Fleisher badmouthing recent heavyweights (RING, 1962)

mcvey · Jan 3, 2019

Nighttrain said: ↑

Fleischer is like that ancient uncle that put at the end of the table at holidays and just smile and nod at times and under no circumstances allow to control the tv remote.
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"Give him a nod from time to time,he likes that" Great Expectations

Webbiano · Jan 3, 2019

Mendoza said: ↑

Almost every historian of the times left Liston out, and this is before his tank job with Ali.

Most people who saw early boxing felt Fitz, Corbett, Jeffries and Johnson ( pre WW I fighters ) were better than Louis and Marciano up to the 1950's.

Two possibilities for their reasoning.

1 ) Maybe they were better.

2 ) Or maybe the competition post WW1 to 1962 was on the weaker side, so they just did not get the credit. I think point #2 has some validity.

The late 1950's to early 1960' was not a strong time for heavyweight boxing. It was a time smaller men mostly under 200 pounds, with just a few punchers in the group. The ones who could punch, aside from Liston were also on the chinny side. And the good boxers ( Aside from Liston ) were medium at best punchers. You could see why Nat was so salty.

1958

Floyd Patterson, Champion

Ingemar Johansson

Nino Valdes

Zora Folley

Henry Cooper

Willie Pastrano

Archie Moore

Eddie Machen

Brian London

Sonny Liston

Mike DeJohn

1959

Ingemar Johansson, Champion

Zora Folley

Floyd Patterson

Sonny Liston

Henry Cooper

Eddie Machen

Billy Hunter

Roy Harris

Mike DeJohn

Joe Erskine

Alex Miteff

1960
Floyd Patterson, Champion

Sonny Liston

Ingemar Johansson

Eddie Machen

Zora Folley

Henry Cooper

Mike DeJohn

Robert Cleroux

Alex Miteff

**** Richardson

1961

Floyd Patterson, Champion

Sonny Liston

Eddie Machen

Zora Folley

Alejandro Lavorante

Robert Cleroux

Ingemar Johansson

Cleveland Williams

Henry Cooper

Cassius Clay

George Logan

1962

Sonny Liston, Champion

Floyd Patterson

Cassius Clay

Doug Jones

Ingemar Johansson

Zora Folley

Cleveland Williams

Robert Cleroux

Billy Daniels

Archie Moore

Henry Cooper

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In all fairness I don't think them top 10s look that weak at all. This might be a little bit controversial, but I think the era gets unfairly underrated, mainly due to Patterson avoiding Liston for a long time.

InMemoryofJakeLamotta · Jan 3, 2019

Jel said: ↑

"His right hand, thrown with an effortless but deadly grace, enchanted his opponents with its sheer aesthetic beauty before laying them prostrate, separated from their senses in a way not seen since the halcyon days of Sullivan and the only-somewhat lesser fistic prowess of Louis."

That sort of thing?
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Yep!

InMemoryofJakeLamotta · Jan 3, 2019

FrankinDallas said: ↑

He was still in a cloud of ecstasy from seeing Jack Johnson in a bathtub.
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It's you! FRANK IN DALLAS not Franklin Dallas

GlaukosTheHammer · Jan 3, 2019

Heh, I agree with Nat mostly.

mrkoolkevin · May 3, 2019

Dubblechin said: ↑

This was sort of the beginning of the end of Fleischer's "reign of lies."

In the late 1950s, early 1960s, Bill Cayton started packaging and syndicating his boxing collection in various forms, like the Greatest Fights of the Century, to different television networks.

For basically the entirety of the 20th Century, unless you saw the films in a theater immediately after a fight, or attended a fight, you basically had to depend on writers like Fleischer to tell you who was good.

I posted in a thread on here before of the time Jim Jacobs showed the Corbett-Fitz fight to boxers and writers at someone's home in the 1960s, and people were laughing at how bad the boxers were until he told them who they were.

Fleischer peddled this garbage for the better part of the 20th century, and he could always say, "Well, I saw them and you didn't."

