Greb

Tunney had 12 - 13 pounds on him .. I'm sure he had fought giving up more tho . Wouldn't be surprised if it was 50+ pounds out of the ring in an alley or a bar .. It's a question for Klompton

 

Joe Cox had 35 pounds on him. Al Benedict had 37. Mickey Shannon had 27. Romero Rojas and Willie Meehan had 26. Bob Roper had 24. Kid Norfolk had about 16 or 17. Bartley Madden and Jack Renault had 15 (Renault had 22 pounds on him in their first fight). There are others like Brennan who had 20+ pounds on him.

 

You can add Robinson to that list too as he was regularly competing in middleweight bouts when he was a welterweight and giving up 12 or more pounds in those fights.

 

Well there are a few posters who do not seem to think size matters so by their measurement none if this matters but IMO reasonable people know that it matters in terms of greatness and invincibility being able to outbox a bigger slower man is expected but being durable enough to handle the size and strength differential and absorb the punishment and still win decisions despite the difficulty and muscle fatigue etc.....is something else...especially if it is a good little man hanging tough with a good bigger man the difference between the two is the smaller guy beating the bigger guy is greatness the bigger guy beating the smaller guy is nothing to write home about.

A 10lb differential and difficulty should be off of percentage and not actual lbs a 170lb man beating 185lb man is not as far fetched as a 120lb man beating a 135lb man also the natural weight of a well conditioned fighters is the actual weight I always base it on not the softer heavier lesser disciplined fighter version...I base it off the frame and best performance weight and age when considering a matchup credibility....Toney was a top notch fighter if you consider his best weights were 160-168 fighting heavyweights and under the store bought fat and muscle was a natural middleweights frame.

 

On the flip side, were there fights where Greb had the size/weight advantage? Curious.

 

He had advantages over some like Soldier Bartfield is one that jumps to mind. He probably had 10 to 15 pounds on him in some of their fights. The weights for Hreb-Robson list Greb at 178 and Robson at 155 but this is deceptive. The fight was at catchweights so Greb didnt see any point to weighing in. The commission tracked him down at dinner eating a steak and forced him to weigh in. He wasnt happy so he hopped on the scale fully dressed in winter clothing. In that era the material clothing was made of was much heavier so he likely weighed about 15 pounds or so less which would have been average for him.

 

Wow and ferrari ?

 

Lol

 

Thanks. I’m aware that Greb gave up weight often, but I figured that was common enough in his day that he also was the bigger man sometimes.

LaMotta made a career of being the bigger man, usually coming in above the 160-plus-one (today he’d be considered a super middle most of the time) while often fighting against welters coming up into the mid-150s.

 

I think in Lamottas case that had a lot to do with the lack of fights available during the war. LaMotta showed he wasnt afraid to fight bigger guys or even reduce in weight to get fights against smaller guys that brought money to the table. A lot of guys steered clear of Jake because he was very tough, very strong, and had a high punch output. That meant you were going to have to work hard against him and take your lumps on the chance you might beat him. I think the record is pretty clear on all that. Leon Thompson who was Tony Zales chief sparring partner explained to me that in that era, where championship fights were few and far between and catchweights matches were the name of the game, that there was a co stant back and forth between fighters and that it was a skill all its own to negotiate a sweet spot where you could get the fight made but gain an advantage on the scales. He had no problem with it and took it stride but talked a lot about the near constant weight negotiations in that era. Lamotta was further hampered by the fact that he was naturally a lhw but he was so short and had such a short reach that he was at a huge disadvantage at that weight and was forced to kill himself to make 160. So when he could get catchweights fights hed jump on it. But if you really examine his record you will see that the number of times he was outweighed or the difference in weights was negligible far outweighs the times he had a significant advantage. Those times stand out because they happened in some of his bigger fights but if you dig deeper you can see that despite outweighing guys like Robinson, Zivic, and Costner he actually came in very low which tells you those guys negotiated low weights for him to improve their odds and accepted the consequences. Its not like he was coming in at 165, which would have been much more comfortable for him. Its just that in the 40s all these guys were scrambling for fights and sometimes you had to weaken yourself by coming in low or fight a bigger guy to make weight.

 

I have Greb as my Number 1 all time.

Without evidence to the contrary , I don't see how anyone else compares. We have the Great SRR on tape, so we KNOW what he is.

But without seeing Greb, his record is just better. So I have to give it to him.

 

I dont think film would make a difference in my opinion unless Greb was getting a ton of gift decisions (which I find highly unlikely). You may argue with his technique but you cant argue with the results. If he was beating the stellar collection of talent he fought on such a consistent basis often on home turf or neutral territory then belaboring how he looked is besides the point.