Do Dempsey's Words Hold Any Water on The Willis Situation?

Jack Johnson was an almost complete non-entity on the division during the vast majority of Greb's career. I hope you are joking.

 

I was sensationalising a little, and i am happy for you to reeducate me.

I realise that the press wasnt calling for Johnson fights or anything like that. In fact i think that you are correct in that he was a non entity in that Promoters, press, politicians etc all didnt want him to get another shot because of what happened in his first reign and this almost seems universal.

In the period we are talking, Johnson beat Tom Cowler, a good contender in 1919, which showed he was (or should have been in the mix as a word title contender). He spent, as i understand, much of 1920 and 1921 in prison, but he still had 4 wins from 5 fights, although against pretty ordinary opposition.

some people might find this article i just found interesting on his contest at the prison where he seemed to fight 3 fights in a day, and it seemed to indicate that he still looked in good shape.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9E06EEDE1631EF33A25755C2A9679D946195D6CF

Interestingly, when Battling Siki won the world light heavyweight title he Challenged Jack Dempsey, and also received offers to fight from both Harry Greb and Jack Johnson. So these two could not have been as far apart as each other as most seem to blindly accept. It wasnt until 1926 that Johnson lost to Eddie Lawson, who was definitely a comptetitive fighter. During this time, Johnson would have been a huge scalp on anyones resume. Greb could have fought Johnson at any time during this period and it would have given him a huge marketable angle for a shot at Dempsey. You would expect, given Johnsons age and preparation it would have been one of those easy fights where a young lion gets an old name on their resume (low risk v high reward). Of course, the problem is that if he had lost it, there is no way that Dempseys crew would give him a title shot, because Johnson seems to have been a political no go and it would not sit right to have a world champion who had just lost to Jack Johnson.

How would Johnson have gone at this point against Harry Greb? Common sense says age catches up to him and Harry wins. But i know i would not have risked my money betting against Jack Johnson.

 

Efforts were made to arrange a bout between Jack Johnson and Harry Wills but it ran into many of the same beurocratic barriers as the proposed Dempsey Wills title fight.

It seems that the p[owers that be didn't even want Johnson getting into the ring with a highly regarded black contender for fear that he would establish a strong claim for a title fight.

Even so I don't think that Johnson was a force to be reconed with when Harry Greb was taking on the heavyweights of the division.

If Wills is guilty of avoiding anybody it is probably Geoge Godfrey who was itching to get in the ring with Wills. His case obviously wasnt helped by his propensity for wearing the cuffs.

 

Wills actually turned down or ignored a number of repeated challenges from other contenders in his career - not only Godfrey, but also Gibbons, Tunney, and Miske.

The question though is, should he be accused of "ducking" other contenders if he was already the #1 contender and pursuing a possible fight with the champion at the time?

 

This was a partial chronology of some of their history, compiled by the Associated Press in late 1925:

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I think Wills probably knew he was some years past his best when Godfrey, Gibbons and Tunney wanted to fight him, and he probably figured winning an "eliminator" against any of them would mean ZILCH to his actual prospects of securing his long overdue shot at Dempsey.

They left him on the shelf and eventually he faced Sharkey when Dempsey and Tunney was done, and Sharkey beat him up.

Dempsey made the biggest mistake fighting Tunney instead of Wills. Historically he'd be praised for giving Wills his long overdue shot, and realistically Wills was probably more washed-up than Dempsey and stylistically easier than Tunney. Wills was probably there to be taken in 1926, and just looking for the payday. Dempsey was washed-up too but probably had more left than Wills, and more pop in his punches.

 

Of course not. He had already established himself as the #1 for a long, long period. He was promised a shot if he beat Fulton. He then destroyed him in 3 rounds, but of course never got a shot. Why should he keep playing that game?

Besides, as a contender you can't really duck someone in the first place.