Dempsey vs james j jeffries

Everything you say are the typical mainstream Jeffries myth stories...he was unbeatable...noone gave him a chance etc....how does Jeff become so indestructible?? it is obvious those who thought he was indestructible were the white supporters of the era and oh by the way until he was begged and forced into actually fighting Johnson no one ever thought he would ever fight Johnson....gives a little boldness to the racists of the era that Jeff would win doesn't it without the fear of it actually happening?

 

I could give you a detailed case, backed by photographs and primary sources, if you want.

He was one of the stronger heavyweight champions, even to this day!

 

No it wasn't just his white supporters.

It was everybody, including his most vehement critics.

I would go as a far as to say, that no champion has ever had a greater aura of invincibility, in their own time.

He wasn't even a particularly popular champion incidentally, until Johnson won the title, and he was needed to save the white race.

 

I am at a loss as to how reasonable boxing fans can look at Jeffs history and with the sheer amount of salesman ship in the sport the constant hustling of promoters and managers trying to position their fighters as the top draw and all the years of the carney antics used by promoters since the age of Barnum and Bailey that fans today still can't see through the sensationalism and just look at the record the opponents the social issues etc.....of the time....there is nothing in the circumstances of his fights in which he did not have a huge size and strength advantage.....he was not taking brutal punishment from an equal athlete he took a beating from a retired(in the rematch) Middleweight in Fitz a LtHevyweight in Sharkey a less than durable fighter in Ruhlin an old and retired washed up fighter in Corbett he refused to fight fighters his size that were big enough to really hurt him or expose his strength as that of an oversized caveman beating up small men.....when did he have to go against the odds?? of course he was invincible fighting the fighters he beat....they had different vales then of fair sportsmanship and competition

I want to give Jeffries credit for what he was in his time....but when posters start comparing him to modern ATG's and repeat the same old stories the sports writers often repeat in a lazy style of shoddy writer work that just plays with the myth of a fighter that cannot be refuted because of lost video....too easy to call him an ATG without rebuttal and IMO it is an insult to anyone who dissects his career.

 

"gives a little boldness to the racists of the era . . . without the fear of it actually happening?"

You mean like all the Dempsey fans who are so confident Dempsey would easily beat Wills. As a matter of fact, Dempsey himself put his certainty about his superiority over Wills in print several times.

 

Okay, no doubt there was hype about Jeffries. But my observation is that the Jeff hype never compared to the Dempsey hype. Anyway, is the question at issue here how either of these men would do against modern super=heavyweights, or how a fight between the two of them would come off?

"look at the record"

Jeff won the championship w/o losing and didn't lose until he was 35 when he was beaten by an ATG. Dempsey lost several times, including getting taken out in one round by Flynn. The best fighter he met, Tunney, beat him twice.
It seems to me the only record advantage Dempsey has is that he beat a handful of really big guys while Jeff didn't have these types in his era to fight. Hard to convince me that the big fellows were really all that good when Dempsey generally had a much tougher time with smaller men like Tunney, Gibbons, Miske, etc. who were no bigger than the opponents Jeff was fighting.

 

"rather than risk him against a top black fighter with the size and power to spark him."

I wouldn't deny that Jeff earned scorn on this score for avoiding Johnson in 1904-05, but it strikes me as a biased criticism when the comparison is with Dempsey. What top black heavyweight did Dempsey fight who was of the historical stature of Johnson, Jackson, Armstrong, or Griffin? All these men were actual heavyweights. The only decent black fighter Dempsey fought was John Lester Johnson who was a light-heavyweight and whom Dempsey did not actually defeat.

 

I just found it odd reading through this thread that it became so much a bash Jeff thread with Jack Johnson actually more in evidence than Dempsey.

Fair enough to score Jeff for drawing the color line, but what is the relevance versus a Dempsey who also drew the color line and actually did not face the top black heavyweights Jeffries did.

Also, Jeff being a big fellow in and of itself is no criticism. He would probably have 30 or so pounds on Dempsey in this match-up. Fact of life in heavyweight boxing.

