to promote a match between Wills and myself.

The facts clearly show that in 1926 I tried desperately to arrange a fight with Harry Wills but the deal collapsed when my guarantee was not forthcoming. Wills and I had signed to fight with a promoter named Floyd Fitzsimmons of Benton Harbor, Michigan. Wills, I understand, received fifty thousand dollars as his guarantee for signing the contract. I was to have received one hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars in advance of the fight. As the date of the fight grew nearer and my money did not appear, I became anxious and asked Fitzsimmons what was the matter. He wired me to meet him in Dayton, Ohio, assuring me that he would have the money for me there. I met Fitzsimmons in Dayton who handed me a certified check for twenty-five thousand dollars and a promise to let me have the balance almost immediately. I balked at that, demanding the full amount right away. Fitzsimmons tried to placate me by calling the bank where he said he had deposited the money. The bank, unfortunately for Fitzsimmons, informed him that it did not have that much money on hand, that there wasn’t enough to cover the twenty-five thousand dollar check he had given me. Furious, I returned the check to Fitzsimmons and told him the fight was off. Later, the Fitzsimmons syndicate financing the fight sued me for failure to honor a contract. I won the case.

When the Wills fight failed to materialize, Tex Rickard jumped back into the picture and matched me with Gene Tunney. The rest is history. And that is the real story behind the negotiations for the Harry Wills fight which never came off. I am sorry Wills and I never got a chance to square off in the ring. I am sure it would have been one beautiful scrap.”

 

.
Isn't more logical to believe that YES Billy Miske had Bright's disease, but
it was in remission at that time, for the fact Miske won about 20 bouts right after Dempsey ko'd him Sept 1920 in 3 rds ? Why can't the combination of Billy Miske In "remission ", and the tremendous fighting offense of Jack Dempsey during this period be the deciding factor ? After all , Dempsey at this period of time
also kod Battling Levinsky ,who was never kod before in over 150 bouts,
Jess Willard, Bill Brennan, Gunboat Smith, and one chap by the name of
Fred Fulton in 0.23 of the first round...A little background on Fred Fulton.
Fulton at 6ft6" was on a roll before he met Dempsey. Fulton kod such
fighters as Jim Flynn, Tom Cowler twice, Charley Weinert, and Fred Fulton,
at that time...? And let us not forget that the 6ft6" Fulton stopped Sam Langford in 7 rounds. Langford had to go to a hospital so badly was his mouth cut...
So let me quote a report of the Jack Dempsey ko of Fred Fulton in July 1918.--- "Dempsey rushed the 6ft6" Fulton at the bell, got inside, and hammered Fulton with a right under the heart, and a left to the belly of Fulton, who floundered and Dempsey stepped back, then hooked a left
to the giant's head and a terrific right to the point of the chin. Fulton
tottered and fell sideways, his head resting on his right arm. Fulton tried to get up, but collapsed and had to be dragged back to his corner.
Time : 0.23 of the first round "... Ringside reporters were amazed by the
power and speed of the Dempsey attack...Too damn bad we have no film of the Dempsey of this period and Fulton ko ! He was a tiger then who combined pantherlike speed for a heavyweight, combined with immense two handed power, and was the roughest infighter ever...Yes he did not fight often, BUT not less often than most of his predecessor's before him...
Yes he went Hollywood when he was in his prime, but Dempsey unlike a MW Greb, a Benny Leonard, and other smaller men made a fortune of money in a couple of fights ALLOWING him to enjoy the fruits of his labor
and band silent screen flappers...Who amongst us would
have done differently ? Not me...In those harsh times boxers fought for the money, plain and simple...Give the man his due I say ! A hell of a
pure ferocious fighter at his best, much like his smaller counterpart
Roberto Duran, sans the "no Mas "...cheers...

as there were no food stamps to take care of their family...

 

Of course I meant "bang "the silent screen flappers".

