"The relative merits of Jeffries and Sullivan...I have sparred with both...Jeff is stronger, much cleverer and fully as game. But Jeff was coached wrong -bent over- and all he could throw was a left swing. That stooping posture is only good for clinches and short-arm work. You can't lead properly with a straight punch. "When Jeff fought Corbett and Fitz, he looked straight up, and they didn't last long. When Sullivan met Corbett, had it been Jeff, he could not have lasted three rounds. "Sullivan's favourite blow was a right hand swing between the shoulder blades, on the back lung, not the jaw. The men he met were afraid and resorted to clinching and he would reach over and punch them in the back. A very effective blow. "Fitzsimmons probably was the greatest of the body-punchers. Whilst he was meeting all-comers he was advised to hit to the body as he was likely to kill some untrained man if he hit him upon the chin. He developed the "solar plexus punch" and was so pleased with it he used it to win many of his big fights. He hit Ruhlin so hard with it Gus thought he might not recover. No other fighter ever became so skillfull as Fitz at this punch. It was his pet, and he had a nack for landin it. "Jeffries, through studying Fitzsimmons became a terrible body-puncher. He knocked out Corbett with such a blow. He hammered Sharkey in the ribs until he cracked them. Sharkey never recovered from that beating. It was with a long left almost straight arm body-blow that Jeffries beat Fitz with in San Francisco. Fitz told me that he saw the blow coming but Jeffries gave it a peculiar curve that fooled him."
I felt he did get proper credit for it during his career. He knocked out Garcia in their rematch with his body attack, buckled Ali's left leg with a hard right to the gut in their second match, took the decision over Young on the strength of his body punching, and put on a clinic with multiple hooks to the body over the first several rounds against LeDoux. (Even with the two knockdowns Scott produced in the final round, Norton's early bodywork should have been enough to secure the decision. I thought LeDoux needed to knock him out to avoid a loss going into round ten, and he didn't quite pull it off.)
He also made the most visible impact to Ali's body out of any Ali opponent in their third fight. A lesser man would have taken a knee from this punch: [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ig2ls6_Wqmw[/ame] 6:58
Fitz had better results against common opponents, imo. He took out a prime Corbett with a bodyshot,stopped Sharkey twice ,something Jeffries could not do ,and gave Choynski himself a thorough lacing before stopping him.I would be surprised if Choynski did not rate Fitz above Jeff, at least as a puncher.
There is some gold in Choynski's opinion since he saw Sullivan in action, and fought Sharkey, Johnson, Jeffries, and Fitzsimmons. Regarding Choyniski opinion on Sullivan, we must remember that back in those days there was heavy clinch fighting. In heavyweight boxing, in-fighting is trench warfare, which is why so few modern heavyweights seek to stand and trade on the inside. In Sullivan's day in-fighting was common. Petty much anything above the belt were rules that could be bent during the action.
Don't foget Joe had some exhibition with John L. He really is in position to be a great observer on styles. Charlie Mitchell's thoughts would be interesting, also.
If memory serves me correct, he also considered an old Sullivan to be a class above Peter Jackson or anyone else, prior to the Corbett fight, of course.
