Floyd Mayweather, Jr. vs James J. Corbett, with poll

Floyd faints in the first 30 seconds when Corbett turns away from a punch and exposes his pale butt cheeks hanging out of his leather thong. Jim takes advantage of Floyd's discomfort and downs him with a flurry of slaps. Floyd struggles to his feet but Jim smashes him with a pansy like uppercut.

With Mauro Ranallo screaming "down goes Floyd! Down goes Floyd!" referee Laurence Cole steps in and DQ's Corbett.

Mayweather DQ win 1.

Adelaide Byrd had Floyd up 118-110 at the time of the stoppage.

 

I’m impressed.

A number of posts in and everyone has maturely resisted ANY gratuitous reference to Corbett’s greatest offensive asset - his thong. Oops, I did it again!

Size does begin to count at some time point. Corbett has a sufficient combination of size (advantage) and skill to get the UD at the least over 15 rounds.

Edit: @FrankinDallas slid in a “cheeky” post before mine. The flood gates have opened.

 

Sorry, but I couldn’t find the options:-

“Corbett wins, and I’ve worn a thong at least once. “ or “I’ve never worn a thong”.

I think this particular qualification or lack thereof could yield some interesting and useful data to take on board.

 

Never an amateur but sparred and trained at the dog pound boxing gym.

Also wouldn't Corbett be too big ???

 

I've never worn a thong, but often imagined doing so. Does that count for anythong?

 

Floyd I think. The rules haven't changed since the 1940's. He'd be more familiar with the environment. The equipment sure has, but that applies to both.

Corbett's bigger, but I bet he wouldn't try to impose his size... his ego would get in the way and he'd try to outsmart Mayweather and outbox him.
I don't believe he'd be able to. Nobody ever did. I don't think Corbett does either.

 

Let's review.

Of the other James J. Somethings that were HW champion over that forty year period, there is a direct correlation between not wearing a thong and retaining high favorability ratings on internet forums.

Boilermaker? Certainly paraded around in his fair share of tighty whities...but no thongs. Still charms young and old alike, faring surprisingly well in time machine h2h match-ups.

Cinderella Man? Why you'd be hard-pressed to find any pics of that prude in less than knee-length trunks! And his popularity has endured such that Russell Crowe* played him in a hit movie an entire century after Braddock won the belt.

*not directly pertinent, but it may an interesting footnote to boxing thong historians to know that Crowe's jockstrap worn in that film sold in auction for $7k.



The results are undeniable. You have three James J.'s, one of whom rocked a thong and has increasingly been viewed as a bum - while the other two didn't provide as much view of their bums ...and haven't.

 

I had hoped to end my Friday night without visualizing a man with a thong, yet here we are.

For the record, I have had 2 amateur matches, tons of sparring, and have never worn a thong.

Floyd fought a few larger 154 pound guys such as Oscar and Canelo (who likely rehydrated to 160 bare minimum) and Maidana who was like 165 on fight night. Corbett was 178 when he won the title, arguably his best performance so it's not too unfair to have him fight at a catchweight of let's say 170. Floyd agrees to be 160 to sort of meet him halfways so they'd both be slightly uncomfortable with Corbett having worse stamina and strength due to being drained while Floyd is a little stiffer and sluggish due to extra weight.

With that out of the way we have styles. Prime "pretty boy" era Floyd was a sizzling combination puncher who let his hands go while having responsible defense and slick movement. He was much more textbook than Corbett who used lots of jittery footwork, awkward upper body movement, and very weird looping shots. Both were actually decent body punchers.

"Money" Floyd was much more conservative rarely throwing more than 1-2 shots at a time and was focused more on survival and winning bouts with clean accurate punching, tight defense, and smooth counters.

I think even a drained Corbett could actually present some stylistic and physical problems. First of all he was 6'1 and was multiple inches taller than even the tallest Floyd opponent Corrales. As bad as he looks on film, he was rather quick on his feet and was used to taking blows from heavyweights and regardless of what quality you think those heavies had, he would probably not remotely be bothered by Floyd's shots. Corbett has a few similarities to Emmanuel Augustus who Floyd admitted gave him huge problems. The erratic movements and unorthodox style would probably infuriate Floyd, especially the older version who liked for guys to come to him so that he could play the Matador and use his defense.

I guess it boils down to if you think Floyd was skilled enough to overcome an enormous height+reach difference combined with sheer athleticism and a very puzzling and hard to predict style. Neither version of Floyd is knocking him out so this would be quite a nail biter, assuming Floyd doesn't drop an F word bomb that rhymes with the larvae of a fly and the fight gets called off due to Twitter outrage.

I say Corbett wins narrowly. They both would have a hard time hitting each other and they would both be trying desperately to make the other guy lead which never looks good.

 

That image is just a thong in your side.

 

Jimmy Corbett's style being compared to Augustus Burton....yikes,wasn't Augustus wearing a red thong when he fought Ward? Good call, GCC!