 

The relevance is if Fitz can hurt him, if Corbett can draw blood, if Ruhlin can rock him, and if a relatively lighter puncher Jack Johnson in comparison to Dempsey could hurt him and stop him then a faster of foot if not hand but more powerful Dempsey should wipe the floor with big Jeff....thread as with all Jeffries vs anyone threads it seems we are required to bring the myth of Jeffries back to earth in order to justify the argument.....What Jeff failed to do with small , old, drunk, retired and washed up fighters was overwhelm as easily as his myth suggests he should have.....at least with Dempsey with can watch his ability, speed and power. I would love to call Jeff the Foreman, Frazier, Tyson of his era because he was until the inflated claims which do not match up with his recorded results he simply was not devastating as some seem to think given his advantages. The whole argument in which I base my opinion on is how easily Johnson was able to beat up and overpower Jeff was proof that when Johnson fought Willard and went for broke trying to KO the man showed the difference in quality of opposition the hit Jeffs chin and his toughness when fighting a big capable heavyweight then fast forward to what Dempsey did to Willard in the first round vs the effort and how easily a determined Johnson's punches were shrugged off by Willard....some claim Johnson was cautious against Jeff I say he fought his normal fight.....some say it was competitive I say it was practically a shut out by Johnson when Johnson chose to not give away rounds....I say that Johnson relished the fight and stretched it out as long as he could given his being denied and Jeff retiring claiming their were no worthy challengers.....Johnson had 16 competitive fights against some of the top black fighters during a period while Jeff was champ and he was denied a shot.....I have the opinion that the fans opinions on Jeff historically is based off of the writings of a very biased and racists era and he was the first great white hope...America during this time had no shame in its opinions of blacks especially those like Johnson....Johnson challenged the great white champions racial supremacy and this was a sin at that time.....As far as Dempsey not fighting a black contender we can in a round about way give Johnson that credit also we know that Dempsey tried to match Wills and the match was quashed....every debate concerning Jeffries on this site requires a removing of Jeffs red cape off and taking the S off his chest

 

Some good posts!

 

To be fair to Jeffries, during his reign the biggest challengers,McVey,Martin,Johnson,Klondike were black , Jeffries wouldn't take a chance on losing his title to a man of colour and he openly said this many, many times.
This of course is the greatest negative against his title tenure ,but many white heavyweights drew the colour line.
Sullivan wouldn't fight Godfrey or Jackson.Once champion Corbett refused to defend against Jackson , as champion Fitzsimmons wouldn't go near him,Marvin Hart only fought Johnson,"I always said I'll never fight a ******,but I'll fight this one ,just to put him in his place."
McCarty on rising to prominence announced he would draw the colour line.Sharkey fought a black fighter early in his career got stopped and never fought another.Ruhlin left them alone too.
Fitz ,Jeffries, and Ruhlin were happy to employ the likes of Bob Armstrong,and Martin as sparring partners,but that's as near as they got to fighting them once the white boxers became champions or prominent contenders.
If Jeffries white challengers had been men as big as himself ,I'm sure he would have had no problem defending against them, but they weren't, even as an up and coming greenhorn many of his opponents were super middles and light heavies.In essence to exaggerate the point he was a giant fighting among pygmies, but, leaving aside the black fighters ,that was not his fault,no more than Willard enjoying a huge weight and size advantage over his opponents was his.
ps Willard on winning the title immediately announced he was drawing the colour line.
Jeffries did have this aura of invincibility about him, never very popular because he was a gruff surly man in crowds, he was a big muscular athlete and undefeated when he retired ,which was unique and the predominantly white boxing fans had only 3 champions before him to compare him to.
Sullivan was larger than life and loved by the masses ,Corbett never attracted the crowds affection, partly because of his style and also because he was a smug, toffy nosed *****,Fitz was a puckish sort of chap, a tremendously hard hitter but not a native American so the limits to his adulation were pre-ordained.
Jeffries was the big superman and the papers were happy to insert hyperbolic tales of him in their dailies, tales which the public lapped up. Disseminating the wheat from the chaff in these tales is pretty difficult.
If you believe he ran several miles with an antelope/elk on his shoulders then you probably believe he hoisted a 400lbs bale off the ground into a wagon,lifted a laden cart back on the road, etc.
Such stories are remarkably similar to those prattled about Sullivan except in his case it was a train engine he put back on the rails!
Film of Jeffries shows a well developed boxer,with excellent musculature for his time, today his physique would be signally unremarkable and he would be Tomasz Adamek size in stature,in effect a cruiser.
He was credited with being exceptionally strong, but he was pushing around older ,often inactive men giving away colossal amounts of poundage.Would he have been able to bully a Holyfield?
Fitz was a great puncher but by the time he fought Jeffries he was 37, had been inactive and his hands were going bad on him. The papers said that he would have won the return fight if he and Jeff were the same size and age,[he was spotting Jeffries 47lbs and 12 years!]
Jeffries shipped frightful punishment in this fight ,his nose was busted, he sustained deep gashes above and below his eyes yet he walked though the punches and Fitz busted his already bad hands on his bloody face .
Would Jeffries have been able to come through the shots of a prime Liston,a Dempsey , a Louis?
Very doubtful imo.
People have always needed heroes and the 1890's and early 1900's were no different in that respect.
Jeffries was great for his time but he had the advantage of feasting on smaller ,older foes.That needs to be taken into account when trying to evaluate him objectively.
I pick Dempsey to win the fight by either a late tko or a points win.I would expect it to be a terrific scrap, with both giving and taking tremendous blows but I see Jack prevailing, certainly no walk in the park for either man!
If Jeffries was in there with a Lewis,a Holmes,an Ali,I think he would be badly dominated and outboxed ,against a pure fighter, he always has a chance.

