Joe Louis' scorecards vs the best boxers he fought.

I remain confused by this excercise. Trying to garner insight into how good a boxer Joe Louis was by selecting these 4 opponents is nonsensical. Every one is aware of the background of the Schmeling fight and while it's an awesome story it provides specific, if not limited, insight. The remaining 3 occurred well into Louis ' decline There is reason why Louis retired post Walcott, not because he didn't want the money, he was shot.

What is the agenda here?

 

Some press, some of the crowd felt Jersey won. As is natural when a fight is closely contested.

10-8 means nothing, rules might change again 50 years from now, doesn't mean we can retroactively score fights.

Doesn't matter one dot. Hopkins was past prime when he beat Jones Jr. Doesn't mean we give him full credit. Lewis was past prime when he beat Tyson. So even if Jersey was past prime when he lost on points then failed to see the final bell, it doesn't change that Louis was past prime.

 

It wasn't universally regarded as a Walcott win. An Associated Press poll of sportswriters at ringside was 20-14 in favour of Walcott, which is hardly unanimous. There was a perception that Jersey Joe hurt his cause by running in the last two rounds. In that era the tradition was that a challenger must WIN the title, not merely nick it.

 

It isn't,"pretty clear ," to any of us because we haven't seen the entire fight.


Louis himself was in no doubt he had won. he said so in his autobiography ,and he said so on the TV program," How It Was" sitting side by side with Walcott.

 

You might think you are bobby fisher but you arent. You actually just proved my point. You admitted that against Charles Louis was no longer Louis. Yet you still chose to use this fight while excluding any others from the same period that would show Louis' ability. Regardless its a ridiculous moot point. Louis still beat every name you listed, usually by KO, with the exception of Charles WHEN HE WAS ANCIENT AND COMING OFF A TWO YEAR LAYOFF. I stand by my original point that you are using skewed criteria to suit your agenda.

 

Thirty four percent of the writers voted for Louis, so did the two judges, that means there was a reasonable doubt as to who had won. You mentioned Louis's body language as an indication that he felt he had lost . I can provide direct quotes and televised ones too that say exactly the opposite .Whom should we believe ,your interpretation of Louis's body language ,or his own quoted filmed opinion?

 

If you had actually LISTENED instead of just making **** up you would have heard the commentators sitting live at ringside in the complete radio broadcast version of the fight (not even half of the entire fight film exists) saying that Walcott was running and retreating throughout the later rounds and that when Louis landed he hurt Walcott. Louis was interviewed in the ring immediately after the fight and said he felt good and was all for giving Walcott an immediate rematch which he did and won by KO. Hardly the demeanor of a guy you want to paint as being cowed by a better boxer. Regardless of a newspaper poll or booing Don Dunphy made the comment that HALF the people thought Louis won and Half the people thought Walcott won. It was clearly a closer fight than some would have us believe.

You can also pretend that Louis-Schmeling 1 was a one sided drubbing but Schmeling came away from that fight with a closed eye and bruises all over his face attesting to the damage Louis did in the fight.

Now lets look at those cards that you keep talking about:


Joe Louis - Schmeling 1
4 7
3 7
4 6

Joe Louis - Schmeling 2
1 0
1 0
1 0

Joe Louis-Billy Conn 1
5 7
4 7
6 6

Joe Louis-Billy Conn 2
5 2
5 1
5 1

Joe Louis-Joe Walcott 1
6 7
8 6
9 6

Joe Louis-Joe Walcott 2
5 2
5 4
6 3

Joe Louis-Ezzard Charles
5 10
2 13
3 12


93 111


Throw out the ridiculous inclusion of Charles which dramatically skews the numbers and you have:


83 76


The only fight of the bunch that was unwinnable on the cards was Charles, when Louis was ancient and hadnt fought in 2 years. That being said, cards dont tell the entire story of a fight. Charles features say that Louis was getting in his licks as well:

[url]http://www.corbisimages.com/images/Corbis-DM3417.jpg?size=67&uid=41e76b4c-905b-4bc1-8c17-c04ac66708d4[/url]


Just like with Charles Schmeling showed the effects of what was a competetive fight:


[url]http://www.corbisimages.com/images/Corbis-U353043ACME.jpg?size=67&uid=77856ad9-c4fb-4d72-9f11-74b10761c8a0[/url]


So yeah, your criteria is pure **** and even by your criteria it hardly points to Louis being inept against boxers. Especially considering he won 5 of those 7 bouts, 4 by KO.

 

Choosing bouts of any fighter when said fighter is past his prime negates the conclusion. Just a completely irrelevant thread.

Losing rounds in his prime to great pure boxers is no crime and does not mean Louis was not a great technical boxer....which he was.

 

Louis is the one HW boxer whose fundamentals and technique was so good in fact that you could use him as an example to teach fighters in lighter weight divisions. I cant think of another hw you can say that about.

 

You can't prove said premise at all though Mcvey. In fact, we're more likely to say Louis had more in the tank than Walcott. Walcott had it harder growing up and struggled a lot more. He was as taken care of as Louis was nor handled nearly as well as Louis was. Walcott's diet (or lack there of) alone for years would mean he was further past his prime than Louis. However, neither one is provable, but one was likely more past his best than the other... and it wasn't Louis.