John L Sullivan vs Prime David Tua

Patsy Cardiff, 1887. Sullivan was active, and 28. He was lucky to draw. It was a bad decision.

 

The photos of Sullivan and Kilrain are interesting, but I don't know that they tell us that much.

Sullivan was frequently overweight, yes, which doesn't speak well of the era. Then again, Johnson and Ali held on for a while despite getting fat in some fights, and there are other elite fat fighters in history. So who knows for sure.

I once believed we could know a great deal about Sullivan's head to head abilities. I no longer hold this view. Too many unanswerables.

 

I've never seen a photo of either Johnson or Ali looking quite as out of shape as Sullivan in his pics.
I'm having a smile to myself now, picturing Jim Corbett's reaction to a mooted fight between Tua and himself !

 

Tua by murder

 

Johnson looks about as chubby in Willard as Sullivan's ring photos look in Kilrain. Both were exhausting hot-weather fights, so both were probably burning muscle tissue more than fat in the ring. Neither looked trim, even though both had a relatively impressive amount of stamina.

Dunno whether Johnson ever looked as fat as Sullivan against McCaffrey, though.

 

Corbett might be ill informed enough about modern boxing to take the fight after looking at Tua and thinking he's fighting "wrong."

 

He fought dirty and didn't follow the rules. He beat the old, small and inactive. None of his 5 round tussles qualify as real fights. He was out of shape and couldn't go 15 let alone 12 or 10. Boxing was a very " different " sport back then.

 

For all you know they looked like Floyd Mayweather.

 

It is highly unlikely that his complete record was 4-6-1.

 

Read the description of the Sullivan v McCaffrey fight. Here is a short encapsulation.

[url]John L. Sullivan Wins World Heavyweight Title (boxing360.com)[/url]
While you're at it take a gander at the copious spare tire around John L's mid- riff.

 

Sullivan broke his arm in this fight.

 

True. But the rules were more in flux back then, despite what MQR's text said.

He beat everybody. All of them could be criticized for some reason, but not all of them fit the old/small/inactive mold.

Which fights of his do you consider real fights?

The concussions he gave people in those fights were usually real enough.

He went 75 LPR style rounds as a way past prime shell, so I suspect the peak version had decent stamina.

Not that the peak version showed up much even when he was young...

 

Okay lets give him another 6 wins and no further defeats, does that sound fair?
This gives him a record of 10-6-1.

 

Which fight, didn't he hurt his arm in another fight besides this one.

 

Ever seen any pre WW1 fighter that resembled Mayweather,if you have ,name him.