Pretty competitive? Dempsey got his ass handed to him both times and admitted it. After both fights his face looked like a well tenderized steak. After the first fight he was in such bad shape his handlers had to lead him over to Tunney just so he could find him to congratulate him. Dempsey was stumbling around the ring at the end of the second. He had been outjabbed, outhustled, outboxed, outsmarted, outgutted, and out everything elsed throughout both fights. In the second there were at least three occasions in which the radio announcer called Dempsey helpless and said he was ready to go down. In the first fight the radio announcer stated that Tunney was unquestionably Dempsey's master. Throughout the fight he was completely perplexed at Dempsey's inability to find Tunney and said over and over how this was not the Dempsey he expected to see. Dempsey himself said immediately after the fight that he knew he had lost by the 8th round. The films dont lie. Ive asked this before when someone has made this comical assertion and I'll ask again, if Dempsey was so competitive against Tunney what rounds did you give him of their 20 completed rounds? How many rounds did he win against Sharkey and which of those rounds came after he blatantly began fouling Sharkey out of frustration for being totally outboxed?
I see it different. I've watched everything I can get my hands on of both Tunney fights and prior to him fading, as he was past his prime, I see a competitive fight. He was never outgutted. That's just your Dempsey hatred coming out .. all the abouts to go down but he didn't .. No doubt Tunney won, he was prime and highly active .. I think a Dempsey with no legs gave some serious competition and was still the second best heavyweight in the world .. I also think in his prime he would have caught and stopped Tunney .. as far as Sharkey, I see it as having been a very competitive fight by the time of the KO ..
^ I agree on the Sharkey fight. I was impressed with Dempsey in that fight, looked to me he was coming on strong fouling or not. That fight was extremely competitive after the first couple of rounds. It was a grinder, workmanlike performance that was beginning to pay dividends. He planted his head into Sharkey's chest and just began to plug away forcing a battle of attrition. As for the Tunney fight, Jack tried to the very end I think out gutted is an unfair description I do believe he lost both fights clearly and was basically schooled by the younger fresher fighter. Outside of the 7th round it's hard to find rounds Dempsey won, although he was game til the end.
You must have been watching a different fight Broadcaster Graham McNamee told radio listeners that Dempsey was "groggy" and appeared to be "going" after a Sharkey barrage in the first, the third, and again in the sixth. James Dawson of the New York Times reported that Sharkey had "badly outboxed Dempsey," leaving the former champion to "flounder around the ring, flat-footed, bewildered, and staggering like a blind man finding his way." Harvey Woodruff of the Chicago Tribune considered Dempsey "finished" in the fourth and a "gory sight."
Competitive? HE, Dempsey probably won only 2 or 3 out of the 27 rounds he fought against Tunney and Sharkey. How is that competitive? What were you watching. Dempsey got his ears boxed off. Louis won more rounds against Charles and Marciano than Dempsey did against Sharkey and Tunney. Louis won about 5-6 rounds out of 23 rounds against Marciano and Charles.
hard to say both were past top form, style wise reflexes off power still there, it would be a different fight for both men against one another aged as opposed to a pressure cooking puncher like Marciano or a quick footed Tunney. This would be a fight between 2 punchers and it would be a toss up....rusty legs would not be a factor
Louis is absolutely painful to watch in the Marciano fight, a shell of a shell of his old self. Dempsey has his moments of fluidity and magic against Tunney, just couldn't put enough of them together in the right places or over the duration to turn the trick against such an elite boxer type. I'll take the 27 Dempsey.
This is not a fight I would want to see, uncomfortable viewing imo; 2 great fighters both pale shadows of themselves, it would make your heart ache, surely, to watch this?
be less painful seeing them fight each other than to see each of them battered by a young destroyer the way that one of them actually did.
He may have been past is prime..but he had this sudden explosiveness, evidenced in the Tunney and Sharkey fights that would have been potentially fatal to the severely depleted Joe Louis. Dempsey was like a grenade found on a beach from a past war that still had the capacity to kill...Dempsey retained to the end that explosiveness, even if everything else in his armory was shot.
LOL, Dempsey-Sharkey is like the Rorschach Test of fights .....:bbb I'm more with those who feel Dempsey was beggining to draw interest on body shots deposited.
Well put rc. While the rusty Dempsey, 3 years away from the ring had no legs anymore, his 7 punch barrage that nailed Gene Tunney in the 7th round each one on target was a reminder of bygone days when the Manassa Mauler was the greatest attraction in ring history...Watching those punches even in slow motion is beautiful to behold.:good
I disagree completely with the Sharkey fight and the descriptions of the Tunney fights .. back to the original question, I think he blows out the slow, plodding, one armed, powerless Louis that fought in 1951 .. I see Charles winning a near shut out over Louis in their 15 round bout .. as far as it being an even fight between Joe and Rocky through five rounds it was but that says a lot about the limitations of Rocky ..
