Why was Greb ranked as no.1 so late?

Agreed; but let us not also forget, without a campaign great fighters become footnotes. Greb was exceptional, but plenty of exceptional fighters do not get his kudos because no one has researched them properly.

 

What if we go back to, say, the 1930s and 40s... when Greb's career had been over for several years? Back then there must have been oldtimers who had watched boxing for many years... and whose opinions were valued and respected. You know, Ray Arcel types who had seen it all.

So do we have have reports from back then... where seasoned fight people (trainers, reporters, etc., who had seen not only Greb, but also great middleweights before him like Fitzsimmons and Ketchel) claimed that Greb was the greatest fighter they had ever seen? It would be interesting to know, if people who actually SAW him fight thought as highly of him as we do today.

 

It seems that Nat Fleischer and many other people of his generation thought that Stanley Ketchell was the greatest middleweight ever. Yet Ketchell was only a top fighter for about three or four years while Harry Greb and Sugar Ray Robinson were on top for about a decade and two decades respectively. I don't doubt that Ketchell was a tremendous fighter at his peak with his career and life ending prematurely, but I find it hard to rank someone so highly based on such a short time at the top.

- Chuck Johnston

 

Possibly had to do something with this (Greb's last 5 fights at MSG). You can't underestimate how powerful NY press was.

Madison Square Garden, New York, New York, USA
1926-08-19 Harry Greb L15 Tiger Flowers

Madison Square Garden, New York, New York, USA
1926-02-26 Harry Greb L15 Tiger Flowers

Madison Square Garden, New York, New York, USA
1924-01-18 Harry greb W15 Johnny Wilson

Madison Square Garden, New York, New York, USA
1923-12-10 Harry Greb L15 Gene Tunney

Madison Square Garden, New York, New York, USA
1923-02-23 Harry Greb L15 Gene Tunney

 

Virtually all the top fighters Harry Greb fought named Greb as the best fighter they ever fought, such as Maxie Rosenbloom and Mickey Walker
who on an old Sam Taub radio show on each Sunday afternoon I would
listen to on my folks Atwater radio...
For many years Nat Fleischer who knew Stanley Ketchel, and saw him fight
always praised Ketchel as the best of all middleweights in his Questions and Answer column each month in the old Ring Magazines...However in
later answers to Ring questions he named Harry Greb as the best of all
middleweights, for what it's worth...

 

Some feel Robinson avoided some of the best black fighters and his loss to Turpin is overlooked.

With Greb, some felt he was a little dirty in the ring, but as far as an agenda the writers would quickly lose credibility if they had Greb losing a fight he clearly won.

If anything is over rated on Greb I think it's the numerous no -Decision fights. Not sure if the fighters viewed some of them as easy pay days and also at times went easy on each other saving themselves for the biggest matches out there.

 

Ketchel suffers greatly, not just because of a lack of film, but the film we do have. Two outings - a consensus poor performance in Papke IV and fishy pantomime with Johnson hardly advertise his ability.

If we had a couple of goodens, say Papke III and O' Brien I, you can bet his legacy would retain some of that gleam which dazzled contemporaries.

 

This question has been answered before. Its basically a combination of two factors: 1. Greb fought so often and in so many locales that until the last 20 years or less his record was largely obscured and certainly the actual details and context of his record. When good, solid research started being done on his record it became clear he was something very special. Even authorities during his own time couldn't have known this because an expert in New York, or Chicago, isn't going to know how a fight went down in Omaha, or Columbus due to the lack of media.

The other factor is that Greb was really disliked by the New York press. He had several very public spats with them and made several digs at them as well. After he died those guys who were working for newspapers went on to write for boxing magazines, which largely wrote the history of the sport for the next 60 years: Dan Daniel, Hype Igoe, Sam Taub, Nat Fliescher, and many many more. Those guys were not only biased against Greb but sat in a perfect position to minimize his legacy out spite, or ignorance (due to simply having only seen him fight a handful of times at the end of his career) or a combination of both.