 

H, thank you for finding this article...I had read this piece by Dempsey
years ago but could never relocate it....Now I hope the target finally get's off of Jack Dempsey's back. He was a decent man whose legacy deserves
better...:good:good:good

 

And once you again you refuse to answer the question. You are as good at ducking the obvious as Dempsey was at ducking Wills. Its easy to see why you admire him so much. So basically, by refusing to answer a simple question I posed you admit that Miske was a joke as a contender.

As for the other quotes you pose. The only ones that are contemporary are from the New York Times, which SURPRISE, didnt send a correspondent to the camps. I quoted correspondents who were actually there and could be picked out by name. I will take all of that over something written 33 years later. But please, feel free to continue.

 

The original point someone was trying to make was that Dempsey was an inactive champion. I pointed out correctly that Dempsey was as active more or less than any hwt champion aside from Burns up until Louis. it's then that you changed the subject focusing in on Miske. So it's you not me ignoring the topic and shifting the discussion away from what was being discussed.

Again Dempsey was as active as most all champions 1880s to 1937. If you want to contend Miske was a soft touch that's fine but there is data, lots of it, that says he was not as sick as some thought. There is no issue when a champion fights a soft touch...every hwt champion did so that held the title any length of time. Kearns as I posted thought they were being conned about Miske being sick the way Billy was fighting the first two rounds. Again there is no doubt he was sick but it's no way a stretch to think based on some of the data that he was in remission at the time of the fight.

Here is a newspaper report prior to the bout. Miske seems in good shape.

September 4, 1920 – Beloit Daily News
Dempsey To Get Stiff Go When He Meets Miske
St. Paul Heavyweight Confident He Can Last Bout With Champ
Has Hopes That Luck Will Break For Him And Return New Belt Holder – If Fit
Benton Harbor, Mich., Sept. 4 – Billy Miske didn’t come to Benton Harbor to take a licking and pick off the loser’s end of a purse.
Lurking in his head is the glimmering hope that he may knock himself into a title on Labor Day. He is confident of staying the 10 rounds with Jack Dempsey because he has done so twice before, once at St. Paul and the other time at Philadelphia. That was back in 1918.
As is the case with all contenders who meet champions, he is taking a gambling chance that at some moment in the fight his big opportunity will come and the dope will be reversed in his favor.
His two lessons from Dempsey have given him confidence, for the stood the gaff in both – a thing that few others have done.
Miske’s new found health is the chief buzz of conversation at his training stand. The camp is located three-quarters of a mile up the road from the battle arena where Dempsey is banging away at Bill Tate and “Panama” Joe Gans. It is the same layout where champion Benny Leonard prepared for his fight with Charley White.
Ike Berstein, Miske’s trainer, is in charge. There is a splendidly equipped gym. The ring is staked off beneath the shade of thickly follaged trees, for which Michigan is famous.
There is a whole flock of sparring partners there to work on, but none of them hardly measure up to the mark. Jack Heinen, an ex-gob and the biggest of the lot, usually gets floored two or three times daily. Heinen was in Willard’s camp at Toledo and he has boxed Jack Johnson. He says that Miske is the new Stanley Ketchel with the combined punch of Jack Johnson and Jess Willard.
Miske made a good appearance in his workouts. Wearing a padded headgear he bounces into the ring like a lightweight and begins to sock. If he fights that way on Labor Day Dempsey is going to be both surprised and pleased. The champion has it figured out that Miske is going to “pull and haul” when the Labor Day dingdong comes off.
Miske is the picture of health now. He has had a slight kink in his spine since boyhood. It has handicapped his ring career in the past. Recently St. Paul specialists jiggled the troublesome misplaced cartilage back into is normal position.
“Billy hasn’t really grown then as some have believed,” says Jack Reddy, Miske’s manager. “He is now able to stand erect and it has increased his stature about an inch. Also he has gained about 20 pounds in weight. He is a living testimony of the chiropractic treatment for spinal trouble.”
When Miske boxed Dempsey at St. Paul he weighed 175 pounds and 176 ½ at Philadelphia. Ther eis no question but that the Miske of two years ago and the Miske of today are very different individuals.
He does not deny that he begged out of the proposed war benefit bout in New York City during the war.
“I was sick at the time” he says, “and knew that Dempsey would certainly knock me out. It would have hurt my entire career as a boxer and I felt that I was justified in not going on with him at that time. It’s different now. I did not come to Benton Harbor to get licked.”
Miske smiled as he thought of all the things that a crown would mean to him.
He’ll have his supporters when he climbs in the ring on Labor Day. His friends dope it that he is a new Miske, that he has stayed on his feet twice against the Salt Lake slammer and that the long layoff of the champion is in the favor of the contender.
Most of the bookings will be stay bets and various forms of wagers on a knockout. None would hardly take the hazard that the title will change hands.
Miske and his friends to not think he is going to be toppled on Labor Day.



