Would John L Sullivan have been a dominant figure ..

I may be the minority in this, but I still think he would be absolutely top of the tree. Sullivan was an absolutely insane talent, very fast for his size and a well schooled puncher. He would definitely be successful imo.

 

John L. Sullivan was the roughest man in the roughest era of boxing history.

 

Hi Guys.
Not so sure myself, as tough and tenacious as he might well have been, from what I have read ( how else ) he comes across as strong and, well little else, the talk of his stamina and durability has to be set against the rules of his generation where by a round ended when one or the other went to the floor, so in effect a " round " could last mere seconds or so, although it was a relivtltly a short span of years between his fighting and the likes of Fitz, Jeffries, Sharkey, and co, I believe boxing had moved on somewhat, and Sullivan would have looked rather pedestrian, and looking to hold and grab as he had done for most of his career, I would imagine, so all in all, I foresee the above mentioned having little trouble with the redoubtable John L, just my opinion.
stay safe guys, chat soon.
Mike.

 

The main question was if he was properly trained or not ... I agree he had natural talent .... strength, power, hand speed, chin and lil,ler instinct but the man was from a completely different era ... If Sullivan was brought along and actually fought real M of Q fighters and studied the craft he had terrific skills ...

 

I think he would have been a force for sure, hard to say if he would have been number 1.

 

Hed have a much tougher career but I do think he'd still be in the mix and arguably at the top. Fitz, Corbett and Jeffries would still be tough customers with very solid chances of winning themselves but Sullivan could be the favourite based on how well rounded he seemed to be. Rushing Fitz and Jeff could be a mistake but the Kilrain fight and Mitchell rematch showed that John L. could do more than just rush and slug with his opponent.

This is also assuming Sullivan doesn't self destruct within a few years of success like he did in real life, by 1884 he had already become a bit of a mess and he only won the title in 1882.

 

The vast majority of Sullivan's fights were with gloves, and this was his preferred style.

He only agreed to take bare knuckle fights, if there was a title claim that he couldn't secure any other way.

There is no question that he was an immensely successful fighter under Queensbury Rules.

The only thing that you might question, is whether the available Queensbury opposition was a strong as that from later eras.

 

Yes, he's among the greatest talents ever to bestride a ring and would be an elite factor in any era. The only thing holding him back would be his penchant for strong waters, skirt chasing and gluttony.

 

You repeat this endlessly without including the fact that his M of Q opposition was novice , the worst qualified opposition of any heavyweight champion in history. The best fighter he beat M of Q was Charlie Mitchell, a small middleweight .... and far and away he was the best man Sullivan fought his whole career till Corbett.

 

I repeat it endlessly because it is true, and some people are not getting their heads around it.

Whatever you can say about his Queensbury opposition, there is no particular reason to think that his bare knuckle opposition was any better.

In fact he fought everybody that he met in a bare knuckle fight in a Queensbury fight.

 

Hard question to answer either way.

Do the rules under which John L mainly fought and the manner in which he fought under those rules really allow for a positive or negative extrapolation of his demonstrated abilities into the realm of strict MOQ?

I tend to think not - very much guess work either way without sufficiently hard evidence to base one’s conclusions on but fun to discuss at any rate.

 

Make the case for Sullivan please I'm eager to read it.