Joe Louis vs. Billy Conn I

I was HYPED for this one. Really the first superfight of epic proportions for me. And yes, I know of Dempsey-Firpo. You call that a superfight?

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1. Conn was hitting but not hurting. I think he overdid the footwork a bit much in the 1st, thus producing the slip. Conn.
2. I sensed Joe was already mad at Conn after the 1st. He tried desperately to pin Conn, but struggled to. When he got Conn in the corners, Conn tied him up. When they weren't tied up, Joe had trouble landing cleanly on Conn who was able to duck underneath a lot of Louis' jabs and power shots. Conn's upper body strength was amazing actually. You could see Louis struggling to control him in the clinches. Louis.
3. Conn landed with moderate power that surprised me. There were a couple of good, short exchanges. Even.
4. Very good Conn round. He was very dominant with his quick flurries. Conn.
5. Louis dug in a lot of strong body shots. That was the most body punching I'd ever seen Louis do at one time actually. Louis.
6. Too little shown.
7. Even.
8. Conn landed with solid, fluid head and body flurries early. He landed a couple at the bell too. Conn.
9. More quick flurries from Conn. Conn.
10. Plenty of clinching. Even.
11. One of Conn's best moments of the fight. He had a lot of good flurries. Conn.
12. Ah, the legendary 12th. They were in close when the set-up occurred. Conn landed a left hook to the body then another to the head, then landed a right uppercut. Then a big left hook by Conn buckled Joe's knees, and another left hook had him backed into the ropes. They tied up again once more; Louis' footing was unsteady. Conn landed at least two more good left hooks before the round had ended. Oddly enough, Conn started heading to the wrong corner, not Louis. Conn.
13. The final round was a brutal slugfest. After an initial cautious beginning to it, Louis kicked things off with one of his patented left-rights, followed by furious uppercuts that snapped Conn's head back. In a rare moment when Joe was pinned on the ropes, Joe traded his uppercuts for Conn's hooks. After Louis had been in the spotlight with his big flurry, Conn opened up with a savage head and body attack of his own that had Louis almost reeling. Louis ate punch after punch until they clinched and the referee broke them. A right hook some time later hurt Conn to a degree, which paved the way for further punishing uppercuts by Louis. It was a left-right at 19: 42 of this video that was the beginning of the end for Conn. Louis scored with many good hooks and uppercuts to both head and body, as Conn staggered around defenseless. Finally a left hook and a right dropped Conn to the floor. Conn attempted to get up, but not in time.

I haven't done this for a while, but with a big superfight like this, it's only right I have some thoughts on it. I think this fight is overstated in two places:
1) The action. Some have called it a slugfest.
2) How far ahead Conn really was.

I actually don't find either too far off from the truth, but like I said, they're both overstated.
1) This was certainly no yawn of a fight, but was not a slugfest either, at least not until the last two rounds. That part of it was a slugfest. I remember thefightcity including it in the honorable mentions of their top 12 heavyweight slugfests of all time. That's laughable that this almost cracked the top 10. I also don't agree with Ring Magazine calling it the 6th greatest fight of all time, though it still is very great.
2) I used to read about this fight and so many sources made it sound like Louis was REALLY far behind. While he was behind enough that I don't think a championship round-sweep would have earned the victory, he was largely winning the fight for the first five rounds, which tends to get overlooked. My final score (which only accounts for 11 rounds, not including the 6th) was 6-2-3. That still would have lost Joe the fight though. Idk, I might be more flexible on this point than the other.

Verdict: Great, great fight. Very tactical for 10 rounds, for exciting for 3. One of Louis' greatest performances given how he saved his title from almost certain loss, not to mention in a great KO fashion. However, although Conn did lose, this probably stands as one of his best performances to have outboxed the great Joe Louis for 12 rounds, and nearly outfighting him in the finale. Btw, @Saintpat, round 13 should have been in those polls you took last year for best 13th rounds.

 

Oh yeah, I remember that now.

 

Yes, but the same was true of Louis.

 

that was the second fight he said that, I thought

 

Wdym?

 

Oh, yeah, you're right. Joe fought five times between those two fights, but the Al McCoy fight was the only one filmed. It was boring and insignificant. I saw no reason to post on it. McCoy's eye was closed at the end of five rounds, and I don't even think McCoy ever went down in the fight. Boring fight. Not a good performance by Louis at all.

 

Very true.

 

Good point chok. I actually said that as an observation, I completely forgot that that's what's said about the fight.