Blair’s account of the fight:
“The first round saw Miske moving fast and sticking his jab in Dempsey’s face, while Jack went right to work on Billy’s midsection to slow Miske down. It worked alright as the body punches hurt Billy badly, slowing him up and weakening him.
As the second round started, Billy knew he wouldn’t be able to battle Dempsey over a long route so he threw caution to the wind. He came out throwing some heavy leather at Dempsey. Miske’s reckless attack surprised Jack and he fought back viciously, anf for half of the round it was a war. As the two separated from a clinch, Miske scored with a solid right that stunned the champion. Dempsey came back with a terrific right under Miske’s heart, and down went Billy, but he managed to struggle to his feet and made a valiant effort to hold off the charging Dempsey. He somehow finished the round.
Jack came out for the third round bent on a knockout, however, Miske made one last try. A sharp left hook landed flush on Dempsey’s jaw, stopping his forward progress. Jack was like a wounded tiger as a succession of lefts and rights landed on a defenseless Miske who was on the ropes, hurt and dazed. As referee Dougherty tried to get between the two, Dempsey lashed out with a sharp right to Billy’s head. Miske went limply to the canvas where Dougherty counted him out.
Suddenly Dempsey, the scowling animal, felt compassion for the prone Billy Miske. Dempsey reached down and helped get Billy to his corner where he stayed until Miske recovered and was able to leave the ring on his own. The fight had drawn 15,000 fans who paid a gate of $134,904.
Miske received a purse of $25,000 for the fight, but it didn’t last long once Billy got home and paid off several overdue bills.”

Finally the NY Times like many major newspapers used local reporters to write some articles. That does not mean the articles contain false info.

 

Not really true. Jeffries was getting lots of slack especially from the police gazette as well as other publications for not facing the up and coming black challengers. As per Fleischer in his book 50 years at ringside...."this is the real reason Jeffries retired".

Once again here are Dempseys own words that indeed correspond to the facts......he himself tried to make the fight happen even though it was not his job to do so.

“From the inception of boxing in this country it has been dominated by men who developed out of struggle with life. Our first real heavyweight champion, Tom Molyneaux, was born a slave in Virginia and won his freedom with his fistic talent. Fighting as a freedman in New York he beat all challengers and earned the right to be called the first American heavyweight champion.

All of the great old-time Negro boxers were born under poor and depressing circumstances but rose above their environments to win acclaim wherever they fought. Peter Jackson, Sam Langford, George Dixon, Joe Gans, the immortal “Old Master,” and Jack Johnson all knew what it felt like to be up against the wall and cornered. Their bitter experiences were reflected in their superb endurance and their toughness of spirit. Their early poverty showed itself in the way they handled themselves as men and boxers.

