Jack Dempsey vs Tony Tucker?

That's a bit of an exaggeration. Football and basketball players from 30-40 years ago were just as good as those today. Baseball has declined if anything. It went from being America's number one sport to being pretty far behind basketball and football.

I'd argue against trainers today being better as well. Cus D'amato Manny Steward, and Angelo Dundee were levels ahead of the guys today. A pretty good case could be made that nutrition today isn't totally better than what boxers knew back in the day. Looking at the diet of older fighters it seems they ate a diet flush with fruits and vegetables along with lean meats. Today you have a burger joint on every corner. Obesity is leagues higher today than it was back then too.

That makes it even more impressive that they got as good as they did. Imagine if Dempsey and co. had access to fight footage.

You don't need to eat 5-7 times per day to gain lean mass. Plenty of people gain a ton of mass off of 3-4 meals per day or any number of meals from 1 per day to 6. The guys eating that much are already trying to maintain an extremely large amount of muscle mass. Like 250 lbs plus.

 

Likewise

 

I didnt realize Rickard was the only promoter in the world. Dempsey sure didnt have a problem fighting for another promoter when he was facing a lightheavyweight who had lost a title elimination (Gibbons) or a dying friend (Miske).

 

Billy Miske....that was a great fighter! I'd pick him to give young Mike Tyson a run for his money

 

Uhh he did. The other promoter failed to produce the money and the fight was banned in New York State, the biggest hub of boxing at the time. Dempsey agreed to the fight multiple times. It was Kearns, Rickard, and others who got in the way. If the commission wasn’t racist they would have let the fight happen in New York and Dempsey would have fought Wills instead of Firpo.

 

The fact that Dempsey can't beat Tucker doesn't affect his ranking in the history books.
When you assess a boxer's greatness, you judge him based on what he did in his own era, not by comparing him to other boxers from different eras.
None of the ATG HW's before 1950 really stand a chance against guys like Liston, Foreman, Ali, Holmes, Tyson, Lewis, Bowe, etc.
But that does not mean the likes of Johnson, Dempsey, Louis, Marciano, etc - are not greats.

 

No he does not, he stands very little chance of doing that.
Tucker out-boxes him all night long, in a even far more convincing manner than Tunney did.

 

Good post.

 

This is why 'sports evolution' doesn't apply to boxing.

Jeffries and Dempsey fought at a time when a greater percentage liked boxing. More people gave it a go, saw if they had what it takes. In those gyms they were taught now rarely used techniques, partly due to stricter refs, partly due to a lack of knowledge.

Take a glance at today's part-time MMA trainers, who think that imitating Roger Mayweather's pad-work is a sign they're a guru. These men are not the beneficiaries of over a centuries' worth of pugilistic wisdom. Many would draw a blank if I said Ezzard Charles. They're closer to LA Fitness personal trainers.

And as for protein. So long as we're not talking of the times he was underfed, Dempsey's lean musculature was a product of constant fighting. It's the best recipe. David Haye's bulked-up physique, however good it looked, didn't help much. Too much water-weight. The physical strength was never there. Weak tendons/connections (hence the injuries).

 

It’s clearly subjective. Imo there’s no way you can put a heavyweight in the top 10 if they aren’t competitive against heavyweights outside of their own era. Sure you can say they’re pioneers or made inroads in the sport but to say they are some of the greatest heavyweights ever would be inaccurate if they lose to guys like Tony Tucker amongst others.

That being said I have Dempsey in my top 10.

 

Its fun to parrot the old stories told time and again but the fact is that isnt true. New York wasnt the only game in town by a long shot it just proved a convenient stumbling block to keep Dempsey from having to fight Wills. When Rickard wanted to promote fights he did and he wasnt afraid to take them out of New York. He promoted mixed race matches before and after Jeffries-Johnson. He promoted Dempsey-Willard in Toledo Ohio of all places when boxing was between legal standing in New York state. He promoted Dempsey-Tunney 1 in Philly to get around the edict of the NYSAC demanding Dempsey fight Wills, he also promoted Dempsey-Tunney 2 in Chicago. Rickard wasnt planted in New York. Dempsey likewise was only too happy to follow Kearns and Rickard’s lead in protecting him and make no mistake thats exactly what they were doing. In 1922 Dempsey signed a toothless promise to fight Wills and even admitted in his own biography that the contract was designed to give the appearance that he was trying to make the fight without actually going through with it. In 1925 after he had repudiated Kearns and was handling his own affairs he did exactly the same thing. While negotiating a Tunney fight with Rickard he had been warned that if he didnt defend against Wills the NYSAC would strip him. As a result he had his close friend promoter Floyd Fitzsimmons pretend to work toward staging a match with Wills. He signed a worthless agreement to fight Wills under terms no promoter in the world could meet. When Fitzsimmons, again a close friend of Dempseys, couldnt come through Dempsey could pretend he was doing his best to make the fight while repudiating Fitzsimmons and saying hed have no further dealings with him (a month later Fitzsimmons was wintering at Dempsey’s house in California). Meanwhile Dempsey had already agreed to fight Tunney for less favorable terms than he supposedly required for Wills. Both he and Rickard are on record as stating that Rickard convinced him to fight Tunney because Dempsey believed Tunney was an easier opponent. This is all Dempsey, Kearn wasnt even in the picture after the summer of 1925. Furthermore Dempsey was a big boy. Painting him as some wet behind the ears rube who was led around by the nose is ridiculous. Had he wanted to fight Wills he could have easily lobbied for the match and gotten it and made more than he was paid for any other fight. Kearns admitted as much while still managing Dempsey. The real fact was that the championship was Dempsey’s key to fabulous wealth and Dempsey was a cash cow for Rickard. Had Rickard, Kearns, and Dempsey actually been as confident about Dempsey defeating Wills as Dempseys ludicrous fanboys they would have ran, not walked, to the fight and laughed all the way to the bank. They avoided that fight, Dempsey included, because Wills posed a far greater threat to Dempsey than ANYONE Dempsey faced prior to 1926. It was not guaranteed Dempsey could best Wills and they didnt want to upset the cash cow. Period. They were all willing to take financial risks under every combination of circumstances you can imagine when the actual risk of Dempsey losing was low.

 

This isn't true, boxing participation blew up after the Dempsey era. It was either Dempsey or one of his contemparies complaining that so many more were getting into boxing but didn't know what they were doing because they didn't have the trainer.

In Jeffries time it wasn't even legal in many US states

 

Fitzsimmons sued Dempsey for breach of contract. He also wrote to Dempsey to confirm with him he would be starting training for a 1926 Wills fight. Dempsey replied he was instead preparing for a Tunney fight. So while Dempsey did sign the contract to face Wills, he actually breached the contract.

Fitzsimmons law suit failed not because Dempsey didn't breach contract, he did. It failed because Fitzsimmons couldn't prove how much revenue Dempsey-Wills would have generated. He also couldn't prove that he paid Wills a 50k advance, so the story Wills got a 50k advance is very likely to be untrue

I can provide the reference if required.

 

This is not true, give Owens moder equipment (let alone nurtition) and he'd be top track and field athlete.

 

Louis would beat at least half of them.