Harold Johnson vs Jack Dempsey

Harold Johnson outboxes Dempsey, the latter would look to pressure Johnson and turn it into a brawl. So Johnson UD or Dempsey come from behind KO is the 2 likely outcomes.

We know Greb didn't give Dempsey a chance Tunney and he boxed them both

 

Very cute PP...You know damn well that this thread is about fighters in their primes. And you and others choose to discuss the Dempsey who at 32 years of age, out of the ring for 3 long years, without one tuneup fight, slow and rusty as hell as the Dempsey of these fantasy fights....Maybe a neophyte will fall for your bias, but I have been around the block too many times to fall for your omissions...Yes Harry Greb after watching a rusty Dempsey train for Tunney chose Gene to beat Dempsey. He was correct....After all the great Harry Greb still had one eye to see the train wreck coming...Nice try PP, but no cigar...

 

I think you're a bit over the top on this one .. no doubt Dempsey was ridiculously well package after beating Willard , stopped being a fighter , ect which is why I have always been disappointed in his career and rate him as an incomplete .. we simply do not know .. I just think he had a lot more proven stuff than you do .. it was not just that he beat Willard it was how .. he did destroy Brennan pre title .. Miske was dying , we know, but he somehow fought more than twenty times over three years and never lost. Guess he fought all dead men. Dempsey "ducked" Norfolk ( although I have never read about a demand for a match ) but he did soundly defeat Gibbons despite extensive inactivity and Gibbons went on to stop the same Norfolk who battled Greb tooth and nail. Firpo was all that you said but more than what you said .. he was very large, strong, highly motivated, hard punching and very awkward, a bigger, at least equally as strong, harder hitting Bonavena type and an inactive Dempsey fighting a stupid fight still showed lightning speed and thunderous power in taking him out .. I completely disagree that the 28 year old Tunney was a softer touch than a 35 year old Wills .. I also think Dempsey showed tremendous heart and shades of what could have been if he continued to fight in his bouts with two of the best sub-200 pounders that ever lived against absolute prime Tunney and Sharkey as an old fighter ..

Was Dempsey the best promoted fighter ever ? Quite possibly. Does that make him a complete unproven phony ? No way.

 

I know a guy who carried his hands low ,didn't hook off the jab and went back in straight lines think his name was Clay something, wonder what happened to him?:huh

 

It took him quite a while to die,3 and half years and 23 fights ,of which he only lost one.

 

Mc, 100% correct. Obviously the brave Miske was in somewhat remission when he won 22 bouts after Dempsey kod him in 1920.
No man can fight and beat 22 opponents out of 23 were he NOT in some form of remission from Brights Disease...Miske is one fighter Hollywood should have made a movie of, because of his
great courage in the face of a deadly disease...Tis a shame...

 

Promotion can get you only so far...Dempsey became the greatest ring attraction in boxing history, because of his savage ferocity, along with a true "KILLER" instinct that cannot be
manufactured...It was ingrained in him much like a later and smaller Roberto Duran, SNARL and all...His forte was a very
lithe body and was as Nat Fleischer described him "incredibly strong "...He was the "real goods" as they say...

 

I didnt say that Tunney was a softer touch. I said he got that fight because he was perceived as being a softer touch. Hindsight is a great thing but prior to September 1926 Tunney was considered the lesser threat of the two. He was smaller, lighter hitting, didnt have the resume of Wills, and hadnt been at the top nearly as long. The other things you basically agreed with everything I said. Just because you havent heard that there was a call for a Dempsey-Norfolk fight doesnt mean there wasnt. Yes Gibbons beat Norfolk after ducking him for nearly ten years. Thats a fact and I can prove it if need be. Even Tunney admitted Gibbons never wanted anything to do with Norfolk. Its funny how you act like Norfolk just conclusively beat Greb and then Gibbons destroyed him. The second Norfolk-Greb bout was as inconclusive as it could it be and Greb was all for an immediate rematch (as he always was) to settle who was better. Norfolk went in the other direction and lost his next bout on a DQ for using the exact same tactics that he somehow won over Greb on a DQ. Then Gibbons kicked his ass and guess who had beaten Gibbons in dominant fashion when Gibbons was a better fighter. In fact Id pick the June 1925 Greb over that version of Gibbons who looked absolutely clueless against Tunney to repeat and beat Gibbons easily. But whatever, the bottom line is that both of these guys stepped in the ring with Norfolk and Dempsey never would, not to spar, not in an exhibition, and not with money on the line. He ducked the same Norfolk that Gibbons was ducking and he ducked the same Greb who sent Norfolk to the hospital and Gibbons into onesided defeat, only to face Gibbons and not do as well as Greb had. Again, paint that how you want but Dempsey is so ridiculously overrated its beyond belief. Ive always said that how great a fighter LOOKS should be prequalified by who he is fighting. Of course Roy Jones LOOKS amazingly fast and unbeatable fighting part time fighters. Of course Dempsey looks dynamic fighting bloated dirigibles who cant get out of their own way. Notice how he looks less than stellar against every prime legitimate contender he faced? Yet theres always an excuse handy. The bottom line is Im never going to be convinced that the prime, well trained Dempsey (despite what you want to believe) who very nearly lost to Bill Brennan would have beaten Gene Tunney. Nobody else should either.

 

Go study Brights disease and then come back here tell me he was not dying when he fought Dempsey. Study what was written about during their training camps and before when Miske retired from the sport for his health. Fanboys dont want to believe that Miske was dying when he fought Dempsey or that he was sick but even Dempsey admitted this and admitted that he knew it before hand.

 

He got KO'd.

Sounds like a Frank Bruno situation.
Did well against Witherspoon, got Ko'd.
Did well against Lewis, got KO'd.

(some people even suggest Bruno did well in 1989 against Tyson, but he didn't really).

Brave loser. Spirited effort. Yes, people love to see guys like that given another shot.
But he fought Dempsey twice and got KO'd twice.
And I'm not even hearing much from you about the first fight. His average against Dempsey is poor.

 

How do we know it wasn't in remission for the Dempsey title bout ?

 

Sure .. I guess that the fact that the semi-shot Dempsey almost iced him won't influence anyone .. nor the claims that Jack lost every second of every other moment in the ring w Tunney which is simply not true . AS far as Norfolk goes, Tunney may have said Gibbons wanted nothing to do w the Kid but at least Gibbons fought and stopped him, something Tunney never dared to do .. here is where we disagree .. I think Dempsey proved more than enough to show he had great skills and fighting heart while you think he was simply an extremely well promoted, marginally talented coward.

 

A lot of great fighters failed to fight the other great fighter of their era, or simply lost to them.

Jeffries didn't beat Johnson.

Johnson didn't beat Langford, at any meaningful stage.

Tyson didn't beat Holyfield.

Wlad didn't beat his brother.

People are right to criticism Dempsey for not fighting Wills, but today the pendulum is swinging too far the other way.

The fact is that he beat Willard who was champion before him, and beat Sharkey who was champion after him. He had a devastating run up to the title, and a lot of title defenses against top opponents.

His critics point out that Wills and Greb beat most of his key opponents between them, but another way of looking at it would be that he beat most of the top names that they beat between them over that period.

 

If Miske was such a dying duck, and he beat Bill Brennan decisivley, that simply underlines that Brennan was not Dempsey's best title challenger.

 

Boxings best minds felt Dempsey was the greatest hwt who ever lived. Those same men did not rate Sharkey, Baer, Schmeling, Carnera or Braddock highly....but they did Louis. You see the opinion of those experts rings out over time as true.