I am personally indebted to a number of Negro boxers who worked as my sparring partners in the years when I was learning how to handle myself in a ring. When I was fighting I had many Negro sparring partners at my training camp. One of these, Bill Tate, became one of my best friends. Now living in Chicago, Illinois, he is one of the finest men I have ever known. Then there was Panama Joe Gans, a great and clever fighter, who taught me a lot. The Jamaica Kid, a very fine heavyweight, worked with me before the famous 1919 fight with Jess Willard. The Kid did a lot to get me into the superb condition that enabled me to beat Willard and win the world’s championship.

Sam Langford, one of the greatest of all heavyweights, is another Negro fighter who showed me some tricks and gave me the benefits of his vast experience. I worked with Old Sam in Chicago when I was a youngster. I never forgot what Langford taught me. He was cool, clever, scientific and a terrific hitter besides a fine man.

Battling Gee and Battling Jim Johnson, both Negroes were also on my payroll as sparring mates. I was a pretty rough customer in those days and my sparring partners had to be good and tough to stay with me. All of these men more than made the grade.

Many times I’ve had the charge hurled at me that I was prejudiced against Negroes. It is time this utter fiction was laid to rest once and for all. All my life I have believed that all men are basically brothers and that differences of color and religion are superficial. I hate prejudice. I hate discrimination. I hate intolerance. Boxing has been guilty of its share of color bias but I categorically deny that I ever practiced it either as a fighter, manager or promoter. The several Negro fighters who have been under my management will testify to my long-held belief in equality of treatment for all men, regardless of color.

Since I am on the subject of the color line in boxing, let me clear the air of the many rumors and suspicions and charges that have been moving around me as a result of my failure to fight Harry Wills. I have never run away from a fight in my life. Ever since I left public school to work in the Colorado mines, my credo has been to fight all comers and may the best man win. Harry Wills was a great fighter in his prime and I would have liked to have been matched with him. But it was not to be. The reasons had nothing to do with color prejudice on my part (which I have never held), nor fear of Wills fighting skill. I wanted to fight Wills badly, but Tex Rickard, who had the final say, never matched us.

Rickard was a Texan. He had a rough time of it out in San Francisco, California, after the Johnson-Jeffries fight which he promoted in Reno. The repercussions of that fight swirled about Rick’s head for a long time after the fight and he was a victim of ugly charges and a wicked smear campaign. This experience soured him on mixed fights for the heavyweight crown. As a result he was never anxious to promote a match between Wills and myself.

The facts clearly show that in 1926 I tried desperately to arrange a fight with Harry Wills but the deal collapsed when my guarantee was not forthcoming. Wills and I had signed to fight with a promoter named Floyd Fitzsimmons of Benton Harbor, Michigan. Wills, I understand, received fifty thousand dollars as his guarantee for signing the contract. I was to have received one hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars in advance of the fight. As the date of the fight grew nearer and my money did not appear, I became anxious and asked Fitzsimmons what was the matter. He wired me to meet him in Dayton, Ohio, assuring me that he would have the money for me there. I met Fitzsimmons in Dayton who handed me a certified check for twenty-five thousand dollars and a promise to let me have the balance almost immediately. I balked at that, demanding the full amount right away. Fitzsimmons tried to placate me by calling the bank where he said he had deposited the money. The bank, unfortunately for Fitzsimmons, informed him that it did not have that much money on hand, that there wasn’t enough to cover the twenty-five thousand dollar check he had given me. Furious, I returned the check to Fitzsimmons and told him the fight was off. Later, the Fitzsimmons syndicate financing the fight sued me for failure to honor a contract. I won the case.

When the Wills fight failed to materialize, Tex Rickard jumped back into the picture and matched me with Gene Tunney. The rest is history. And that is the real story behind the negotiations for the Harry Wills fight which never came off. I am sorry Wills and I never got a chance to square off in the ring. I am sure it would have been one beautiful scrap.”

