Best defence Dempsey or Marciano

Dempsey by a country mile.

 

Why?

Who presented Dempsey with angles and slick counter punching ability that proved he was such a defensive master?

 

Tommy Gibbons for one.

 

Ok.

 

Rocky Marciano had underrated defense he was very hard to hit clean. There's a reason Dempsey was knocked down and hurt many more times.

 

Nah

Did you watch the fight? Gibbons looked terrible

Gibbons didn't deserve the shot in the first place. He got it by losing 10 rounds to 0 to greb

 

Wasn't he leading the series at this point?

 

Dempsey.

 

No he didn't He got it because the citizens of Shelby wanted to throw a prizefight
to put Shelby on the map..after offering Kearns a 100 grand. they were to broke to pay a challenger..But Gibbons volunteered for free..Greb ain't gonna fight for free he made so little money compared to Dempsey ..He had to take jobs as a sparring partner ..I wonder if part of his duties as sparring partner was to give Jack
massages after sparring sessions

 

Marciano stated he could not avoid old Joe Louis's jab.

 

He got it by winning his last 6 fights only one of which went to points.After Dempsey he had 12 more fights winning all but the last ,[to Tunney].

Gibbons got his start in boxing as a young man in St. Paul at the local YMCA. He turned professional in 1911 as a welterweight at the age of twenty, knocking out one Oscar Kelly in Minneapolis. He relocated to New York before his third bout and went undefeated in first twelve outings to secure a match with fellow up-and-comer Billy Miske in 1914. The fight, held in Hudson, Wisconsin, lasted a full ten rounds, but as state law forbade official decisions at the time, the bout was declared a no-decision. Still, more reporters at ringside felt that Gibbons had the better of the action. In 1915 the pair fought a rematch, to another no-decision which again was felt to be Gibbons's fight. Almost immediately following this, Gibbons leapt into a match with Pittsburgh's Harry Greb, a wild-swinging middleweight brawler who would later be recognized by The Ring magazine as the single greatest middleweight in history. According to reporters, only Greb's fabled toughness saved him from a knockout. The fight went the distance and was officially a no-decision, but no one doubted who the winner was. Gibbons spent the next several months traveling and fighting less than stellar opponents in Canada, Missouri, Milwaukee, New York, and Scranton before taking on Battling Levinsky, who was the reigning light heavyweight champion of the world at the time, though, because Gibbons was only a middleweight, the title would not be on the line. Though Gibbons was by now undefeated in twenty-four pro fights, Levinsky was a veteran of an amazing 181 fights. Again the fight ended in a no-decision, but reporters gave their verdict to Gibbons.

Gibbons continued his undefeated streak for the next three years--fighting a variety of competition and fighting in places such as Dayton, Pittsburgh, Scranton, Baltimore, Akron, Terre Haute, Des Moines, Buffalo, Denver, Minneapolis, Calgary, Seattle, Peoria, and Edmonton. On May 15, 1920 he fought a second no-decision against Greb. Even Greb's hometown paper reported that Gibbons handed him "the licking of his life." In a rematch two months later, which took place in a thunderstorm at the open air Forbes Field in Pittsburgh, the fight was closely contested in the early goings but Greb's aggressive style made all the difference in the final third of the bout. The newspapers gave their verdict to Greb. Technically, though, Gibbons was still undefeated and he continued to be so through his bouts with moderate level fighters like Chuck Wiggins and Dan (Porky) Flynn in the next few months. On June 22, 1921 he knocked out Willie Meehan, the San Francisco "Fat Boy," who had twice beaten the great Jack Dempsey earlier in his career. Against Gibbons, Meehan lasted less than a round. In fact, for all of 1921, Gibbons scored twenty-one knockouts, ten in the first round. On March 13, 1922, Gibbons was back in the ring with his old nemesis, Harry Greb. This time Greb was the more active fighter and walked away with a fifteen round decision, handing Gibbons his very first professional defeat

 

How many fighters with a good defense are good drawing cards..??
I don't remember seeing a line around the block to get tickets for a Curtis Cokes
fight

 

Tunney stated that Dempseys win over Gibbons was his best performance.

 

Marciano, the most underrated defence in HW boxing and not only that he'd set traps and counter. Anyone who voted Dempsey doesn't have a clue, he was reckless and constantly made mistakes.