As for the no decision fights Mendoza, no, the accounts of them make it very clear that these were real fights in which the fighters were trying their hardest to win. In fact the only time ive really consistently seen ND fights (of even decision fights) considered more of an exhibition than a blood and guts war is with the African American fighters on the chitlin circuit, Im sorry to say. Time and time again accounts of theirs crop up where it is clear they are just going through a glorified exhibition. That's not a dig at them because I love those guys but its the truth.

 

Yeah, I don't buy the odd logic that people who saw and thought highest of Greb all died ... but somehow others of the same era are regarded highly. Benny Leonard, for instance, seems to have been regarded as great immediately ... more appreciated in his time and more appreciated in the decades immediately after, and the same people who rate him highly certainly were aware of Greb. So it would defy all odds that only Greb's supporters died while those who liked others in the era somehow lived longer.

Klompton: Can you help me understand which of Greb's biggest wins -- the ones against top competition that most enhance his reputation -- were "discovered" in the last 20 years that were unknown before?

Yes, many of his opponents spoke highly of him, but you can find oodles of accounts of fighters rating each other highly (both opponents and sparring partners) from any era. Those are important, but they also cancel each other out to some degree.

The thing that is oddest to me is Greb's star has risen without video evidence ... had fight films of his turned up in the last decade or two and people saw him and said, 'Wow, this guy really was special,' that would be understandable. But obviously this isn't the case.

 

It didnt hurt that Benny Leonard was from New York and continued to be a beloved figure in boxing for two decades after he retired.

With Greb its not so much that there are lost fights that suddenly appeared (although this has happened) but that there were dozens and dozens of fights which for decades had no more details attached to them than "ND." When the actual circumstances of those fights came to light his legacy saw big boost. There are tons of fights which flew under the press's radar that we now know more about which enhance Greb's legacy. For instance his bouts with Jack Dillon, George Chip, Battling Levinsky, Maxie Rosenbloom, his first bout with Tiger Flowers, his bouts with Jeff Smith, Al McCoy ( not a great fighter but the champion when Greb dominated him), his fourth bout with Tunney in Cleveland. The list is as long as my arm of important fights he had and won outside of a large media presence which light has only recently been shed on which increases our understanding and appreciation of him. for instance rosenbloom told the story dozens of times of how he beat greb. not true, he was utterly dominated in their fight but greb wasnt around to defend himself and who do you think the new york boys wrote won? rosenbloom of new york. same with tunney who loved to tell of how he figured greb out and beat him in their last four bouts. totally untrue but the boys from new york sided with their own. who knew any of the details of grebs bouts with guys like chip, smith, etc until recently? yet all or most of those untruthfully claimed they beat him. had all the guys who claimed they beat greb after greb was dead and unable to correct them actually beaten him he wouldnt be such a great fighter. the thing is those guys knew greb was great and knew his scalp would add to their prestige if they said they beat him and who would be the wiser because nobody had microfilm or boxrec at the time. thats why his reputation suffered and has been rehabilitated with great research.

I also take issue with the idea that nobody rated Greb that highly. The problem was that outside of New York, the experts who saw Greb and rated him VERY highly didnt have the same level of influence as those guys from New York who ended up writing for Ring Magazine and other such publications. For instance Ed Dickerson was one of the best boxing writers and one of the most knowledgeable boxing men in the country. He rated Greb as the greatest he ever saw and had seen most of them. But writers from Grand Rapids dont get the kind of attention that writers from the New York Times do. I could go on down the list of writers and experts who rated Greb as one of the greatest (and some rated him as THE greatest) but those guys rarely got heard. Guys like Hype Igoe, Dan Daniel, Bob Edgren, and Jim Dawson (all of whom had long and influential careers in the sport after Greb died and all of whom clearly were not fans of his) were the ones who wrote Greb's legacy to the greater public after he died and Greb would have hated that because he was generally at odds with all of those guys.

 

I think you're onto something here. Probably a lot of the New York pundits hadn't seen Greb live until this part of his career, and what they saw might have been impressive to some degree but certainly wasn't ATG dominant -- it's possible they wrote him off largely as a good-but-not-great guy who couldn't cut it on "Broadway" when he stepped up.

