The actual skill level of Jim Braddock

McGrain · Aug 10, 2017

mcvey said: ↑

Is their film of the fight available for viewing in its entirety? If the answer is no ,then no definitive conclusion can be drawn as to the rightful winner ,imo.
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I'm not sure. I haven't seen it. Nor has Mendoza.

Mendoza · Aug 10, 2017

McGrain said: ↑

No Mendoza. First of all, there is no film of the referee docking Farr. Second, we don't have film complete film of the round so we don't know that was the infringement he was docked for. Third, because we don't have complete film of the round we don't know what other infringements he made in this round. Fourth, because we don't have complete film of the round we don't know what other infringements he made in rounds 1 and 2. Finally, docking a round from an opponent for a single foul was in no way outrageous under the rules of the day (or even today, though it would be a point rather than the round).

So no, Braddock wasn't "helped by the ref" he was helped by his opponent infringing the rules and the referee enforcing them.
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Well you said,
This content is protected

How are you sure what you saw wasn't docked a point? What do the press say on round three about the foul?

Docking a point in a close fight so early ( round three ) can swing a close fight.

McGrain · Aug 10, 2017

Mendoza said: ↑

Well you said,
This content is protected

How are you sure what you saw wasn't docked a point? What do the press say on round three about the foul?

Docking a point in a close fight so early ( round three ) can swing a close fight.
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Yes, but the film is incomplete, which I also said -
This content is protected

I have no idea what the press said about the foul.

And yes, fouling can swing a close fight. It's why it's best not to do it.

superman1986 · Aug 10, 2017

mcvey said: ↑

You are entitled to your opinion.
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I was pulling your leg

he grant · Aug 10, 2017

reznick said: ↑

The reason it took 7 rounds for Louis to finish Braddock was because Braddock wasn't giving up range easily.
He was stopping lots of Louis' rushes with his stiff jab, counters, range control and Boxing IQ.

Louis had to fight Braddock tentatively, at range.
In fact, it's one of the slowest pace performances you will ever see Louis have in his very long career.
It was the same case with Max Baer. Coincidence? No.

Not to mention that Braddock knocked down the prime Bomber.
Guess Klompton will say he cluelessly stumbled into that one too.

If you think that you can survive 7 rounds with Louis by covering up and biting your teeth, you are lost.
Louis had SHWs doing 360's on the way to the ground with single punches. So let's be realistic about how much of Joe Louis' power you can absorb with heart and grit alone as a natural LHW.
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Pretty interesting points ..

KuRuPT · Aug 10, 2017

I honestly think Baer might've thrown that fight. He almost seems to not be trying in there.

klompton2 · Aug 10, 2017

McGrain said: ↑

No Mendoza. First of all, there is no film of the referee docking Farr. Second, we don't have film complete film of the round so we don't know that was the infringement he was docked for. Third, because we don't have complete film of the round we don't know what other infringements he made in this round. Fourth, because we don't have complete film of the round we don't know what other infringements he made in rounds 1 and 2. Finally, docking a round from an opponent for a single foul was in no way outrageous under the rules of the day (or even today, though it would be a point rather than the round).

So no, Braddock wasn't "helped by the ref" he was helped by his opponent infringing the rules and the referee enforcing them.
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Farr was docked for "flicking" with his glove instead of punching.

superman1986 · Aug 11, 2017

klompton2 said: ↑

I also think the Louis fight is Braddock's finest moment and the fight in which he fights his best. However, in watching that fight again for this video and post and noticed that Louis looked as bad as Ive ever seen him. Watch how he paws with his jab and while throwing also sticks out his right hand with it in a similar pawing manner. I realize hes trying to "catch" any return jabs by Braddock with that right but its actually the most amateurish Ive ever seen Louis look including the first Schmeling fight. Later on he tightened up his defense and instead of reaching out with the right to catch incoming jabs he would wait for them and parry them. This may have been a strategic decision on Blackburn's part but I think it hurt Louis in the fight because with that right extended out alongside his jab it left him open to those ridiculous arm punches that Braddock would throw and allowed him to get scored on unnecessarily. The knockdown, if you watch it closely, you will notice Louis hurts Braddock and then swarms on him. When he does he squares up his feet and then starts to step while punching. This leaves him in a perfect position for a Braddock counter and off balance as well. There were a couple of other things like that I noticed but it was kind of a sloppy performance by Louis.
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Braddock isn't the only one who benefitted from time and chance, others have too.

Imagine if Ali and Frazier had their rematch before Foreman fought Frazier? Ali won the rematch and so Foreman gets his title shot vs Ali. Well, its likely Foreman never becomes champion. So then he goes on to war with Lyle, defeat a washed up Fraizer and loses to Young, retiring and becoming a preacher. His successful comeback was built on his previous career success, but now he wouldn't have it. How would Foreman be perceived today?

