Fleisher badmouthing recent heavyweights (RING, 1962)

To be fair, many of the boxing writers openly laughed at how bad Cassius Clay was for much of the 1960s, so it makes you wonder.

I never thought Corbett was much good though. His record isn't anything special. Beat a washed-up Sullivan.

 

Ah Okay. They saw about 18 minutes of the fight, including rest periods, then, since that is all that is left of the actual fight. The full fight was reenacted later. I believe a copy of that still exists, nearly complete.

 

More interesting rankings of Heavyweights, including Fleischer's and several other Boxing Historians: https://coxscorner.tripod.com/heavylists.htm

 

Dare I say Fliesher was beyond bias in this article? Him not having the ability too see Ali's style wasn't based on power but skill ,speed , and atheletiscim speaks volumes to this fact.
His bias expresses itself in the simple refusal to call "Clay" Ali , the name he adopted.
Sometimes the forest can't be seen because of the tree, Fliesher own words expresses his true motivation for his ranking of "Clay" not in the top ten.
His begrudgingly admitting Ali's technical abilities but in the same sentence mention his "attitude " to America speaks more of his politics than his unbiased view of Ali.
Sometimes, some points of view are so influenced by personal prejudice it blinds the writer to the obvious. This is what I get from Fliechers article.
This article should be placed with the flat Earth articles. A truly uneducated opnion, based on a personal perspective, based on personal prejudice.
Nothing more.

 

How many of the guys from the early 20th century did Fleischer actually see live? I am starting to doubt he actually saw Fitz or Sharkey or Jefferies live.

 

He was born in 1887. Unless he somehow had access to easy travel, i highly doubt he saw a peak Jefferies. I am pretty sure he saw Johnson at his peak though. I certanly don't think he saw Nonpariel Jack Dempsey or Fitzimmons or Corbett or Joe Gans at their peaks.

Like someone else in the thread stated, Fleischer grew up idolizing these guys. He obviously had a life long attachment to these guys.

Again, i am always interested to hear from people who saw these guys live so i would not dismiss their opinions. But he does come across as extremely biased.

 

I think there was a lot of showings of the Jeffries Vs Sharkey, and Fitzsimmons Vs Corbett films later.

Him not seeing them live doesn't mean he didn't see a lot of footage that's no longer extant.

 

I'm not sure that's fair.
Fleischer, as the article explains, stood by Ali when there was a campaign to completely disown him.
It would have been easy for The Ring to strip Ali of their recognition, and there was a lot of pressure on them to do so. They probably received letters and threats and concerns from advertisers and readers/subscribers. Fleischer probably received hundreds of personal calls about it.
But he stood firm and continued to regard Ali as the world's heavyweight champion.

 

Does my head in seeing Gene Tunney so high on all those lists, 3 bouts at Heavyweight does not warrant a place higher than Rocky Marciano or any accomplished Heavy for that matter even if 2 of those wins was Mr Dempsey. I know they're all professionals but their ranking criteria is insane or I'm just missing something.

 

Yeah,,,he beat the reputation of Sullivan

 

Nah. He was seen as a gifted fighter that had some fundamental flaws (pulling straight back from punches etc) that would be exposed by the best. I never seen anyone claim he was laughably bad.

And during his championship reign the opinion of him rose of course. He was seen by many during that time as a marvel. Don't think anyone that watched him against Liston, Patterson and Terrell etc laughed at how bad he was.

 

The interstate train network even in 1890-1900 was still pretty vast. My Grandfather’s Barber, who was close to Fleischer in age (Born in 1893) lived in Youngstown, Ohio and before having to report for duty for the First World War often would take a train to see fights in New York or Philly.

Here is a New York Train timetable from 1902
http://www.canadasouthern.com/caso/ptt/images/tt-0702.pdf

 

Yeah I've never understood the argument that some guy in 1910 couldn't have seen a fight in New Orleans or Reno even because he lived in New York or whatever.

I'm not saying Fleischer and others didn't tell lies but I suspect there's some fallacies about "travel in those days" on this site.
If we were talking 1840, 1850 or something, yeah, but late nineteenth and early twentieth century it was possible to get train just about anywhere surely.

 

Nat may have had a similar talent seeing every major fight like fellow New Yorker, Woody Allen had in Zelig.
Leonard Zelig could blend into countless events in history, an idea used again in Forest Gump.
Fleischer did make an indelible mark in heavyweight history by getting Jersey Joe flustered in Lewiston, Maine in 1965.