 

Is this the same McVey that I had a run in on the subject of Liston? Surely it can't be. He's making some similar arguments to what I made. * shakes head, walks off mumbling *

Good post btw.

 

No it's his ganger doppel!

 

The relevance issue was about the color line. I was not talking about Jeff's in ring performances, which certainly do matter, so why not stick to them.

"we know that Dempsey tried to match Wills"

Actually, Dempsey had an exclusive contract with Rickard and so the negotiation for a Wills fight was always a farce. Kevin Smith, who used to post on this board, explained that Dempsey had all sorts of legal escape hatches and this fight would never come off. His last post that I remember was why bother to discuss this issue with fans who simply repeat myths. Wills was a more popular challenger than Johnson and was actually the top contender longer, so Dempsey and his handlers were forced into going to lengths with signing charades that Jeff didn't need to. The bottom line for me is that I find Dempsey's assertions that he really wanted to fight Wills as convincing as Hitler's assertions that he really wanted peace.

But the facts are that neither man defended against the outstanding black challengers. If you want to rant about Jeff--okay. What you say is true. If you want to grant Dempsey a pass, it is your business, but I see the two, as well as Sullivan, Tunney, and the rest, as basically guys who drew the same color line. Jeff differs from Sullivan, Dempsey, and Tunney in that he did get into the ring with top black heavyweights like Johnson, Jackson, Armstrong, and Griffin at some point in his career.

But my main point is that this is all off the issue. Jeff and Dempsey both drew the color line as champions. Has nothing to with what would happen if the two in prime met in the ring.

"removing of Jeff's red cape off and taking the S off his chest"

Oh, come on. In fairness, the guy had a pretty good record. How many champions managed to win the title without ever losing, defended it several times, and retired undefeated? Ducking Johnson in 1904 and 1905 clouds his career and that is totally fair, but my take is that he is the only white American champion in the whole 20th century other than Marciano who has a strong claim of being the legitimately best heavyweight in the world based on what he actually did in the ring rather than on what his supporters claim he could do (Dempsey would have wiped the floor with Wills. Tunney would have dazzled Godfrey, etc.)

As for Johnson, I think he was at his best better than any version of Jeffries, but also in my opinion of any version of Dempsey. I don't think a 35 year old Dempsey would have done any better against him than Jeff did. So I don't see Johnson as relevant to a Jeff-Dempsey discussion.

I appreciate your take on Johnson and Jeffries and also Willard, but it does vary quite a bit from Johnson's take just before his death:

"Nat Fleischer, Editor of this publication, thinks that during my fighting career I earned the right to be designated as the greatest heavyweight fighter, considering all assets of a first rate ringman, and for this I am extremely grateful. That designation is open for wide discussion.
Tex Rickard,the man whose gambling brought to boxing the first million dollar gate and who, with the lure of $120,000 in gold, got me to fight Jim Jeffries in the latter's comback, didn't agree with Nat. He had his idol, the man whom I stopped in fifteen rounds--Jeffries, the great California Boilermaker. According to Tex, they came no greater in fighting qualities.
That prediction was made a few months before Rickard's death, when Gene Tunney was the heavyweight king. Since then we have had several other champs, the greatest of whom is the present king, Joe Louis, and I doubt Tex would have changed his mind if he were alive today. I am inclined to agree with Rickard, strange as it might seem, but I'm proud to have The Ring editor think of me in that vein."

Later, on the Johnson-Jeffries fight:

"A great fighter had fallen that day. A man whom I always cherished as a super-human ringman, had been taken into tow by me and that was something to cherish.
When I walked to my dressing room, I stopped momentarily as a thought came to me--I wonder what Jeff was like in his prime?"

Ring Magazine (July, 1946 issue)--"A Champ Recalls" by Jack Johnson.

You make much of of Willard beating an old and out of shape Johnson in a finish fight, after losing badly for 25 rounds. In the article I just quoted, Johnson gives a list of his best heavyweights, which includes Jeff and Dempsey, but Willard is never mentioned.

Can you name any major observer of the time who placed Willard above Jeffries?

 

Dempsey had no such contract with Rickard their arrangement was on a fight by fight basis.The Wills fight was mooted with different promoters at different times.Dempsey v Gibbons was not promoted by Rickard . Jeffries had several credible black challengers during his reign,Martin,McVey ,and Johnson to name three.Dempsey really only had Wills,who of course should have gotten his chance.