Who was the better fighter, Jack Johnson or Joe Frazier?

FOTC Frazier would have won* a head to head match up via TKO9 imo, he's much much better.

 

Joe Frazier did hit harder and was a more persistent pressure fighter, but Jack Johnson had better lateral movement in his prime, which could cause problems for Joe. Especially if Jack moved non stop for 15 rounds. It could look like prime Muhammad Ali, 1964-1967 fighting Joe in The Fight Of The Century. Back in Jack' era the gloves were pretty flimsy, thus causing facial lacerations.

 

Jack Johnson

 

Nobody was better than Smoking Joe.

 

Smokin Joe!

 

Frazier's work rate would be a serious problem for Johnson to overcome.
While a good hitter Johnson did not possess the dynamite of a Foreman,[who did?] So the chances of Jack being able to stop Joe in his tracks are pretty remote.With his couching bob and weave Frazier would be vulnerable to Johnson's uppercut,correspondingly Jack would be open to Frazier's retaliatory left hook every time he launched it. Each has the weapon to cancel out the others.
It depends if you think Frazier's non stop, bustling offence would have Johnson too busy defending himself and trying to smother and contain the barrage of left hooks that would be coming his way,or that Jack would be able to create openings to get that right hand in after tagging Joe with his left lead? The rules under which this fight would be fought would probably be crucial to the outcome.
A reasonable case can be made for either man imo ,but I expect more will plump for Smokin Joe than Lil Arthur.

 

Frazier would have won. I have a ton of respect for Johnson but boxing was different when he fought. Slower paced, less movement and not a lot of combination punching. I am not knocking those guys from that era. They were tough guys no doubt but a guy like Frazier would go through Johnson's era pretty easily.

Then again, a lot of those dudes would avoid Frazier even more than Johnson and Langford..

 

Frazier by a mile, easily.

 

Frazier was a beast going into FOTC and excellently conditioned - his workrate and determination would have been too much for Johnson IMO and Frazier would have beaten everyone Johnson fought

 

Good question. Head to head I'll shout for Frazier wearing him down over the stretch. But there's a fair few I'd put Joe winning over so that s not calling in to question Jack's greatness. As a question of who was the more versatile and adapted to more styles then its Johnson imo. I've said it a few times that JJ was miles ahead of his time, he came along in an hard Era and had to learn just to survive.
Both great fighters tho.

 

Johnson was a very great fighter, but he didn't move enough to keep out of Joe's way. Joe might have taken some mighty shots, of course.

Pre-FOTC Joe wins TKO in the 11th.
FOTC Joe takes him out in 7.

 

Joe has a far more impressive list of victims but I don't really even know what the opening question means. Is this a head to head match-up? If so, Joe takes it by latter round stoppage.

 

Going against popular opinion think Jack would give smokin joe huge problems