But once everyone could see the fighters, they knew he was full of it.

It's surprising how many just accepted what he said. Like someone said in another thread, one guy voted for Johnson as the greatest fighter because Fleischer said he was. The guy had never seen Johnson fight.

We've all seen Johnson fight. He wasn't the greatest. We've all seen Fitz and Corbett and Burns and McVey and Jefrries, and neither were they.
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Good post.

Seamus · May 3, 2019

At some point two the endeavors of boxing history and boxing nostalgia need to separate and become distinct fields.

BitPlayerVesti · May 3, 2019

Seamus said: ↑

At some point two the endeavors of boxing history and boxing nostalgia need to separate and become distinct fields.
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Fantasy fights aren't boxing history anyway.

Seamus · May 3, 2019

BitPlayerVesti said: ↑

Fantasy fights aren't boxing history anyway.
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But the arguments made on behalf of them are informed by boxing history... supposedly.

salsanchezfan · May 3, 2019

mrkoolkevin said: ↑

In discussing his vote for Jack Johnson in the "40 experts pick" poll, Fleischer starts off by insulting the past 40+ years of heavyweight fighters.

Fleischer: "There isn't an active heavyweight today who can be rated on a par with the majority of those who fought prior to the rise of Jack Dempsey to fistic fame. In the opinion of the writer, who has seen most of the heavyweights during the past 56 years, the present crop would have been meat for the stars of the past. Only Dempsey, Gene Tunney, Joe Louis and Rocky Marciano among those who came into prominence after World War One, compare favorably with the past masters." (RING Dec. 1962, p.9)
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He sounds like me, except that he's talking about heavyweights.

mrkoolkevin · Dec 21, 2020

Dubblechin said: ↑

This was sort of the beginning of the end of Fleischer's "reign of lies."

In the late 1950s, early 1960s, Bill Cayton started packaging and syndicating his boxing collection in various forms, like the Greatest Fights of the Century, to different television networks.

For basically the entirety of the 20th Century, unless you saw the films in a theater immediately after a fight, or attended a fight, you basically had to depend on writers like Fleischer to tell you who was good.

I posted in a thread on here before of the time Jim Jacobs showed the Corbett-Fitz fight to boxers and writers at someone's home in the 1960s, and people were laughing at how bad the boxers were until he told them who they were.

Fleischer peddled this garbage for the better part of the 20th century, and he could always say, "Well, I saw them and you didn't."

But once everyone could see the fighters, they knew he was full of it.

It's surprising how many just accepted what he said. Like someone said in another thread, one guy voted for Johnson as the greatest fighter because Fleischer said he was. The guy had never seen Johnson fight.

We've all seen Johnson fight. He wasn't the greatest. We've all seen Fitz and Corbett and Burns and McVey and Jefrries, and neither were they.
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klompton2 said: ↑

Fleischer waxes poetic about the pre WW1 heavyweights but how many and how much of them did he actually see? My guess is that prior to Jim Jacobs digging up film on those guys it was very little of them and Jacobs had Fleischer and his cohorts squarely in his sights when he said they were deluded old men who had vastly overrated their heroes and oftentimes couldn't even pick them out of a film.

Fleischer was based in New York. Pre WW1 was a time when travel wasn't exactly easy or quick. Most of these guys fought the vast majority of their fights outside of Fleischers area at a time when Fleischer was a school boy and later going to college. He always liked to pretend that he was at every fight everywhere it happened but you can catch him in lies sometimes later in life stating he was at this fight, or that fight when he couldn't possibly have been. My guess is that like a lot of people, he grew up reading about these guys, idolizing them, and yes, he saw them on occasion when he got the chance, but they were who peaked his interest and as such they have a special place in his heart. Nothing wrong with that but it doesn't make him the most objective observer when discussing them. But lets be fair, most of us are guilty of that. Im pretty surprised when, on the odd occasion, you hear some guy from a different era give props to the younger guys.
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Some very good posts in this thread...

djanders · Dec 22, 2020

Dubblechin said: ↑

This was sort of the beginning of the end of Fleischer's "reign of lies."