 

Look, if you want to duck your head in the sand and refute what Miske's own family, Dempsey, and several reputable sources who were there on the ground say, fine. Be my guest. But when Dickerson, who was there as a referee and knew both men, writes the following day: "A lamb was led to the slaughter and he died game. That was all. Miske has been a sick man for a year or two and he needed the money. His friend Jack Dempsey, gave him the opportunity to get in on something and what the loser received today is going to be quite a lot." In describing Miske Dickerson wrote: "Miske looked anything but a well man, his skin being of a sickly pallor."

Well, thats pretty inflammatory and pretty prophetic as well. I guess he just got lucky hitting the nail square on the head several years before that same story actually became common place.

But go on. Ignore it. Like I said. It doesnt matter. Outside of the fact that he was dying Miske had never done anything to prove he was a contender at heavyweight. At light heavyweight he had lost his most recent matches to the best fighters he fought so he wasnt even a good contender there. But that's ok. You explain away why Dempsey gets a pass for his abysmal championship defenses while ignoring his two biggest threats.

You can quote Dempsey all you want. Ive seen him tell several different versions of why he failed to fight Wills and Greb, none of them match the facts. He can claim he had no racial bias. I can show where he drew the color line several times before and after he won the championship. He can claim he was actively trying to face Wills. I can show where his own secretary stated that the scenario he recites was a ruse to appease the New York State Athletic Commission and enlisted the help of his close friend Fitzsimmons in the act. I can also show where Fitzsimmons' , despite Dempsey's feigned enmity toward him immediately after this, stayed with Dempsey for a week in Los Angeles just shortly afterwards. He says that it was only after the Wills fight failed that Rickard brought Tunney about. I can show court testimony by Tunney himself which proves that Dempsey and Tunney were already heavily involved in negotiations for their fight BEFORE the Fitzsimmons "offer" and had signed in principle for the fight while Wills was still being strung along by Dempsey. Those are the facts that have never been written about and that Dempsey stumbles over. The same infallible Dempsey who said no promoter ever offered him a fight with Greb (a lie) and that he never sparred with Greb in New York (a lie) and so on and so forth. I find it funny that every fighter out there always tells his story in a manner that best suits himself, most fans know this, but for some reason Dempsey's own words on the situation, taken years later, seem to be his defenders last ditch defense. A sorry defense indeed. Do you think Harry Wills and Paddy Mullins might have a different take on the events? They did I assure you. But that doesnt jive with your vision of the Dempsey myth so lets ignore that right?

 

Jack Dempsey.

thats my opinion. Jack Dempsey.

 

Think what your saying Mc. If Billy Miske wasn't in remission about the time he was kod by Dempsey in September, 1920, how the hell did he win
about TWENTY fights in a row , beating a fit Bill Brennan, Charley Weinert
Jack Renault, and other fighters during this stretch ? It is completely
logical to assume he was not at "death's door " during this time. Is it not
?. It seems that any positive feat that Jack Dempsey ever attained in the ring, HAS to be 'tainted", by some [not you] on ESB...Even when he decapitates a Fred Fulton in.023 seconds of the first round, though Fulton
stopped Sam Langford in 7rds about that time, Dempsey get's no respect...Is it possible that Jack Dempsey never died ? He became
Rodney Dangerfield ? NO RESPECT...:hi:

 

With any historical event ...any....anyone can find snippets that seem to show an opposing view. Writers search to find that one snippet every day in an effort to write a book that turns already well known events on their head. Result is completely historically inaccurate...but it sells books. For 90 years the facts have been well known concerning Dempsey and Wills and no new info has been generated that would alter the mountain of evidence that's well understood and documented. Dempsey has been completely exonerated regarding ducking Wills. All historians worth their salt know this as fact....unless they are trying to sell a book that is.

 

So if Miske wasnt sick why were so many people saying he was? Why was his skin color said to be bad? Why the level headed reporters saying that the ballyhoo for Miske was out of control? Why the reports that the fight was a mismatch with Miske having no chance? Why did Miske feel the need to spend the entire promotion discussing his health? Where theres smoke...