Again, I'm not saying that's the case in reality, but it's a valid perception from someone who may have seen his big NY fights and not seen his barnstorming fights against good opposition.

The live-fast-die-young thing can cut both ways, sometimes at once. Greb didn't have the inevitable decline that most boxers go through nor the nearly-inevitable comebacks that so often happen. Ketchel and Salvador Sanchez, to name two from far different eras, died young and their reputations weren't harmed by it. Sometimes dying young leads to greater immortality, take the actor James Dean for an example.

I'd love to know why some members of the New York press are alleged to have had it in for Greb, and what evidence there is that this bias ran so deep that they must have conspired to rob him of his legacy for them to have been on the same page in doing so. Sure, they might favor a guy they knew and covered (i.e. Benny Leonard), but being from New York or fighting often there wasn't a requirement for being rated as an ATG -- tons of examples of that. It stretches credulity to believe there was such outright hatred for someone to carry such a vendetta decades beyond his passing without there being a VERY good explanation for so many of the sport's historical press figures to harbor such dislike.

I would more easily believe the above explanation, that some of Greb's most high-profile near misses happened in NY and thus the press there wasn't as impressed.

I find this subject fascinating. I don't think there is any fighter in history whose stock has risen so much higher so far beyond his fighting days. I'm 50 years old and I don't remember Greb being discussed in such august company when I was younger, nor can I think of anyone who has cracked the mythical P4P top tier from an earlier era in the manner that Greb has.

 

The New York press, at the time Greb was trying to break in there and then became champion, was extremely biased against outside fighters. During this time period the New York boxing commission was literally trying to take control of the sport, consolidate power in New York, have all of the big fights staged in New York, and have all of the champions be from the New York metropolitan area. This is not an exaggeration or a conspiracy theory. I admit it sounds like one but its all true and very well documented. New York boxing writers and New York promoters went along with this because obviously it benefitted them. As a result New York set their sights on non New York champions such as Johnny Kilbane (who they attempted to strip), Johnny Wilson (who they stripped, who although being from New York had relocated to Boston and worse was largely inactive as a champion even before he was banned in New York), Joe Lynch, who was a New Yorker but fought mostly outside of New York as champion was banned and essentially forced to defend his title in New York against Goldstein (another New Yorker) in New York, etc etc. Essentially if you were a champion you would be expected to defend your championship on a regular basis in New York (where New York promoters, writers, and commissions would benefit from taxes, promoting the bouts, press coverage etc) at the very least, at worst New York was going to do everything they could to get rid of you and install a champion in your place that would fight in New York or that was from New York (and more likely both). Such was the case when they stripped Johnny Wilson and laughably demanded on short notice that Greb fight Dave ********* (nevermind how they arrived at the determination that ********* deserved a title shot). Greb's schedule was already full making it impossible for him to accept (as Im sure they were aware of) so they matched ********* with Phil Krug, who was from right across the river. Krug had done even less than the laughably undeserving ********* to get a title shot. But you know what they did do that New York liked? They both fought the majority of their bouts in the New York metropolitan area and could easily be expected to bow to the wishes of the New York commision on where they defend. Champions were very vocal about this blatant power grab, as were writers outside of New York and its why the NBA was founded in 1921 as a means of banding together other states which did not want to be under the thumb of New York. At this time, when Greb was just starting to break into New York, after his first bout with Gene Tunney, Tunney allied himself with Billy Gibson who was one of the most connected and influential New York managers. A systematic campaign was begun by Tunney's people to discredit Greb in any way possible. One of the ways was by paying off press reporters to write unfavorably about Greb (particuarly that he was a dirty fighter) This is clearly illustrated when you see that several of the writers who said in their same day coverage of the first Greb-Tunny fight that Greb had broken Tunney's nose with a punch in the first round suddenly changed their stories after the intervention of Gibson and said it was a headbutt. This began in the fall of 1922 and continued well after their bout in December 1923. As if this wasnt bad enough Greb called the New York press out on this and publicly alleged that he was forced to pay New York sportswriters several thousand dollars in order to write favorable press about him in regards to a Dempsey fight. He said all of this as a means of pointing out how easily Tunney's people could influence New York sportswriters (who were well known at the time to be on the take of the highest bidder). By publicly revealing this Greb caused a major backlash in the New York press and for the rest of his career many of these guys were after him and took every opportunity to go after him. It was bad enough that he was considered an outsider by many of them from the outset, now he had brought to life how business as usual operated in the New York sportswriters world and they made him pay in print. After that and his treatment in the second and third Tunney bouts Greb was always highly critical and highly skeptical of New York officials and sportswriters.