In the late 1950s, early 1960s, Bill Cayton started packaging and syndicating his boxing collection in various forms, like the Greatest Fights of the Century, to different television networks.

For basically the entirety of the 20th Century, unless you saw the films in a theater immediately after a fight, or attended a fight, you basically had to depend on writers like Fleischer to tell you who was good.

I posted in a thread on here before of the time Jim Jacobs showed the Corbett-Fitz fight to boxers and writers at someone's home in the 1960s, and people were laughing at how bad the boxers were until he told them who they were.

Fleischer peddled this garbage for the better part of the 20th century, and he could always say, "Well, I saw them and you didn't."

But once everyone could see the fighters, they knew he was full of it.

It's surprising how many just accepted what he said. Like someone said in another thread, one guy voted for Johnson as the greatest fighter because Fleischer said he was. The guy had never seen Johnson fight.

We've all seen Johnson fight. He wasn't the greatest. We've all seen Fitz and Corbett and Burns and McVey and Jefrries, and neither were they.
Click to expand...

I don't know. I wouldn't be surprised if the truth is somewhere between Fleischer and more modern thoughts. I may be mistaken, but I believe the fight Jacobs showed in the 60's was actually a reenactment of the actual fight (of which very little actually remains). What the people may have been laughing at was nothing more than the fact that the actors (Fitzsimmons and Corbett), in the reenactment, were not good actors. In fact, many of the very early boxing films are reenactments, and not the actual fights.

mrkoolkevin · Dec 22, 2020

djanders said: ↑

I don't know. I wouldn't be surprised if the truth is somewhere between Fleischer and more modern thoughts. I may be mistaken, but I believe the fight Jacobs showed in the 60's was actually a reenactment of the actual fight (of which very little actually remains). What the people may have been laughing at was nothing more than the fact that the actors (Fitzsimmons and Corbett), in the reenactment, were not good actors. In fact, many of the very early boxing films are reenactments, and not the actual fights.
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Jacobs had previously-unseen films of actual fights too:

https://www.boxingforum24.com/threa...acobs-films-views-on-old-heavyweights.623760/

https://www.boxingforum24.com/threads/1966-sports-illustrated-article-on-jim-jacobs.585395/

Jason Thomas · Dec 22, 2020

djanders said: ↑

I don't know. I wouldn't be surprised if the truth is somewhere between Fleischer and more modern thoughts. I may be mistaken, but I believe the fight Jacobs showed in the 60's was actually a reenactment of the actual fight (of which very little actually remains). What the people may have been laughing at was nothing more than the fact that the actors (Fitzsimmons and Corbett), in the reenactment, were not good actors. In fact, many of the very early boxing films are reenactments, and not the actual fights.
Click to expand...

I think CBS showed highlights of the Jacobs collection in 1962 on a wintry sunday afternoon. Around two hours worth. I watched it. Off memory, the Fitz-Corbett and Johnson-Jeffries fights were the same ones we see. Not reenactments. And I think the others-Gans, McGovern, Dixon, Ketchel, etc. were of their real fights. Much was made of the first showing of Willard-Johnson.

I remember watching and being fascinated at seeing men The Ring Magazine contained so much about but whom I had never seen.

Dubblechin · Dec 22, 2020

djanders said: ↑

I don't know. I wouldn't be surprised if the truth is somewhere between Fleischer and more modern thoughts. I may be mistaken, but I believe the fight Jacobs showed in the 60's was actually a reenactment of the actual fight (of which very little actually remains). What the people may have been laughing at was nothing more than the fact that the actors (Fitzsimmons and Corbett), in the reenactment, were not good actors. In fact, many of the very early boxing films are reenactments, and not the actual fights.
Click to expand...

It wasn't. I've copied and pasted the article before. He showed them the Fitz-Corbett fight.

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Fleisher badmouthing recent heavyweights (RING, 1962)

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Fleisher badmouthing recent heavyweights (RING, 1962)

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