Fitzsimmons Against Todays Heavys

Just one point Mendoza states on the opening page of this thread, the Fitz v Ruhlin fight was filmed and of good quality.
"By the way the 1900 Ruhlin vs Fitz fight was filmed and according to what I read came out clear. Fitz looked great in the match."

It wasnt the equipment failed to start.A re-enactment using the real fighters was made by a shyster named Lublin who attempted to pass it off as the actual fight ,but when it was spotted that Corbett, who had been Ruhlin's chief second for the real fight was not in his corner during the re-enactment the film was exposed as a phoney.
The fight took place in MSG NYC and Corbett had returned to San Francisco and refused to come back for a fake fight . Ruhlin got such a hiding from Fitz that he had to wear stage make-up to cover his bruises in the faked fight. An account of the chicanery around this re-enactment can be found in Gilbert Odd's book on Fitz ,"The Fighting Blacksmith."
Adam Pollack also states the fight wasnt filmed ,as does Klompton I had a cash bet with Mendoza on this but he reneged on it saying the re-enactment proved the fight was "filmed".
Fitz would be up against it with modern heavies,they are so much bigger and with different techniques today.Janitor is right to praise Fitz for his conditioning.
He would run miles behind a trotting sulky,he was a terrific road runner.

 

Jack Johnson- " even when he missed, his swing made a noise like a swarm of bees " he was in his 40s then.

 

You mean today's heavies?? Wilder fury joshua??

 

Not the Valeuv of the Liakhovich fight. Nicky looked pretty damn good in that fight. His jab was working very well.

 

Incredible as it sounds, it is the truth!

 

Agreed, but he might be tempted to have a go!

This was not exactly a man who needed a precedent, before trying something!

 

lol

 

But his large body would be a large target for Fitz and he was slow as hell. Maybe he's tough enough to take anything Fitz could give, but I wouldn't bet on it.

 

That is some fair food for thought, but I must protest on several matters.
Factually: theabsolute shortest height I can find anywehere for James Toney is 5.9", & he may have been marginally taller.
Also: George Foreman is not what is meant by any conventional definition of a SHW.
Which is NOT pure weight, but height & weight when fairly lean.
George would fall at least a bit short on both counts.
Maybe he would barely make the latter when not dehydrated later in his second career.

Competitiveness: at least with Spinks, he absolutely would be unlikely to have beaten either Holmes or Cooney at 170.
He gained a large amount of muscle mass, & needed it to hang tough with Holmes, & overwhelm the much larger Cooney. Even if pound for pound he was better when smaller, he was not against all comers.

 

He’d probably do better against modern heavyweights than any other 160 pounder.

 

I think you're wrong.

Very wrong.


In fact I'm not sure how well he would do against today's MWs.