Where would you rank John L. Sullivan?

Name one M of Q heavyweight Sullivan defeated that you rate in the top 100:heavyweights of all time. Case closed.

 

True but he was ten generations before his time.

 

I don't have any of them in my top 100, but I also don't know enough about them to say that they couldn't have been.

 

Paddy Ryan, Jake Kilrain, Charlie Mitchell, Patsy Cardiff, Herbert Slade

 

You're either not serious and trolling or embarrassing yourself.

Anyone serious ?

 

I will ask you a serious question.

Is there any era since then, where you do not consider the second best heavyweight of the era to be a top 100 all time heavyweight?

If the answer is no, then there might be a case for the second best heavyweight from Sullivan's era, whoever you deem that to be.

 

Serious as a heart attack. Those men were made of tougher stuff than the show ponies we pay to watch these days.

 

Janitor, pathetic.

 

I'm not even sure you read English. Your jiggerish is irrelevant to the thread.

 

Not sure he even won the Cardiff fight. I'm with He grant here. Sullivan could of had a few scalps of some better fighters than Paddy Ryan, Jake Kilrain, Charlie Mitchell, Patsy Cardiff, Herbert Slade, Jack Burke (missed one)


Kilrain was pretty good but I think he was faded by the time the bout actually came around he had to wait like 16 months without fighting & basically watch his "being in shape" slip away.

I would of liked to see Sullivan face George Lablance or George old chocolate Godfrey both were his seniors. Sullivan faced none of the guy's before him which is really odd. not counting Ryan who was more a non-QB fighter and not that significant. Ryan was nothing more than Jem smith was to Kilrain (just a guy)>

Sullivan did not even face the top challengers (before Jackson) In Joe Mcauliffe & Pat Killen he faced the 3rd best of that time in Patsy Cardiff & it's quite questionable if he was capable of beating him he proved nothing in his bout with him.

He did attempt to face Godfrey and he attempted to face nonpareil jack dempsey.

He would of had a solid resume with all these opponent's (not counting Jackson) as i'm trying to give him a benefit of a doubt here.

But in Sullivan's defense I can't remember which Ref it was but He had Sullivan rated as the top of the pioneer's.

I would rephrase "Name one M of Q heavyweight Sullivan defeated that you rate in the top 100:heavyweights of all time."
To name one of a top 60 fighter he beat during the pioneer era.

The only one he has is Jake kilrain.
But as i stated he could of had several in Dempsey, godfrey, Lablance.
and unfortunately I truly feel he didn't face the best version of Kilrain. Sure Sullivan had to wait just as long as Jake did but some fighter age differently and it really affected poor Jake Kilrain.

And this being his very best win really makes me wonder. I have a video of "ranking John L Sullivan" on my channel.

I don't think he was anywhere near as good as the australians (as they were taught clinically) not self taught like sullivan & kilrain. They were the new Era fighters compared with these old "irish" dinosaurs and the gap was huge. Sullivan was buddies with Choynski after Joe Choynski faced Goddard & told him about him Sullivan wanted no part of them & he was in australian at the time. They rode back together dejected at the incredible gap between the style's. As all the aussie were trained by Larry Foley & Peter Jackson. I think even Sullivan would have trouble's with a Tom Lees much less a real heavyweight. As the australian's were light years more trained than them. They fought endless sparring sessions that Foley sent them through which Sullivan never did. He grant pointed this out in his post.

but I think on his very best day he could of maybe beat a Denver Ed Smith (another foreign fighter). Who beat a prime Goddard. Denver Ed had youth pure will & toughness unmatched, he was a rugged fighter that would cause any pioneer fighter trouble.
That's giving him every benefit of a doubt.
A very experienced George Godfrey was getting his brains beat out by Denver Ed Smith and Sullivan would really have his hands full but at his highest true potential that's about where I would guess he would be. In a very non bias approach.

 

I'm sorry that you think you were born into the most athletic generation in the history of the species. The men of Sullivan's era were more fit and virile than the coddled softies prancing around in sequins today. I'd take Joe Goddard, sober and trained, to tear a hole through the heavyweight division today. Peter Jackson presented him with the modern science of boxing and Goddard put him on his ass for the favor.

 

you keep completely straying from the topic of the thread ? Sullivan fought the worst level of competition of any heavyweight title holder by far. It was a sport in its infancy and he fought flat out worse than amateur boxers, he fought guys that would be in tough men contests for the most part other than Mitchell who was a middleweight. Sullivan was a physical marvel and a raw professional

 

In my view we really do not not know enough about John L. Sullivan or his competition to accurately rank him among the all time Heavyweights. What we have is his record (no doubt incomplete), his opponents' records (woefully incomplete), testimonies from people who actually saw him fight (mostly quite favorable), and Adam Pollack's well researched book (in which he seems to indicate that he believes Sullivan was not just a primitive brawler, and writes of his skills and ability as a boxer, while acknowledging that Sullivan had vices and faults as well). We, obviously, have no useful film of J.L. Based on what I have learned about John, I would hesitate to simply write him off. He may very well have been better than some today think he was, and I lean in that direction, personally, since I probably rank him higher than most moderns do.