Probably on the same level as Bonavena, Shavers or Chuvalo. A good, tough 70s contender who could punch but had a lot of technical errors. Keep in mind, this would be the same George Foreman we revere today, except he got a title shot against Ali rather than Fraizer thus never becoming a champion.

My point is, one can say Braddock stumbled upon the championship by accident or chance, but that case can be made for many who have held championships. He had to have something that got him there besides luck.

McGrain · Aug 11, 2017

klompton2 said: ↑

Farr was docked for "flicking" with his glove instead of punching.
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That's probably worse than the leading with the head thing he was warned for in the film.

mcvey · Aug 11, 2017

klompton2 said: ↑

Farr was docked for "flicking" with his glove instead of punching.
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Good info!

mcvey · Aug 11, 2017

superman1986 said: ↑

I was pulling your leg
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Pull both of them, they are rather short and could do with lengthening.

InMemoryofJakeLamotta · Oct 28, 2018

klompton2 said: ↑

So this film is in answer to Reznick's clip reel showing Braddock's "skills." I argued that its deceptive to take a few carefully selected clips and present Braddock using skills thats werent really representative of his ability or style the majority of the time. I argued that in fact Braddock was so poor a champion that it would be much easier to find examples of him looking inept than it would be to find clips showing his supposed skills. I was right of course or I wouldnt have wasted my time. In fact I edited this down to make it easier to upload to youtube. There were long stretches in several of these fights were you could literally cut several minutes straight without any editing to illustrate how pedestrian Braddock was. After all, there is a reason why the guy had one of the worst win/loss ratios of any HW challenger. Its no coincidence and it has nothing to do with the mythologizing about him being a hard luck fighter who never got any breaks only to show his true worth when those breaks came.

Sports fans, particularly boxing fans, have a tendency to romanticize. Take your average ham and egger, give him an interesting story and suddenly the fighter went from a mediocre journeyman to am all-time great. Two perfect examples of this in varying degrees are Billy Miske and Jim Braddock. Jim Braddock is our subject so lets focus on him. The story goes that Braddock was a hard luck fighter who never got the breaks or the opportunity to show what he was really made of. He was a diamond in the rough so to speak, just waiting on that opportunity to showcase his true ability as a fighter. Chewed up and spit out by the fight game Braddock had retired in order to devote himself to working full time to support his family during the depression. A chance call to substitute on two days notice on the undercard of Max Baer's title winning fight against Primo Carnera against Corn Griffin afforded Braddock the opportunity that had been missing his entire career. Braddock stole the show and parlayed that victory into two more showcase fights that garnered him a shot at the heavyweight championship. Finally Braddock was center stage and had the support he had always been missing in order to fight the fight of his life and win the heavyweight championship.

The legend of the "Cinderella Man" was born. But lets examine that popular account a little closer. Was Braddock really a hard luck fighter who never got the breaks? Not really. In the 1920s and 30s New York dominated the boxing world. Madison Square Garden was the Mecca of boxing and the short of winning a title the dream of every fighter was to fight in the Garden. New York wanted to maintain this control over boxing and so fighters from the East Coast sphere of influence had a huge advantage of fighters from basically everywhere else.

Case in point, within a year of turning pro Braddock was fighting in the Garden and shortly thereafter in venues like Yankee Stadium and Ebbetts field. Literally thousands of fighters equal or better than Braddock would have killed for that opportunity. When Braddock stepped up his competition his record became spotty. Hed win some. Hed lose some. Finally Braddock was given a chance to showcase his skills against Jimmy Slattery despite having been handily outpointed by Leo Lomski two months earlier. Lomski had earned himself a title shot with that victory but made the ill advised decision pick up some extra fights in the interim and lost two straight to Maxie Rosenbloom and Tuffy Griffiths. So lady luck smiled on Braddock and he was called up to face Jimmy Slattery with the winner slated for a title shot against Tommy Loughran. Braddock won the fight but most papers agreed that it was less his ability that won the fight and more Slattery's love of alcohol.

So it was that Braddock found himself in the unlikely position as challenger for the light heavyweight championship. Yet this time he wasnt up against a drunk and devotee of the great white way, he was up against highly skilled, well trained professional who had been fighting the best in the game for nearly a decade. Loughran made Braddock look like a rank amateur. He speared him on the end of his jab, countered him, spun him, feinted him into position, and did anything else he chose to Jimmy. Braddock simply followed Loughran around the ring round after round with his hands down low, his chin up, and swinging wildly whenever he got within five paces of Tommy. Its not an overstatement to say that Tommy exposed Braddock and Im likely not the first person who used that phrase in regards to this fight.

