Harry Greb Confident He Can Beat Dempsey

What was the most disgusting in contemporary coverage was how "sporting writers" like Frank Menke & Co. tried all they could to put the blame on Wills as supposedly ducking every tough challenger and "frightened" at the thought that Dempsey would consent to meet him. Tunney mentioned in his auto-bio that he paid percentage of his purses to a couple of New York journalists to get good press coverage, I have little doubt one of these was Frank Menke. A journalist wh or e.

 

No, you can't face them all. But Holmes failure to meet Page and Thomas is held against him. And who other HOF:er besides Dempsey failed to take on his two clearly best contenders? Page and Thomas were among the best contenders, but not clearly above the best.

 

Why shouldn't we criticise his failure to face Greb and Wills?

Don't get me wrong, fighting Gibbons, Miske, Firpo, Sharkey and Tunney was all great.

He had to face Carp also.

But Brennan? Easily could have been Grey or Wills there.

 

If you know the history, and you do NOT, Fleischer took it upon himself to forse the erasure of the "color line" in heavyweight boxing. He did this by writing articles in RING to push and forse the issue. This was a journalist doing his best to change the national culture. Years later if you read his books not a mention of Dempsey being afraid or ducking Wills. Not a peep. Furthermore you see many references to Greb in his writings. Not a single peep regarding him fighting Dempsey. Not a peep that Dempsey was afraid to fight or ducked Greb? Why? Everyone pretty much understood Dempsey at 6'1. 190 pounds fighting a 5'8 165 pound middleweight would have been a mismatch. First solid blow by Dempsey ends the bout and sends the middleweight to the hospital.

 

Perry don't condescend to me and then just make up your own version of history. In 1921 Nat Fleischer picked Harry Wills to knock out Jack Dempsey and Tommy Gibbons. In 1922/23 he wrote that if Dempsey ended his career without ever having faced Wills it would prove he was afraid of him. He devotes a short chapter of his 1929 biography of Dempsey "The Idol of Fistiana" to Dempsey not facing Wills and outlines exactly how they ducked him in 1922. That chapter starts on page 50 since you didn't seem to be aware of it. In 1960 Fleischer stated that Liston was being ducked by the champion for the same reason Wills had been, because of his punching power.

I could give other examples but you would ignore them.

Lets not lose sight of the fact that Fleischer was bankrolled to start the Ring by Rickard in 1922 and that he was given an office in Rickard's building and often worked as a publicist for him and had a partnership with Dempsey in 1929. Fleischer also knew which side his bread was buttered on and that the Dempsey myth helped sell the very magazines that supported him but still found time to diplomatically point to Dempsey's refusal to face Wills on a regular basis throughout his life.

 

Can't believe this thread was even needed .. we have gone over this a thousand times, this must be the 20th thread on this one subject

 

If it was a such a mismatch, why was Dempsey alright fighting people who Grey had already beaten?

 

I don't care about today's writers. Menke was a syndicate writer who's pieces were printed in hundreds of newspapers across the US, and thus affected the opinion of fans significantly. Overall, the picture was distorted very much in favor of Dempsey at the expense of Wills' reputation. This had to be fixed sooner or later.

As for Greb bout, had Dempsey not mentioned his willingness to face him (directly or indirectly, by agreeing to meet the winner of a supposed "elimination" bout, which was won by Greb) on multiple occasions, nobody would have blamed Jack for not facing Harry, but he had, and therefore he has to take the blame for that bout not taking place. I also recall Kearns claimed he had been willing to match Dempsey with Greb, although that was after they parted ways.