Boxing Historians: Worst excuses ever used to duck a fighter

presumably he said "I'LL BE .... OWW my back!"

 

"My wife said I can't" - Lennox & Carl

Edit: Apparently Lennox' wife AND mum said he couldn't.

 

All too true.

Peter Fury regarding Hughie: "We had him checked again and he's got such bad acne - so bad that it's called something else - that it's having an adverse effect on his body, leaving him tired and fatigued."

http://www.skysports.com/boxing/new...p-up-delay-amid-health-issues-says-peter-fury

 

It "kind of is a duck" if your brother is the best heavyweight in the world and by far the toughest challenge out there and you know he's the only person out there who can probably beat you.

So, instead, the two of you form a promotional company and share all the titles ... and take a cut of the promotion of the other's guy's title defenses.

The heavyweight title isn't a TAG TEAM championship. But that's how the Klitschkos treated it ... at times they didn't even bother avenging their own losses and left it up to the other brother.

And interest in the heavyweight division all but vanished for the better part of a decade because the TWO BEST heavyweights by far made a pact never to fight and instead chose to fight lesser men.

The Klitschkos had no qualms about hitting each other in the head. They bragged about their intense sparring sessions against each other ... so intense they claimed they had to stop sparring each other.

Deciding work together to share all the belts and pin that decision on their mom was weak.

If Joshua, Wilder and Parker all formed their own promotional company tomorrow and vowed never to fight each other but instead took a share of each other's money from each defense ... so they could fight less and still make money on someone else defending a belt ... think that would be good for boxing?

That's what the Klitschkos did FOR YEARS.

 

I would have done the same if I was Ray. Why give someone a rematch when they won't give you any credit or respect for beating them the first time ?? Tommy needed the rematch more than Ray.

 

Yeah, but in what world has any fighter - especially one who was ahead on points and stopped with a round and a half to go - ever said, "Yeah, he clearly dominated me and knocked me out". It's just not going to happen. He was minutes from gaining a win, so of course he's going to gripe about that. I know I would.

 

Nothing wrong with Tommy wanting a rematch but the issue was he refused to give SRL any credit for winning.

 

Well, there have been cases of the champion signing a contract to meet the #1 contender, then backing out and never giving him a match for his title.

To me, this is the worst excuse as they had already signed to meet.

A champion can fight pretty much where he wants, with the rules he wants.

Two historic examples are Jack Johnson backing out of a signed contract to meet Sam Langford, and the staged event where Dempsey signed to meet Harry Wills, only to be overturned by the New York Atheltic Commission.

Langford and Wills were historically and financially robbed, and the fans missed out on what would have been a historic event in boxing history.

 

Except that Johnson was not the champion when he signed that contract in London in 1908.

Once champion he demanded $30,000 to defend his title," against all comers no one barred". The offer from the NSC was for £3000 about $6000.

As champion Johnson agreed to fight Langford twice but Joe Woodman could not come up with necessary guarantee the first time ,and Hugh McIntosh withdrew his offer for Johnson to fight both Langford and McVey in Australia in a two fight deal once Johnson went to trial.
All easily verified by anyone interested in the truth.
You keep repeating this and I'll keep correcting you and I have the primary sourced reports to back my posts up!

 

Except he pulled out of the contract in 1909 WHEN he was the champion. Nice try. That is the truth...and you know it. Johnson signed, then balked. He'd be sued these days...and shined big time for pulling a stunt like this.

The way you reply is to leave out information in hopes of the less informed believe you.

Do I really need to post more information on this?

This thread is a bit of a double-edged ax as you are an adamant apologist for both fighters.

 

He refused to honour the contract of that there is no doubt,the bone of contention is that you said this.


"Well, there have been cases of the champion signing a contract to meet the #1 contender, then backing out and never giving him a match for his title."
1.First off Johnson was not the champion when he signed the contract .
2.Langford was not the number one challenger when Johnson signed that contract,Johnson was!
The history of this arrangement is easy to discern.
Peggy Bettinson, the matchmaker at the National Sporting Club Covent Garden saw a chance to sign Johnson to fight Langford.He offered Johnson and Sam Fitzpatrick his then manager £3000 [$6000] to fight Langford in Feb 1909. Johnson and Fitzpatrick accepted and signed for the fight,but once Johnson ,who had taken the short end of the purse against Burns[ just $5000] to entice the champion into the ring, became champion himself he decided he wanted the same purse for defending his title as Burns had received against him namely $30,000. Since Bettinson would not up his offer , Johnson reneged on the contract. In short he broke his word. You can say since he had put his name to the contract he should have gone through with the fight and I would agree.
Johnson was a pragmatist'
He had been chasing both Jeffries and Burns for title shots for years,and at the age of 30 he knew he would not have many years in which to make his championship profitable.
He set a price of $30,000 defence, no one barred if they could come up with $$$.
That was his way of excusing his actions.

I'm always up for,posting any primary information that is required to back up my sources, yet you are singularly lacking in responding in kind yourself!

 

I can quote sources all day. 1 ) you tend to ignore them. 2 ) Unlike yourself, I seldom need them.

But just for you, Jack Johnson signs, DUCKS SAM LANGFORD!

