Flynn KO's Dempsey--Ringside Report

Honest man. :good

I will say that it's not be all end all. Dempsey, if i remember correct, was fighting at least every month, sometimes against worthy opponents, sometimes not, but it's bound to go wrong sometimes. In that sense there are softening circumstances, but not something that can be forgotten (like Johnson-Choynksi), either.

 

Ted Spoon has never counted out the possibility of Dempsey losing out legitimately on this one, but what to do about the surrounding stories?

Did Dempsey really break his right hand in a bowling alley while picking up change? It's one of those close-nit episodes that sound too random to be false.

And at what weight do we take it? While this was just prior to his steam rolling in 1918, Jack was walking on a very tight wire before Kearn's and Deforrest came to his aid, often coming into fights very underfed with no time for training.

Whatever ever truly transpired was later wiped clean by Dempsey when he came back to knock Flynn out of the ring in 1.

 

Personaly I group dubious fights into yes, no and maybees.

This one for me is a maybee.

We can never know for sure whether Gans dived against McGovern for example.

The purpetrators usualy take the truth to the grave with them.

For Dempsey part he never claimed that he took a dive in this fight and he gave widely differing and contradictory acounts of the fight on seperate ocasions.

 

It seems clear cut ... a young Dempsey who dedicated a whole chapter in his book to "I shudda warmed up" got caught cold ... however, he claimed he was knocked down three times and kept getting up, kind of like Witherspoon v.s. Smith, not flattened cold for a minute ...

Great work on the coverage ...

 

"Ted Spoon has never counted out the possibility of Dempsey losing out legitimately on this one, but what to do about the surrounding stories?

Did Dempsey really break his right hand in a bowling alley while picking up change? It's one of those close-nit episodes that sound too random to be false.

And at what weight do we take it? While this was just prior to his steam rolling in 1918, Jack was walking on a very tight wire before Kearn's and Deforrest came to his aid, often coming into fights very underfed with no time for training.

Whatever ever truly transpired was later wiped clean by Dempsey when he came back to knock Flynn out of the ring in 1. "

"Personaly I group dubious fights into yes, no and maybees.

This one for me is a maybee.

We can never know for sure whether Gans dived against McGovern for example.

The purpetrators usualy take the truth to the grave with them.

For Dempsey part he never claimed that he took a dive in this fight and he gave widely differing and contradictory acounts of the fight on seperate ocasions. "



Whatever...

Every fighter who loses has an excuse and if hes popular enough as Dempsey was a portion of his fans will always accept those excuses.

As for Gans-McGovern anyone who has seen the complete, unedited film of that fight, and who has done research on it, AND who either isnt biased in some form or has their head planted firmly up their ass can tell that fight is a dive.

 

I don't think it was a fix. Years ago I read book by Dempsy's daughter (good book) Her account sounded right. At time of fight, Dempsey was still inexperienced, and came into ring cold, not warmed up. Flynn jumped on him right away, and according to her, fight was stopped by Dempsey's brother (Which is not true if article posted is genuine) Dempsey did ko Flynn in 1st round of rematch, and stayed undefeated till Tunney fight 10 years later. Who knows, maybe it was a fix, I don't think so, but none of us will ever know.

 

Dempsey probably lunged in and missed like he did against Firpo and got KTFO for his trouble. Its happens in boxing, happened to Lennox against McCall

 

I'm starting to think this was no dive.

I don't think it's particularly scandalous or damning that a young Dempsey who fought frequently, perhaps was unprepared and had no amateur experience fought a veteran who threw all his eggs in one basket and made an omelette out of Jack. I wouldn't hold it against him, Jack was an undeniably incredible talent, IMO perhaps the best athlete the division has seen after Ali and his rise to the top was stormy. You can hardly hold a loss like this against him.

 

If it was a fake it was a darn good one. I'm not going to wrack my brain on deciding this one. I do appreciate people doing good spade work to dig up these accounts.

 

Great thread.
I don't think this fight was fixed. It might have been, but you can say that about most fights.

Flynn probably taught Dempsey something. Going by the reports, he seems to have "out-Dempseyed" Dempsey with a fast aggressive start. That seems reasonable.

Interesting that Flynn was said to have fought Walcott. A walcott-Flynn fight is absent from the record books.

 

The more research done, the more clearer the picture becomes.

Dempsey was not only sparked in thsi fight, but probably a few others under different names.

His chin never realy improved, but he did work a lot on his reflexes and head movement as a means of defence.

Basically if the guy gets walloped flush there's a chance he's getting knocked down and quite possibly out.

 

Woah, barbados joe walcott knocked out Flynn in one round?

Any other evidence of that fight taking place?

 

What research suggests that ?