Does anyone still have Dempsey as a top ten heavy? Top 15?

He was ranked ahead of AJ?

 

Yes.

As I remember it, AJ had just lost to Ruiz when the fight happened, so Fury was #1 and Wilder was #2.

It was for the vacant lineal title, if you agree with the argument that Fury had resigned his status.

 

Not specifically long tenured champions, rather fighters dominant over the best of their era. I appreciate theres often a correlation between the two.

At their respective bests, Wills was dominant over slightly superior opposition than Dempsey for me, though it's close and I've no problem with them being ranked the other way around.

I've no problem with Ali over Louis and accept most have it that way.

Louis was more dominant over his, slightly weaker, best opposition, for longer, at or close to their respective primes, than Ali. So, theres an element of what you like, when ranking them. They are that close by my eye, I may as well had tossed a coin when choosing between them.

 

You’re making a Modern v. Classic comparison.

With that said, Larry still stands out for having not fought the best guys (namely Thomas, Dokes, Coetzee, Page and a Witherspoon rematch) although a case can be made that Cooney was the most qualified challenger available. With that said, Ali and Foreman preceding him and Tyson and Holyfield proceeding him did fight the best. Ditto Lewis. Wlad did too not counting Vitali.

The “face of an era” type champions who didn’t fight the best are basically Dempsey and Holmes imo. Not sure if I’m forgetting someone.

 

Probably others.

 

He might well have done, but we can't take that assumption at face value.

If Georges Charpentier had drawn the color line against Battling Siki, or Harry Greb had drawn the color line against Tiger Flowers, then they would probably have been heavier favorites than Dempsey over Wills.

My point is that these fights needed to happen.

Having said that, you can build a legacy without any potential challenger.

 

In terms of ATG rankings? Nope. Really hard to make room for him when I've got a guys like Tyson, Foreman, Wladmir, Holmes, and Frazier fighting for the 5-10 spots. They accomplished far more if we're being brutally honest and didn't hold up the color line.

H2H he doesn't quite make it either. For the first 3 rounds Dempsey is one of the most dangerous fighters of all time due to his blistering hand speed, lethal power, killer instinct, and fast starting. But against modern men over 220+ who have both size and skill, I have a hard time envisioning him keeping up outside a punchers chance. Against cruiser sized guys Dempsey is phenomenal however and I have no trouble putting him in the top 10.

 

I've read that claim before in one of this forum threads, but I have never seen any documentation. I've read over the years that Wills received $50,000 when promoter Floyd Fitzsimmons backed out of the fight, but accepting significant remuneration in exchange for releasing the promoter from his contractual obligation is not the same as declining to fight Dempsey.

Despite whatever he claimed, Dempsey was complicit in drawing the color line. If Dempsey had wanted to clean up the division, all he would have had to do was demand to defend his title against Wills before agreeing to fight anyone else. He had enough clout to do that and he had the support of the Licensing Dept. of the NY State Athletic commission which refused to sanction the Tunney I fight for NY because the Dempsey camp declined to fight Wills. Instead, Jack took what he thought would be the easy route and hid behind whatever hollow reasons Tex gave for moving the fight to Philadelphia for the express purpose of avoiding a fight with his leading contender, Harry Wills.

 

Was it really that simple, and is that even a realistic scenario?

Would you have expected Fury, Usky, Joshua or Wilder to have demanded one of the others, a a prerequisite for making obscene money fighting slightly easier opposition?

Those men will be comfortable in retirement whatever, while a fighter in Dempsey's era, needed to spin a few plates to secure that.

Dempsey wasn't afraid of Wills, or even facing him twice.

He was afraid of being poor again!

 

I think you are quite correct in saying that Dempsey was deathly afraid of returning to the poverty of his hobo days. But do you think the Wills fight would have drawn less than the Tunney fight? I think it was an even more attractive match than the Tunney bout from the box office standpoint either in New York or Philadelphia. Dempsey had kept the title on ice for three years at a time when the popularity of boxing was growing at the fastest rate it ever would, at least in the United States. The public was craving boxing action at the heavyweight level.

So Dempsey wasn't afraid of Wills? I'm sure you are correct, but that only makes Jack's refusal to fight him all the more egregious. If he wasn't avoiding him out of fear, then that adds more weight to the conclusion he was going along Rickard's decision to draw the color line. I might cut more slack to the Dempsey of 1919, but by 1926 he was schooled well enough in the ways of the world to stand up for himself.

I confess I know nothing about Fury, Usky (not sure I ever heard of "Usky"), or Wilder, never having seen them fight. I took a break from boxing around 1980 to pursue career matters. When I tried to come back to it in the 1990s, things were so confusing with all the added divisions and sanctioning bodies that I just gave up and went back to digging deeper into the history which had attracted me to the sport in the first place.

 

Who do you suggest? Bowe isn’t really a top 15 guy. I can’t rattle off pre-Dempsey guys’ resumes.

 

In my top ten for sure. I can pick apart almost any fighter’s career. But then there are the intangibles. Their overall impact and influence on the sport, Their dominance of an era, the style and intensity in which they fought. Dempsey checks all those boxes for me.

 

Top 15 for me

Louis
Ali
Holmes
Lewis
Wlad
Foreman
Marciano
Frazier
Holyfield
Tyson

11 Johnson
12 Liston
13 Dempsey

 

Nino Valdes was the number 1 contender in1953 &1954.Marciano did not fight him.

 

I think he'd still make the bottom half of my all time top 15 heavies. I'll give it some more thought. I'd rank him around third for the timeframe of 1900-49. Afterwards loads overtook him in my view.