Braddock had heart, theres no debate about that. And he was rugged and durable. He had to be to plod forward with his hands low eating punches in the hope of landing one of his own. But Braddock's fundamentals were woefully lacking. He duck walked forward behind only a cursory pawing jab (when he actually threw it). He would wing arm punches and haymakers, often from way outside. Its not uncommon to watch him throw an uppercut from four feet away with no hope of it landing. His punches were telegraphed, wide, wild, and often missed. Indeed he often lept in leaving himself off balance. His defense was non existent, he often tried to catch punches in mid air but more often than not he simply ate them. He was especially ineffective on the inside. Mauling doesnt even begin to describe his infighting. Mauling has been used to effect by boxers from Fullmer to Ruiz but Braddock makes Ruiz look like an infighting virtuoso as he would wallow ineffectively all over his opponents on the inside as they landed punches.

But was that the end of Braddock? Was his career thrown into the ashcan of history and he never given a break again? No. In fact within a year after the Loughran debacle Braddock had fought some of the biggest names in boxing at the biggest venues all over the country. The Olympic in LA, the Coliseum in Chicago, the Arena in Philly, Fenway Park, Boston Garden, and Braves Field in Boston and yes even Madison Square Garden invited him back. The problem for Braddock was that he lost most of those fights because, as stated before, when the level of competition increased his mediocre skills couldnt cope.

Over the next several years Braddock's career fell into this similar pattern. He got showcase fights at showcase venues and invariably lost. He could beat the also-rans (usually) but he rarely outperformed an even middling contender before he got his shot at Griffin. And what of that Griffin fight? How did this fight re-energize Braddock's career given that most people today have never heard of Griffin? Well thats interesting. Corn Griffin himself was nothing special (he had struggled with mediocre opposition and his record was largely padded) so it wasnt exactly a marquee win for Braddock but what captured the public's imagination was that it was an exciting win. Griffin was being publicized as a coming prospect and was said to have given Carnera a beating in sparring leading up to the Baer fight. He seemed in control in the second when he floored Braddock for a quick count. When Braddock arose Griffin charged and being overeager was caught himself and sent down for a nine count. When got up the two fighters went at it hammer and tongs and the crowd was in an uproar as both fighters walked dizzily backed to their corners at the end of the round. The fighters picked up where they left off in the third but Griffin, who had already beens stopped four times in his career, was not up to the task and after two more knockdowns the fight was over. Think of Derrick Jefferson, who got a title shot based on his exciting win over 16-9-2 Maurice Harris. Thats the equivalent of this fight. Griffin would win only once more in his career, losing 13 more times.
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I lol'd reading this....comedy gold!

janitor · Oct 28, 2018

KuRuPT said: ↑

I honestly think Baer might've thrown that fight. He almost seems to not be trying in there.
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Isn't the simplest explanation that he simply broke his hand as he claimed?

The injury seems to have been verified by an X ray after the fight, and it seems to have given him trouble subsequently.

janitor · Oct 28, 2018

klompton2 said: ↑

So was Braddock really a diamond in the rough? A skilled fighter with a case of bad luck who never got a chance to showcase those skills until it was almost too late? Or was he just a journeyman with modest ability who was at the right place, at the right time? You be the judge:

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All of the facts that you have outlined are true, but they permit a positive take or a negative take, and you seem to have gone for a negative take.

I will make the following observations:

Braddock was more highly touted as a light heavyweight contender than you are allowing for.

I don't think that a man who has just beaten the #3 rated heavyweight contender, can in any way be regarded as an undeserving challenger, or a man who was gifted his title shot. If somebody beat Dillian Whyte, and then Anthony Joshua gave him a title defense, I doubt that you would have anything to say about it.

I don't think that the idea of Baer having thrown the fight merits any serious consideration. The hand injury is reliably documented from multiple sources, and is almost certainly the reason why Baer did not prosecute the fight effectively.

Joe Louis fought practically everybody in that era, and the next, and some from the one after, and he rated Braddock as one of the best that he ever faced. He at more than once said that Braddock was one of the most dangerous punchers that he faced.

Braddock was one of the weaker lineal champions in my opinion, but he was certainly much more than a journeyman of modest ability, and he had that X factor that you seem to find in even the weaker lineal champions!

reznick · Oct 28, 2018

I think Pat M and KK should hit the like button on Klomptons video.
At least then it can have a 1:2 dislikes to likes ratio.

Right now it has 0 likes. 4 dislikes. And 1 comment which disagrees with the video. Rough times. Maybe BillyGoat Carnera can throw another like on it to get the tides moving.

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The actual skill level of Jim Braddock

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The actual skill level of Jim Braddock

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