Gene Fullmer - The Cyclone

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Id be afraid to get in the ring with that guy!!!!!

 

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I don't like him, I think he was a cynically dirty fighter who was often protected by fighting in his own back yard.

 

He certainly threw the kitchen sink into every punch.

 

I think someone should defend Gene Fullmer on a couple of these charges.

"fighting in his own back yard"--I guess to Europeans and New Yorkers all these fights seem to be in his back yard, but--Fullmer did fight at home a lot. He was a draw there, but he won his titles by beating Sugar Ray Robinson, a New Yorker at that point, in New York, and Carmen Basilio in San Francisco. San Francisco is 736 miles from Salt Lake City (in contrast, London is 579 miles from Berlin) and one could hardly find two cities more different than Frisco and Salt Lake in the USA. LA is 688 miles from Salt Lake City and likewise culturally a polar opposite. On his way to the titles, Fullmer beat Gil Turner, Paul Pender, Charles Humez, Neal Rivers, and Wilfie Greaves in NYC, and Rocky Castellani in Cleveland, plus Tiger Jones in both Cleveland and Chicago. All these fights were east of the Mississippi. The fights with Milo Savage in San Antonio, Texas, and Del Flanagan in Butte, Montana, were hardly in Fullmer's home towns. Even Las Vegas is 420 miles from Salt Lake City, almost twice as far as Paris is from London. And having lived in Vegas, it is again nothing like Salt Lake City. Gambling and glitter is not Utah.

"Dirty"--I remember an article by Fritzie Zivic back about 1960 in which he offered to train Fullmer in fighting dirty as Fullmer was just not a dirty fighter. Zivic pointed out he didn't really butt, and never thumbed and rarely hit low. Fullmer is very rough and crude-appearing fighter. I saw his fights back in the day, but perhaps memory would fail me, but there is a lot of film of him and I am watching round after round and I don't see low blows. Fullmer throws side swinging arm punches but you are not going to hit a guy in the groin with a side swing. At worst you would hit the hip. But round after round I haven't seen low punches. As for butting and thumbing, can you name fights in which Fullmer wins on cuts. A really dirty fighters does that all the time but Fullmer never or rarely did. Fullmer does tend to plow in, but his "butts" would be to the shoulders or chests.

For those scoring him as a dirty fighter, how many rounds did he lose for fouling? Compared let's say to Henry Armstrong. Or even Sugar Ray Robinson?

Also, some knock him for clinching, but I see it in reverse. Fullmer doesn't clinch. He keeps right on fighting inside. His opponents try to clinch him, but he usually keeps his right hand free to punch. It looks rough, but I don't see anything against the rules, at least of American boxing of that era. Fighting out of a crouch and pounding away on the inside was accepted strategy. Frankly, it is why American boxing was more entertaining than the stand straight and jab Euro boxing.

 

Joey Giardello said he deliberately butted him, he called him a dirty a*s hole. Joe Miceli's wife shouted at him after her husbands fight with him," you should'nt fight dirty like that," he replied," I had to get even for my brother". Fullmer had 64 fights 30 of them in his back yard many of them of them with his local referee Ken Shulsen, one or two with another local third man Pete Giacomo and several with local judges Del Markham and Bob Yokom.I think he was protected at home and I think he was a dirty fighter. The king of billy- goating and rabbit punching.
Great sense of humour when interviewed though.

Any fighter dirtier than Zivic? How many times was he dsq'd?

 

Fullmer stated that he and Basilio had two great fights, but Basilio was just too small at MW.
He also stated both of them hated Robinson.

 

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three different issues raised--Fritzie. Fritz did say that he always knew where the ref was before he fouled and he made an art of getting away with it. Fullmer impressed as being too crude to cleverly foul and get away with it.

But to get to an issue there is a direct evidence of, Fullmer fought 34 of his 64 fights in Utah. 21 of his first 24 when he a young guy building a local rep were in Utah. 27 out of 40 after he became a national and then world class fighter were outside of Utah. He fought 11 fights in New York City, 6 in Madison Square Garden. In contrast, Carmen Basilio only fought 6 fights in NYC even though he was from the state of New York. His fights were mainly at Syracuse. Billy Conn from Pittsburgh only fought ten fights in NYC. Like Conn and Basilio, Fullmer was a local draw and so fought a lot of local fights, but not an unusual number, and the significant majority of his big fights were outside of Utah. The "home cooking" issue just doesn't wash. Fullmer first won the title from Robinson in New York City. He won the second time from Basilio at San Francisco.
Here is a list of locations for Fullmer's title fights-
New York City (1)
Chicago (1)
San Francisco (2)
Los Angeles (1)
Salt Lake City (3)
Las Vegas (3)
Bozeman, Mt (1)
Nigeria (1)
So three out of thirteen Fullmer championship fights were in Utah. Not a high total of hometown defenses in my judgment.

Rough fighting is so subjective that it is hard to debate. I haven't seen many low blows from Fullmer. His butting seems marginal. Giardello and Miceli's wife are not exactly objective observers.

 

Fullmer had the following major fights in Utah
Fernandez
Miceli
Webb
Giardello
Vejar
Turner
Greaves
Basilio
Panter
Savage
He had local referee Ken Shuler in at least 8 of his fights and local officials too.
Basilio and Tiger were fights in which Fullmer had to travel, one was for a vacant ttile the other was as a challenger. Hitting someone on the back of the head with rabbit punches isn't hard to see and Fullmer did it regularly,and they ddit call hima billy goat becuase he fought erect like a European boxer , he used his head and a lot!
I think I've proved my point,at least to my own satisfaction.

 

McVey

The Giardello fight was in Bozeman, Montana which is about 408 miles from Salt Lake City (somewhat less from the Utah border) across the rocky mountains and the states of Idaho and Wyoming. I know you are British so this mistake is understandable, but it is like mixing up London with Cardiff or something.

Basilio, Turner, Greaves, and Savage did lose fights to Fullmer in Utah, but Turner and Greaves also lost to him at Madison Square Garden, Basilio also lost to him at San Francisco, and Savage at San Antonio, Texas. This group doesn't prove anything.

Panter was a westerner also. I thought he fought out of Salt Lake, but I might be wrong and haven't got time to look it up now. Anyway, Panter, Vejar, and Miceli are not among the most formidable Fullmer opponents in my judgment. So your whole case boils down to Fernandez and Webb. But this isn't a lot of "home field" advantage. Defending your title in your home town isn't that unusual for any champion and 3 out of 13 fights is reasonable. So I don't think you have a good case at all on this point.

Dirty fighting is subjective and you certainly have a stronger case on that one. I have to have a retina operation this morning so I don't have time to respond now. Hopefully I will be able to in a few days. If you want to go into more depth with your critique of Fullmer, I will be looking up this thread when able.

 

All the very best with your op.