Fitzsimmons' Style In-Depth

i cant see the page

 

its just shows me tiny snippets.

You couldnt copy and paste the page as an image could you?

 

the first link worked good

From what i have seen. The empahsis was on countering the shot from the opponent with there own. This left them open to a follow up punch that to me indicates a lack of combination punching in that era.

The punching and slipping are almost exactly as they are today.

From these pictures i'd get the impression hes a clever counter puncher with precise accurate counters. He worked the body well also and had clever movement and side steps to avoid punches.

 

i have just scanned it quickly. Some of the interesting things i have noted are:

The foul Pivot blow. Is it performed as technically correct today?

The throw opponents left lead in the air block. I have never seen this today. It explains the weird Fitz vs Corbett pose with both arms flailing in the air.

In one of the pictures where Fitz shows how to stop the left hand lead, his right hand is actually in (shock and horror) a high guard position.

The famous solar plexus punch is in actual fact a left hand switch solar plexus punch, followed by a left uppercut to the chin. Was Corbett really knocked out by the solar plexus shot? Or was it the left Uppercut to the chin that Fitz says here.

 

great point there, but i think from the film it was the left to the body

 

Another thing i noticed from a quick scan of some of the rest of the book, is that Fitzimmons places his weight in the Corbett fight at about 10 lbs lighter than boxrec does.

 

interesting that, i didnt read the book just the pictures. Wonde which ones right?

 

He is truly an enigma. A physical description of him with spindly legs and a top heavy upper body would not lead one to think of him as a boxer. But I believe I read Nat Fleischer describe him as a terrible heavy puncher.

I guess it was Johnson that showed him his limitations.

 

I really dont think that Johnson showed him anything. He was so old then it isnt funny. I dont think there is a fighter his age whoever lived (including Foreman, Holyfield etc) that could beat Jack Johnson at that time. Also consider that it is widely acknowedged that his arm was injured going into the fight. Ineterestingly, the book also had a quote from Fitzsimmons saying that he was to retire after the Corbett fight as he had proved no fighter lived who he could not beat in a prize fight. If this is the case, it is quite possible that he actually did take it easy and lose the extra something, like Johnson, Willard Dempsey, Tyson etc all did, once they won the world title. The Jeffries defence was a good 2 years after the Corbett win, so who knows.

If anything, the Jeffries showed some form of limitation against big modern heavies, but he wasnt exactly disgraced in this fight either, so it isnt out of the question for him to defeat some modern superheavies. If he weighed at the middleweight limit when he won beat Corbett, i think that this was the biggest win ever by a middleweight and it solidifies him as the greatest middleweight ever and probably the greatest pound for pound fighter ever.

 

From what I've seen and read about Fitz, I get the sense that he was some kind of technician or counterpuncher, who looked good against fighters who came at him; but if a fighter made him come to them, he perhaps was open and vulnerable.

 

Fitzsimmons told Jim Jeffries that it was not a blow to the solar plexus that stipped Corbett but a blow to the inner margin lowest rib where it passed over the heart.