Harry Greb Footage

No, but just as Walt Disney never saw Greb fight, neither did Bill Gallo. And by the time Gallo was writing on boxing, he was just another mindless simp two generations removed from Greb, whose nose was following money and access, and repeated the party line he was told to repeat. And yes, I've read his "writing".

 

Fact: There is more footage of Sammy Davis Jr boxing Wilt Chamberlain than there is of Greb.

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Fact: There is more footage of Jerry Lewis as a soldier than there is of Genghis Khan.

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Seamus is one of the voices of reason here.

 

Was Bill Gallo a twice undisputed WW champion with more wins over fellow HOFers than anyone other than Greb? No.. but Jimmy McLarnin was.. in an issue of Knockout he calls Harry Greb the greatest fighter he ever saw.. this comment was made in the 50s.. the plethora of greats McLarnin would have witnessed by that point is too many to list ... yet he still settled on Greb.. Are u seriously arguing a non comment by Gallo in an obscure & partially scripted VHS recording carries more weight than that? Why does Greb need an endorsement from Bill Gallo? Your argument is as flaky as it gets because you don't even know Gallos thoughts on Greb.. you're just attributing his omission in that conversation to a complete dismissal of Greb to prop up your own bias. You've been countered with numerous articles, rankings, books, scribes, historians, quotes etc that easily debunk your statements.. That video proves nothing. You've embarrassed yourself here.. not just for your petulant outbursts but for the lack of acknowledgement you give to anyone other than a fkin boxing cartoonist that you've probably only ever come across once or twice before yourself anyway. Draw me a river.

 

It seems bizarre in the extreme to claim that its unethical to apply wins or losses to a no decision fight when thats exactly what the experts, promoters, boxers, and fans did in that era.

 

Unethical.. Have u heard yourself? I tell you what's unethical.. basing Grebs standing on some cringe video of Bill Gallo from the 80s.. your interpretation of his popularity as a fighter has no bearing on his overall credibility because we have his record & achievements & we have the testimony of those that witnessed him. You can also clearly track his relevance over time by things such as ring Magazine who have consistently had him in their top all time MWs since day dot.. as was demonstrated to you. You've also completely undermined your entire argument here with this statement:

No, i wasnt 'going on' about Kaplan at all now was i.. I quoted him (among many others) just once here .. praising Greb in response to you trying to give the impression that Bill Gallos lack of acknowledgement is the be all & end all. On the one hand you're saying nobody was talking about Greb back then yet on the other hand you're saying Kaplan (who was a huge Greb advocate all of his life) was part of that set up, thereby clearly demonstrating that somebody WAS. How do you know Kaplan didn't advocate for his selection.. or maybe he wasn't even asked.. you just pick & choose who you want us to hear from because you have a chip on your shoulder over Greb.

You make zero sense. I don't base my argument or opinions solely on Kaplan anyway, that was just one quote.. you've completely embarrassed yourself in this thread & all you've proved is the polar opposite of what you set out to prove.

'Thanks for playing' .. who do you think you are? LMAO.. Bill Gallo is entitled to his opinions as are u, but don't throw them down our necks like they're the only ones that matter because in your case its been found severly wanting.

 

He had a clear bias against Greb, it's ok some do. Newspaper decisions were the thing in that era, but now we have "official" judges who always get it right. Ridiculous.

 

What a strange argument. At the end of the day boxing is two guys punching each other. Its a fight, its not brain surgery. If two random guys fight outside of a bar I dont need two judges and a referee to tell me who won with an “official” decision.

Likewise when there is a fight today and somebody posts a round by round on this forum for everyone who didnt buy it on pay per view, those tuning in are doing so because while a RBR isnt official it gives us an idea of how the fight played out and who won. When a fights official decision is close or controversial we seek out other opinions from experts to try to make sense of it. So the idea that we should just disregard media reports in an era when they were the rule not the exception is just wrong headed.

I think we also need to take into account this idea that official decisions are so infallible. In the 1940s and 1950s the sport of boxing was dominated by the Italian Mafia and the International Boxing Club. They routinely fixed fights, moved fighters who were undeserving through the ranks, and bought results. Why is that era with “official” decisions supposed to be so much more reliable than an era where you had to rely on a variety of opinions to get a clear picture of who won a fight?

Or what about the Don King era? How many shady “official” decisions did we see in that era? Lets take Lennox Lewis-Evander Holyfield I for example. That fight had an unsatisfactory outcome both in terms of action and the “official” decision. After the fight people were literally posting lists of the newspaper verdicts to try to make sense of it. To me the tepid action and muddy result was clearly designed by all involved to require a rematch and double up on the purse. How is this any different than what some are criticizing the no decision era for?