My source, Clay Moyle's Langford book!

>>>May 3, 1909 – The World (New York) when Johnson was champion.

Black Champion Proves He Tampers With The Truth.

His Agreement to Box Before the National Sporting Club of London Was Signed with His Own Hand.

He Tried to Shift the Responsibility to Others.
World Produces Photograph of His Signed Letter - Opinion of Secretary of Club.

By William P. McLoughlin

Very few persons who have followed the course of Mistah Jack Johnson since he won the heavyweight championship of the world by walloping little Tommy Burns need to be told of the absolute indifference of the big negro to either truth or candor. Those, however, who like the man from Missouri, must "be shown" before they will believe and derive the most convincing proof of Johnson's dishonorable character from the letter which I print in this column and the photographic facsimile which accompanied that letter from London.

It will be remembered that the moment Johnson was proclaimed heavyweight champion he began to suffer from what a facetious friend of mine would call "elephantiasis of the cranium," but which the erudite Kid Griffo describes as the "swelled cocoa."

Dropped His Friends Overboard:

Johnson as soon as he gained the title, had no further use for the men who had stood by him when he was hustling after a snack of pork and chicken. Sam Fitzpatrick, who went broke and kept on borrowing from his friends to grub stake Johnson in the vague hope of getting it back when he would succeed in working the negro into the championship class, was cast aside. Johnson gave no earthly reason for this act of gross ingratitude. Fitzpatrick the faithful had to beat it back to San Francisco from Australia with all his pockets turned inside out, while the slugger he befriended arrived with bulging pocketbook and a bushel of resin unerative contracts.

More offers were made here. The negro promptly began to sidestep those to which he was already bound so as to hitch up with newer and more liberal ones. Right and left he disregarded his moral as well as literal obligations. So far did he go in this direction that in order to allay in some measure the popular indignation he began to worse than romance. He liked like the lamented Joe Mulhatton or Tom Ochiltree. He was worse than a gas meter. He blamed this, that or the other person for having signed contracts for him of which he knew nothing whatsoever.

When he threw over his agreement to box Sam Langford before the National Sporting Club in London, he declared that he had never agreed to any such proposition.

The Proof of It Is Here:

I am enabled today to present a damming proof of the four-flushing negro's duplicity and bad faith. The photograph (next column) shows Johnson's own letter to the club, signed by himself, in which he makes the offer to meet Langford. The camera does not lie.

Following is a letter from Mr. Bettinson, secretary of the National Sporting Club, which I received today:

National Sporting Club, Ltd.,
Covent Garden, W.C.
April 23, 1909

Dear Sir - I cabled you the other day that Johnson's statements were untrue, in consequence of several American newspaper cuttings I had received, in which he stated he repudiated Fitzpatrick's contracts, as if he had not any knowledge of what had been done.

Of course you will see by the enclosed photograph, that Johnson was absolutely personally responsible. In fact, the suggestion to box Langford for the same purse, win or lose, with Burns, came from him; and at the time, I thought it very decent of him to make the offer. The club did not ask him to do so, and I am quite certain we should always have been willing to have made a bigger offer, in the event of a victory over Burns. However, he is a ******, and a very bad type of one; and, as far as the club is concerned, we do not wish to bother about him, but when I see him making lying statements in the American Papers, I think it only right that I should repudiate them.

I think Johnson is throwing away the substance for the shadow, as he had 6,000 pounds worth of contracts booked up in London for six months of easy work. Of course, he may get more money in American, but I think this is pretty good booking for a black man.

I am pleased to say, we have got a good English champion. He is a big fellow, fourteen stone, and can really box well. He knocked out Moir in 2 min. 47 sec. on Monday evening last, and could do it at any time when called upon. Personally, I think he would have a great chance with Tommy Burns. How he will fare with Langford, I do not know, but he is very confident that no twelve-stone man can beat him. As a matter of fact he has seen Johnson, and think he could beat him. Still, we must wait to see how he goes with Langford before saying too much.

Sincerely yours,

A.F. Bettinson

No wonder Johnson is hissed and hooted at his every appearance on the stage here. Lovers of boxing the world over are naturally lovers of fair play. There is no other game which is so keenly sensitive to the touch of dishonor, and when there comes along a faker he generally reaps the reward for which he has sown the seen.

Langford is little better than Johnson. He has tricked and "pulled" and faked in the ring whenever it suited the purpose of his backers. He has hopped aside when Johnson almost caught with the goods on him.

I should like to see the two of 'em inside the ropes, and I'd like very much to see them wind up like the snake who got his tail in his mouth and swallowed himself holds bolus. I'd send a couple of wreaths.

 

To tell you the truth, I cannot come up with one example where a fighter lost a squeaker or had a fight stopped when he was ahead, and ever gave the official winner credit. And that never stopped a rematch when money talked. Ray as a rule never gave rematches to anyone after a close fight. Not Benitez, Hearns (their second fight came 8 years later) or Hagler. He fought a rematch with Duran but it was Duran giving him the rematch. So, IMO, that excuse that Leonard used for Hearns was just rhetoric so he could move on.

 

One of very few ducks I'm totally okay with. Fight would have been boring anyway, it's hard to get up the same killer instinct when across the ring from your own brother.