How good was Dempsey's title reign?

Ring Magazine is about the worst source for this kind of information you can find. Like I said, show me where he was quoted as saying this during his life in a contemporary account. Not 30 years later in Ring Magazine by a writer who says "Greb admitted later...". Bull****. Ring Magazine was populated in large part by many of the same class of New York newspapermen who practiced a long and continuous character assassination of Greb. Greb was consistent throughout his life that he felt he could beat Dempsey and lobbyed very hard accordingly.

 

Some newspapermen did dismiss Greb because his size and lack of punch. But those men may well have been paid off by Dempsey and Kearns to write that stuff. Likewise, writers who were championing Greb could have been paid off too. But newspapers do tend to shape public perceptions. And the ideas were out there.

 

His size, yes, but there were at least as many who felt he was a threat to Dempsey. I have yet to see one paper that stated because he couldnt punch he didnt deserve a shot at the title. Some may have coupled that with his size but anyone who used punching power as a basis for a title shot would have been laughed out of a job.

 

I agree with that.
But the whole scenario points towards Dempsey's pathetic gross inactivity , his utter failure to defend his title often enough, as the real elephant in the room, NOT the specific "ducks" of Greb and Wills.
Look at all the "easy" fights that were missed too. Willard 2 was viable at one point, Carpentier in Europe, Brennan 3 ..... all missed opportunities.

 

Ironically enough, there are golden posts in all these Dempsey threads. Sometimes a needle in the haystack, but they're there. It seems to bring the best out of people. It doesn't make it any less like a twilight zone. The poll is the only refreshing aspect to the thread for me.

 

We already know how Suzie Jr. rates Liston's reign.

 

I dont think they were missed opportunities. Those were fights that, like the proposed gunboat smith championship fight, there was a backlash against. Willard was considered far too old, inactive, and out of shape to face Dempsey. When it looked like he might actually get a shot he was forced to submit to a battery of physical exams just to see if he was fit enough to box much less face the champion. That kind of publicity killed the match and Willard was forced back into contention.

I dont think anyone outside of Rickard, Kearns, and Dempsey, including Carpentier, wanted a second Dempsey-Carpentier bout. Im not even sure how that would have been sold to the public. The bloom was off the rose at that point. They basically kept Carpentier hidden from the public after the Levinsky fix in order to make sure that comparisons between himself and Dempsey were kept to a minimum. Once people saw what many insiders predicted: a one sided slaughter, I dont think a rematch would have done well at all. In Europe maybe but Kearns was far too smart to let Dempsey go to Europe and risk losing his title on a fix or some back room shinnanigans. I just dont see that fight as realistic option.

Some people were indeed interested in a Bill Brennan-Dempsey rubber match. But when was that going to happen? Kearns, and Rickard were not about to let either Dempsey or Carpentier fight anyone and risk losing prior to july 1921. The most realistic time for that fight would have been either just before or just after Dempsey's trip to Europe in 1922. The problem is that Brennan was injured (if memory serves) around the time Dempsey goes to Europe and is out of action for six months. He was already kind of fading from the scene a bit and this layoff didnt help as it allowed Gibbons and Firpo to start actively and somewhat successfully seeking acclaim as a challenger, overshadowing Brennan and anything he had done recently. The nail in the coffin came when Brennan returned and was outpointed by Johnson, and then a few months later nearly killed by Firpo. Johnson loses to Willard, Willard to Firpo, voila, you suddenly have a manufactured challenger based on all of these rather motley, but expertly promoted, HW fights.

 

I know you don't like the old Ring Magazine under Nat Fleischer. You have stated this repeatedly, but there were many fine honorable writers in the
magazines of that time ,who were honest and had not a whit to gain,relating this quote that Harry Greb expressed.
This quote i read was in a mag probably in the late thirties or early 1940s, and the writer most assuredly spoke to Harry Greb whilst Harry was still alive.
Wouldn't you think.?
Another thing : If Ring Magazine despised Harry Greb as much as you allege,
why then did Nat Fleischer just before his death, choose Harry Greb as the greatest middleweight in history, even replacing Stanley Ketchel as No.1,whom Fleischer years before rated as #1 middleweight ???
We, you and I, are tilting at windmills. Whether my quote I read, which was printed by a writer,was a falsehood on his part,I know not, but READ it I DID...Everyone of us who read about yesterday's boxers, must assume they are reporting the truth, many years before they reported their stories.
I believe that old writer who spoke to Harry Greb, was telling the truth as he
had nothing to gain by a false quote...

 

You keep giving out those B + grades to champions who don't defend there title vs their #s 1 and 2 contenders.

You would be the world's greatest critic! :happy

 

And how would you describe someone who thinks beating four separate HOFers in a title reign is only worth a "C"?

 

Like I said, post a source with an actual provenance otherwise its worse than meaningless. I dont care how much weight you put into the quote, if someone comes out 20 years later saying "greb said dempsey would kill him in private but i kept it secret all these years" sorry but that has bull**** written all over it in light of the actual historical record.