Sam Langford discusses his Jack Johnson fight and ducking

Neither Langford or Johnson weighed in for their fight so weights were estimated on the fighters word.

Langford gave a very dramatic account of their exhibition bout after their real fight. It does not jive with any accounts of it that others have written .Reports state Johnson was careful to direct his blows away from Langford's damaged eye.
Langford had them both punching all out, trying to put each other lights out.
Accounts of their real fight did not give Langford a round and state he just tried to stay the distance in the later rounds to save his friends money.

Johnson dropped him twice for long 9 counts and cut his face and nose.
Those who saw it praised Langford for absorbing such a beating but none gave him any thing in the way of points. Adam has good material on it in his excellent new Johnson book. After Johnson took the title from Burns, Langford's name was thrown out as a possible challenger.
Langford's manager Joe Woodman replied.that they were chiefly trying to obtain a middleweight championship fight with Stanley Ketchel, whom Sam most wanted to fight.
Woodman said "Langford wants to be the middleweight champion of the world, and a little later it will be time enough to talk business with Johnson or any heavyweight in the business".
"We want to whip Stanley Ketchel acquire the middleweight title and go after the big boys higher up in the division."
Hence the Langford team showed no eagerness to fight Johnson despite the fact that both parties previously had signed to fight in London.
This is from Adam Pollack's brilliant ," In The Ring With Jack Johnson Part One. The Rise" Highly recommended.

 

It's interesting Johnson was 190 for this fight but fought most others in this period in the 180 range ... I think the weight difference has been made out of proportion by many ... I'd guess Langford was between 160 and 165 and Johnson was between 180 and 185 or so ..

 

I guess we will never know for sure.Unarguably Johnson had a size advantage, [though not an experience one.]
Unlike a certain unbeaten heavyweight champion that preceded him ,who always met bigger men.:hey

 

There's no way that Langford was as much as 160-165 when he fought Johnson in 1906.

Sam not only would have been trying to help his friends who had bet on him not being knocked out by Johnson in that fight win money but he and Johnson reportedly had a $500 side bet on that which Sam said he won as a result of Johnson's failure to knock him out.

I haven't read Adam's book yet but Langford and Woodman clearly expected Johnson to return to London to fight Sam after his title contest with Burns, win or lose. I find it hard to believe you would go down this path again. They'd agreed to fight at the National Athletic Club prior to Johnson's fight with Burns and the contest was postponed once the opportunity arose for Johnson to fight Burns in Australia. I'll have to read what Adam has written on this subject but all the research I did on this subject pointed to the fact that Langford and Woodman wanted that fight against Johnson in London and expected that it would take place based on Johnson's agreement with the National Sporting Club. To say that the Langford team had no eagerness to fight Johnson after he'd defeated Burns is way off base.

 

You seem unduly protective of Langford.Not to say combative towards me. In several posts and threads I've readily agreed he was head and shoulders above McVey and Jeannette and clearly the standout challenger during Johnson's reign.

It is you who are", going down that path again ," repeating what is common knowledge, ie that Johnson and Langford had signed to fight at the NSC,[ something I wrote in the post you are now attacking].
There has been no attempt to state otherwise.


I have merely repeated what Adam says in his book and included his quotes from Woodman.
I made it clear they were extracts and quotes from Adam' sbook , no attempt has been made to imply anything that is untrue.
Quotes that perhaps you didn't find?

Perhaps you should read the book before attacking me?

Otherwise you are like a censor asking for a film to be banned without having seen it.

My advice is keep your powder dry until you have a target to fire at.
In this instance you do not.
Adam says ," Langford probably weighed around 156-160lbs,Johnson likely outweighed Langford anywhere from 25-35lbs.Some secondary sources report Johnson was 185pounds though he could have been even heavier."
Adam states that 21 days earlier Langford had given about 30lbs to Joe Jeannette and punished him, dropping him in the 7th rd,and making a punching bag of him in the last round.
I look forward to your reply.
ps Getting your Langford book this year.

Below George Clarke's take on it .


"I don’t have time for little guys like Walcott. I marry pretty dressmaker Martha who loves muscles getting bigger on my long arms and notices people often get nervous when I take off my shirt. You’re the biggest five-foot-seven man I’ve ever seen, many tell me. Damn right. I’m ready to punch heavyweights in the face. In 1906 I’m still only a middleweight but not afraid of big smoke Jack Johnson, the colored heavyweight champion. I don’t mind Johnson’s six inches taller, has a foot more reach, and is thirty pounds heavier. I go right after him but catch jabs and crosses to the face. I’m still determined to get inside and punish his body. In the sixth he decks me with a right uppercut. I get up but go down again. One eye’s closed and my face is swelling. A left floors me in the eighth and so does a combination. Johnson presses to finish me. He’s bet five hundred bucks to my two-fifty he can. Instead, I hurt him with a left hook to the body in the ninth and the jaw in the tenth. My other eye’s closing now, my nose’s bleeding, and still I’m chasing that big smoke. "

 

Blegh... George Clarke's stories are the most tedious boxing FICTION I have ever read.

 

Well, I guess there are times I feel as though I need to be protective of Langford's legacy. In this particular thread you wrote that the Langford team showed no eagerness to fight Johnson despite the fact that both parties had signed to fight in London.

