1919 Jess Willard vs. 1988 Larry Holmes

LOL.. Yep.

I just pulled up Willard vs Johnson which was when Jess was presumably in his prime. He looks f-cking terrible. hands consistently low. Stance is way too wide. He tries to fluster his opponents by shufflng his hands which seldom works and when Johnson comes in he he swats at him like a fourteen year old highschool freshman in a lunch time scuffle. There are modern day 18 year old amateurs who would have schooled this guy.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74dnCeXI8MM

 

The evidence is all around you. All you have to do is stop arguing for one minute and look at it. Its all on film. Oh I forgot. WATCHING FIGHTS isn't a reliable source by your reckoning.

 

i'm one of the old farts that think Langford, Fitz, Johnson , Greb etc were really great fighter ever but Willard versus any version of Holmes, over twenty rounds Old Larry wins all twenty.easily.

 

There seem to be a few people saying that the evidence is obvious, and all around me, but nobody seems to be able to articulate what the evidence is.

If I told you that there was a teapot at the centre of the Earth, and responded to your requests for me to prove it by saying that it was obvious, you probably wouldn't be very impressed.

 

The problem there would would be that I couldn't "see" the teapot's location to verify it. Not the case for Willard's abilities when contrasted to his more modern counterparts, or at least to those who know what they are looking at.

 

You can see what Willard looks like on film, but you still have to justify why this translates into him losing to the fighters you say that he would lose to.

It is not good enough simply to say "I don't like the look of him on film, therefore its obvious".

By saying that he would lose to certain fighters, you are making a very specific assertion, which places a very specific burden of proof upon you.

Given the extreme and far reaching nature of what you claim, it would take something blinding.

If you cannot produce evidence that backs up that specific assertion, then the default position is that it is neither proven nor disproven.

 

Its a simple process really. When a fighter has glaring flaws that could very conceivably play right into the hands of other fighters who's strengths could be used to capitalize on them, then a reasonable conclusion can be made. Its certainly a lot more practical to study films of the compared fighters in question than using the testimony of a long dead sportswriter who sat several rows back at some of these fights while periodically looking down to write notes and ultimately didn't even live to see men who fought past 1950...

The only other evidence would be to build a time machine and put these fighters in the ring together which is impossible, but that hasn't stopped you from making your predictions.

 

Frankly I don't see how anyone can discredit studying ACTUAL fights as a conclusion building method. I mean what more is there?

 

LOL, I just spent hours searching for this next clip and i found out the last time i used it, John galt was actually the person posting all this talk about Willard and his lack of fundamentals. talk about history repeating.

Anyway, since so many are keen to use film to say how great modern boxing is, and delight in explaining how so many modern amateurs would beat Willard and resign him to never being a professional fighter, could you please explain to me how these mythical amateurs would fare in a fight with proven modern professionals like the former interim WBC Latino heavyweight champion, Matias Vidondo (pictured here in his one and only loss). I am going to assume that most people will considered that the other professional fighters that Vidondo knocked out in the first round or two are not in the same class as Willard, Moran, Johnson or anyone else mentioned in an old time newspaper report.

I do wait with baited breath for an explanation of how their footwork, conditioning, modern nutrition, positioning of hands etc was superior to a Prime Jess Willard.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EALcYERW-s0&feature=youtube_gdata_player

 

I don't consider statements by contemporary writers to be more important than film evidence, but I must insist that what a fighter actually accomplishes in the ring, is more important than film evidence every day of the week and twice on Sundays.

If it isn't, then why don't you make your living betting on the outcomes of boxing matches?

 

Holmes hands down. He is quite simply one of the best heavies ever. Look at him against Holyfield, relaxed crafty even a way past it Holmes wins this going away.

 

Jess Willard was not much good but all this talk of "18 year old amateurs" or "any decent amaterur" beating him is a bit far-fetched.
Oh, maybe in a 3 or 4 round amateur fight.

But Willard was obviously tough and durable.
And I think that punch that he landed on Johnson in the 26th round was a good one, and a good indication he'd be tough and dangerous in a 12 or 15 or 20+ round fight.

Yes, in the annals of boxing history, there are probably several, perhaps hundreds, of good professional contenders who would beat any version of Willard.

 

I think another point needs to be made here.

Some people are using the fact that Willard seems to have taken up boxing relatively late, and won the title while relatively inexperienced, as an argument against him.

In pretty much every other case where something like this has happened, it has been held up as an argument in the fighters favour.

Nobody says that Mike Tyson wasn't very good because he was only 19 when he beat Trevor Berbick, or that Joe Louis wasn't very good because he had only been fighting professionally for nine months, when he beat Primo Carnera.

If Willard coming into the game so late is such a big deal for people, then why are they not exalting him for his accomplishment in overcoming this obstacle, or taking it as evidence that he was actually pretty good?

 

Might is the operative word of course.

Proving it is obviously somewhat harder.