Did Dempsey duck Wills?

Does nobody know that in 1925 Dempsey signed to fight Wills? He signed to fight him but pulled out of the contract because he was garunteed 300K. The promoter (Fitsimmons) brought Dempsey a check for 25K. When Dempsey turned the check in at the bank it turned out it was a rubber check. I wouldn't fight for free either so i agree with his choice to withdraw.

Now as for Dempsey never having fought a great fight, one of the reasons that people say that is because all the film footage from that era is horrible. Fighters just didn't look as good because the filmed jerked, they showed it too fast, it skipped, fast hands couldn't be seen. Everyone looks like they have no skill what so ever and look very crude.

Another reason is the amount of time that has passed. No one remembers the non-champions. Soon people are going to be talking about how little skill Muhammad Ali had and how overrated he was. They're going to say he only beat slow bums with little skill. Thats how things fade with time. Dempsey beat an army of great fighters, but time forgets these great fighters and makes Dempsey look like an amateur.

The final reason is that Dempsey was just that good. His punching power overwhelmed many great fighters making them look pathetic (which they would next to him). Proof that his punching power could make them look like bums comes from the Firpo fight. To begin this story we start with Jess Willard. Willard hit so hard that he drove Bull Young's jaw bone into his brain. Thats a fairly hard punch. When he and Firpo fought, Firpo brushed off Willard's bombs (translates to: Firpo had one hell of a chin). Anyone who remebers the Firpo-Dempsey battle remembers that Dempsey sent Firpo crashing to the canvas seven times in the first round and twice in the second. Dempsey hit hard.

To wrap this all up not only did Dempsey no duck Wills, but he is definately an ATG.

 

I think Dempsey's daughter broke Seamus's heart

 

Nice post.

 

Dempsey ducked the best guys around who happened to be black, so how can I rank him as a true great. HE DUCKED THEM because he did not fight him, because no boxer in their right mind would turn down fighting for the championship. It is silly to cut it any other way, he is the only "Great" who gets to be great despite ducking the best fighters of his time. I wouldn't say Louis was great if he ducked all those great white fighters in the 30s.

 

Not that i agree with this, but according to many on this site the following greats ducked their best fighters:
John L Sullivan
Jack Johnson
Sugar Ray Robinson
Larry Holmes

So, even if true, Dempsey wouldnt be in bad company would he?

 

Couch....great post. Accurate and sensible.

 

The Robinson one is new to me. Johnson fought everyone in the top 10 so that has no merit (mcvey, langford, jeanette, jeffries, burns, fitzsimmons, denver ed, etc).
I don't see who Sullivan ducked.

Larry Holmes did duck the best fighters and he was never even a lineal champion (the lineal title was the wba that ali vacated and holmes never touched it). You are not a champ if you do not hold the belt the last champ held.

 

Couch, you posted what HAD to be said on ESB. Dempsey according to his peers was a killer in the ring. Today some misinformed posters see a film of Dempsey or others of his era on a HAND CRANKED camera, not in real time that makes those fighters look like Charley Chaplin did in the silent films of his era, along with Dempsey...I can ASSURE those posters that my dad for one, walked like anyone today did. Wouldn't it be wonderful if somehow they found film of Dempsey pre Willard, flattening Al Palzer, Carl Morris, Billy Miske, Gunboat Smith, Fred Fulton etc,all with modern camera's ?. Thousands of boxing writers, Fighters, Trainers, boxing fans ,
raved about the prime Jack Dempsey, and I will take their word about his
greatness over some posters on ESB, who NINETY years later denigrate
the Manassa Mauler...Who is closer to the truth ? The vast amount of
men who saw Dempsey fight or his naysayers almost a century later....???
Well said C...:good

 

Holmes was the lineal champion. Ali retired and holmes was the rightful next in line via his win over norton and an unretired ali. The wbc wba ibf etc belts have little meaning. That time frame was the beginning of the end of boxing as we knew it. The boxing commissions took control in a great effort to make as many bouts as possible...title bouts. All to bring in money to line their pockets. This is today why there are so many champions who should not be champions and why boxing is ruined as compared to what it once was.

 

Dempsey had a great defense....better than any hwt today by a huge margin that is for sure. The fluidity of his movements are lost in the poor quality of the film footage. I once had a huge library of fight films some very rare. Really don't need that today with YouTube around. Dempsey like any attacking fighter could be outboxed but he had great athleticism with his weaving bobbing style and unlike Frazier and Marciano mastered finer points of the game...feints, blocking/parrying/slipping and then countering to vital ears of the body. Dempsey in reality was more akin to Louis than Frazier or Marciano in this regard.

 

S, how do we differ on your post ? Of course Dempsey got Careless as he did with Firpo in the opening seconds. And he paid for it when he got hit in the head by the bullish but crude Firpo. But though in a fog, Dempsey had amazing recuperative powers, and fighting on instinct and primitive savagery he destroyed Firpo, in the next round with a one-two so fast and vicious that you can hardly see it in slow motion... Dempsey won a 15 round decision over a MASTER BOXER, Tommy Gibbons on,July 4, 1924 in a broiling sun. Dempsey,playboy that he was hadn't fought in TWO YEARS
prior to this bout, and he still outboxed a great boxer in Gibbons who about this time kod Kid Norfolk, and flattened Jack Bloomfield in spectacular fashion in London... Dempsey beat everyone he fought from Willard on,and
he would have given any fighter that ever lived a fight to the end when in his prime...In my opinion Joe Louis and Jack Dempsey though small compared to today's mastodons, had the perfect combination of handspeed
and coordination mixed with great power that would overcome body mass.
And I will throw in a young Mike Tyson in the mix...Speed and coordination
trumps body mass for heavyweights I believe, and Dempsey and Louis
proved that in their destruction of much bigger men...ciao...

 

Todays bigger hwts are predominately slow and low skilled. The greatest hwts are those who were quick and athletic.....Ali. Louis. Dempsey. Boxing is a sport of skill foremost. Louis or Dempsey and those like them could fell the largest of fighters with one well placed punch.

 

Just a thought here, but would Harry Wills have remained the no 2 Money earning heavyweight of the period, if he had not have ducked Jack Dempsey?