I dont really think Greb dying "young" helped or hurt his legacy like Ketchel/Sanchez because both of those guys were still young and active and in Sanchez case he was in his prime (Ketchel was probably through as a top fighter barring a miraculous return of his health and form although this wasnt widely known). Greb was well known to be on the downside even by the time he won the title and it was seen in his performance that he had slipped dramatically in the last two Flowers fights. I dont think anyone was under the impression that Greb died while his star was burning brightest. Furthermore, there would be no embarrassing comebacks or fighting on too long just for a paycheck. Greb had his bad eye removed and a glass eye was placed in its place. Its one thing to fool a commission official when you have a detached retina, its entirely another thing to have your glass eyeball fly out of your head and roll around on the canvas the first time you get hit in a fight. Greb, for all intents and purposes was retired when he died. He kept this fact to his friends and family because he was in the process of conning Red Mason out of a lawsuit by pretending he would continue to fight for him, and was going to open a white collar gym which he figured would get more promotion if he pretended he would return to the ring some day so he talked about his next career move but he never had any intention to return to the ring and couldnt have even if he had wanted to. Furthemore both Ketchel and Sanchez died after being in the limelight for only about 3 years and while still in their early 20s. Greb died after having been a top fighter for a decade and when he was 32. So, again, I dont think the early death helped Greb because when a fighter dies like a Ketchel or a Sanchez (Les Darcy is another) when they are seemingly on top of the world its always a case of "imagine what they could have accomplished if they hadnt died" because there is the possibility that we never saw their full potential. With Greb we saw him reach his full potential and then fade. So there was never really a question of what more he could have accomplished.

You have given me an idea though. I think Im going to put together a list of experts who thought highly of Greb and their quotes to illustrate that in some circles Greb was considered a pound for pound great, even in his lifetime. For instance Ive seen more than one expert from the 1940s/50s talk about how Greb would have beaten Robinson. Ive seen more than one talk about how Greb would have beaten Marciano. Ive even seen one talk about how he would have beaten Louis. Mickey Walker, Maxie Rosenbloom, Tommy Loughran, Gene Tunney, and many others called Greb the best they ever fought at one time or another (even while they were trying to get people to believe they beat him every time out LOL) So its not entirely true that suddenly Greb's star began to rise. I think its more a case of people having easier access to the information that once pulled together sheds light on Greb and just how special he was. I think in some circles Greb was always considered one of the best, I think some of us just needed to catch up that way of thinking by getting more information.

 

Thanks for the information.

I look forward to seeing those quotes. I know they are out there, but to have a lot of them in one place would certainly help the 'debate.'

Again, I reiterate that I'm not questioning Greb's place in P4P history, I just thought this thread addressed a very interesting point about when and why the shift began to happen and revived it for further discussion.

I'm not a Greb basher by any means, which I think is clear from my posts. His record very clearly speaks for itself: the question here is why it took so long for that to happen in the mainstream discussion of his career and place in history.

 

as someone who treasures your book klompton, i think its great to have you so accessible on the forums and reading your posts like those above.

 

I really appreciate the information. But what IS the true story with the Tunny fights? Did not Tunny eventually get to good for Greb, at least considering a size difference AND Greb having only some sight in one eye?

When was Grebs creme de la creme prime, just before his detached retina, or soon after before his eyesight deteriorated?

Should he be downgraded because I understand he fought very dirty, & would not have done so well if forced to follow the rules?

Klompton sorry if you said it before, but at their absolute peaks, who up to LHW (let's assume real weight, NOT guys who due to weigh in times could be really 180's at fight time? COuld beat Greb?

COuld anyone in your view beat him at the weight he could easily make, 168?