Care for another example? Go to Boxrec and look up Manny Pacquiao’s first fight with Tim Bradley. They have 125 newspaper and expert opinions on the scoring for that fight. If opinions dont matter then ask yourself why they eould do this. Because “official” decisions arent the be all and end all. A consensus of opinions gives us a much clearer picture of who won a fight than three officials.

As a result of this argument I went through and looked at Mr. Comptons book again and a couple of things struck me. First, Greb was winning newspaper decisions remarkably consistently. He wasnt just winning fights in towns where there were five newspapers and three voted for him and two for the other guy, he was winning fights were ALL of that towns papers voted for him and typically in overwhelming fashion. He was doing it all over the country, and often in the other fighters backyard or on neutral territory, not in his hometown as has been alleged. When you combine this level consistency with the results he was showing in fights that did go to an official decision you get a clear picture of why, in an era where we have wide access to these accounts its easy to see why appreciation of Greb has only grown as light as been shined on his accomplishments.

Finally, its not like people who have researched this era have falsified results for Greb in order to have him standout among his peers. Grebs contemporaries are being judged under the same standards they just dont exhibit the same level of consistency at such a high level of competition. This is made even more remarkable because of the frequency Harry Greb was fighting. Fighting that often he had to be laboring under injuries, cuts, fatigue, and all of the other issues that likely account for some of the losses on the records of other great fighters from the era.

There really is no other way to view Greb than a very special and very unique fighter and attempts to minimize his accomplishments seem petty and biased.

 

I once saw a training footage of Greb.It looked terrible

 

Good post. I think I'll be ordering Compton's book I've heard great things about it.

 

Excellent post.

 

First, I don't understand how "Don't change official records" is a strange argument.

Second, you don't need a consensus of opinions to determine if someone got knocked out or didn't get knocked out. You won a no-decision fight by KO. If you didn't win the fight by KO, then the official result was a no-decision.

Finally, anyone who says Greb won a no-decision fight by decision ... and is changing the official result to a newspaper win ... THAT IS FALSIFYING THE RESULT. You couldn't WIN a no-decision unless you knocked the guy out. You couldn't WIN a DECISION in a NO-DECISION fight.

So anyone who is saying one fighter or another won a no-decision by decision IS FALSIFYING the result.

They are. The official result was a no-decision. You couldn't win a decision in a no-decision.

HOW IS THIS NOT GETTING THROUGH?

Everyone who signed to compete in a no-decision fight understood this. Everyone knew. Nobody had a problem with a ND on their record if no knockout was scored.

So, why do you guys have SUCH AN ISSUE with this?

TELL ME.

Explain yourselves.

 

A CONSENSUS of EVERYONE's opinions isn't how you determine an official result, though, is it?

But if that's what you all believe, why are you stopping? Newspapers continued to post who they thought won fights throughout the 20th century. RIGHT?

Most news organizations covering fights still do. Right?

So why are you stopping? Why are you guys NOT in favor of CHANGING ALL the official results to a CONSENSUS opinion?

Why are you stopping at only the fights we can't watch?

Is it because people who can see the fights you are changing the results on may not be in favor of you going back and rewriting history on fights they can see?

Is it because it's easier to toss official results on fights people can't watch, under the cover of darkness (no film)?

Start changing official results on fights they can see ... and see how long this nonsense holds up.

People are pissed Boxrec doesn't even include when a fight was for a WBA title now ... because they saw the fights and know they were for the WBA title.

Start changing the official results of fights they saw, and start naming new WINNERS and LOSERS on fights people can watch using the same "counting newspapers" formula.

Put the OFFICIAL RESULT of every fight ever fought that didn't end in a KO up for A CONSENSUS OPINION on who won.

See how long you go before the whole changing official results scheme gets trashed.

 

Nobody is changing the official result. Experts are merely using as many opinions as possible to determine how a fight played out. This was being done even in that era.

Can you show me widespread frustration akin to what you are exhibiting from the no-decision era when every paper covering a no decision result listed a winner? You cant because it was the norm. Thats why your contention that this is revisionist history is so strange. This doesnt just apply to Greb, it literally applies to every fighter in that era.

One mans opinion on the internet isnt going to change the fact that a wide consensus of opinion gives us a much more reliable take on a fight than even the official ruling of a three judges in any era.

To pretend that in a sporting event featuring two men fighting one another there couldnt possibly be one man or the other who performed better and “won” is crazy. Crazy.

If you honestly believe that these fights werent fought on the level and dont really count as real fights then put up or shut up and give specific examples that pertain to Greb illustrating this fact and why we should discount his entire body of work based on that. If you cant then you are just pissing in the wind.