I maintain that is absolutely false and that they had every desire to fight Johnson in London after he'd defeated Burns. That is the path that I was referring to we've been down before in a number of other threads. The problem I have with this particular thread and what you posted is that if some poor individual comes along and reads this thread by itself they might actually accept the above statement as fact.

I will go and read that section of Adam's book just as soon as I can make the time later today.

Did I understand you last post correctly? You wrote "ps Getting your Langford book this year."

You haven't read my book on Langford yet? Is that true?

I have a lot of respect for Adam's work. But, I was disappointed to see that my book on Langford isn't listed in the bibliography for his Johnson book. It makes me wonder if he read my own rearch on the subjects related to Johnson and Langford. I messaged him separately recently to question why he chose to write that Sam was a 23-year-old fighter at the time he fought Johnson in 1906. Adam told me he did that on the basis that Boxrec listed Sam's birthdate as 1883. There is a lot of material in my book that was used to explain why I believed his birthdate was really 1886, including the fact that his brother Walter was born in 1883, the year Sam would have had to be born in to be 23 at the time he fought Johnson.

More recently, I posted that I received a copy of a census dated 1891 that listed Sam as a six year old and explained that while some of these censuses have been proven to be inaccurate at times it's also possible that Sam could have been born in 1885. At this point in time, I believe either 1886 or 1885 is the true year of his birth.

I don't go into this particular issue concerning the year of his birth for the purpose of entering into further debate about his age at the time he fought Johnson but express a concern. When I came across that particular sentence in Adam's book I couldn't help but wonder how many individuals will read that and incorrectly accept as fact that Sam was 23 years old when he fought Johnson.

It wouldn't surprise me at all to learn that Woodman did issue a quote somwhere along the lines to the effect of what you shared from Adam's book about Ketchel being their primary target. I can easily imagine a reason for doing so as there were many times they were trying to obtain a fight with both men to no avail. But, to quote something like that by itself, without providing all of the other details concerning the story of the fight that was to take place between Sam and Johnson in London and why that didn't take place concerns me, again. I say that because I believe that some could read this thread who haven't read those other threads on the topic and accept it as fact that Langford and Woodman were not anxious to fight Johnson when I am convinced nothing is further from the truth.

Like I said, I'll go read that part of Adam's book later today although I've got a number of other things I'd rather accomplish today.

Who is George Clarke? What you've shared from him here sounds a bit like his own interpretation of Langford to me rather than any quotes from Sam. I'm curious when Clarke wrote this.

Gotta run or I'll be late for Saturday morning basketball.

 

Well I certainly don't want to stir up any grief between you and Adam, I'm just clarifying my position which, as far as Langford's ability goes ,I thought I had made plain, especially in recent threads.

I just quoted an extract from what is an excellent biography,and I did state it was from the book.
What interpretation a reader puts on it is up to them.

As an author yourself, you will appreciate it would not be correct of me to quote long passages verbatim, let people go out and buy it, it's well worth the money.
I agree about Clarke ,I've never heard of him ,it seems to be an "interpretative piece". I just posted it for interest, it was written last year I believe.

Just wanted to be clear I've no interest in attacking Sam Langford , an alltime great who certainly deserved a title shot and possibly could have won crowns at Middle,Light Heavy ,and Heavy.

 

Scrolling down the rest of that piece I found quite a few inaccuracies without trying, I just posted it for interest.

Perhaps he belongs with that Canadian chump who wrote that awful biography of Tommy Burns
Dan McCaffery? That really is a joke of a book.

 

I don't think Louis wrote many letters.

 

"Well I certainly don't want to stir up any grief between you and Adam, I'm just clarifying my position which, as far as Langford's ability goes ,I thought I had made plain, especially in recent threads.

I just quoted an extract from what is an excellent biography,and I did state it was from the book.
What interpretation a reader puts on it is up to them."

I'd like to think there's no worry about stirring up any grief between Adam and I. We're friends and like I said, I have a lot of respect for his work. I haven't read his latest work on Johnson yet but I definately well and I'm sure it is excellent. The sole reason for my response was that a concern that a reader could incorrectly interpret the facts if they read this thread in isolation of many others on these subjects. But, there's a part of me that questions why I should really care about that.

I have a lot of work ahead of me right now to inventory a large collection of boxing books and bound boxing periodicals that I just received this week and should really devote the bulk of my time to that right now. Spending time rehashing materials that are contained in my own book about Langford in this thread probably isn't the best use of my time. But, I'll try to make a point of reading that section in Adam's book concerning his fight with Johnson.

You didn't answer the question in my previous post. Did I understand you correctly, you haven't read my book about Langford yet?

 

That's right, I haven't, want to send me a copy?

The reviews are excellent and I look forward to it.
Just so you know I've no agenda regarding Sam who is unquestionably for me the greatest fighter never to have not only not won the crown but never got a chance at it. P4P he is firmly in my 5 top and a solid case can be made for no1. What an absolute tragedy he and Johnson did not fight when both were the finished article ,and in the shape to do themselves justice? I came across an article today that states Champion Johnson and Langford were due to fight in Australia , but the match fell through because of finances ,I'll try and find it.

 

Tell you what. I have a brand new paperback version of book that I'll inscribe and sell you for $10. But it costs me $24.75 to ship it to the U.K. That would be a total of $34.75

If you have any interest in that proposal you could send payment via Paypal to my email address of

This content is protected

if you use that service.