Harry Wills footage

I've seen the above footage before elsewhere but I must say the quality is Excellant here. Thanks for sharing. I can't help but feel as good as Wills was that his style plays into Dempsey's hands. He let's the opposition tee off on him before he ties up and mauls with his free hand with hooks and uppercuts. I think that would be a disaster against a murderous puncher like Dempsey. Firpo seems to hold his own until trhe knockdown, madden is too small and toyed with, and Wills is washed up for Uzcudun but I feel that stylistically that is the most similar style of opponent to Dempsey of the the three. Just not as fast or powerful.

 

Wills has gone up in my estimation massively I'm actually surprised how agile, quick and skilled Wills looks for a man his size in this era. He absolutely toyed with Firpo and Madden. A quick untelegraped step in jab, feints, counter punching, shifts weight very well inside generating allot of power.

I'd pick him over Dempsey and Jack Johnson, maybe Louis too.

Thanks for sharing

 

I thought Firpo and Wills actually looks like a decent scrap until Firpo gets illegally decked on the break. I wouldn't classify it as toyed, however most of the fight is not shown and I know Wills won pretty handily. I think what would hurt Wills is the excessive repeat opponents of his opposition. Mcvey, Thompson and Langford comprise about 40 fights. It may inflate his record. He is more mobile than most men his size for the day and certaintly would have posed a signifigant challenge to Dempsey. Dempsey certaintly faired better against Sharkey which is close to around the time they would of met in the 1924-1926 range.

 

Notice how Wills wobbles with Firpo with a JAB just before knocking him down. He owned Firpo.

 

Wills was 35 guys .. keep that in mind .. at 35 no one is close to his best ..

 

Yeah but Firpo still lasted distance with him, I can see Wills is the more skilled heavy but up until the knockdown it doesn't look like a one sided thrashing. It looks like two large bulls locking horns in a good tussle.

Yes Wills was long in the tooth and was not prime by the mid late twenties I am just referencing that, that is likely to have been when his fight with Dempsey would have taken place.

 

No it didn't Wills is clearly beating him to the punch while Firpo generally misses. There's obviously about 3 levels in class difference from the start.

A Dempsey fan complaining about illegal punches is a big hypocritical too.

The fight should have happened in 1919-1923 really, by 1925 Dempsey was taking the ****.

 

Awesome footage...It looks like he would have given Dempsey major trouble...Thanks for posting.

 

Who said anything about complaining or being a Dempsey fan. Don't be so sensitive power puncher. He did illegally hit him on the break, it's there to be seen. Dempsey had some iffy moments as well during his career but that wasn't the footage we were viewing. If someone is three class levels above another fighter it usually doesn't go the distance imo.

 

Awesome Quality!

 

I must be missing something.

Wills looks ordinary to me.

 

was this at about 3.11?

you can see that Firpo telegraphs his punches a lot and wills punches much shorter, quicker and compact. The telegraphing is Firpos main problem, i thought his actual technique was very ordinary and he pretty much just tried to land a big right hand, which Wills seemed to take quite well. Earlier on there was a very good uppercut from Firpo, which was his best punch in the scenes shown, but wills handled it very well.

The knockdown was in the clinch, but that was allowed under the rules, wasnt it?

To be fair to Firpo, i thought he took it pretty well and it didnt look to cause all that much damage at all.

I doubt that Wills would enjoy the same speed advantage against Dempsey as he did against Firpo. And i think that Firpo seemed to handle wills undoubted power better than he did Dempsey. YOu would have to think that based solely on the effort's against Firpo that Dempsey must start favourite against Wills, although i am not sure what would happen if Wills caught him the same way that Firpo was able to catch Dempsey.

Wills' footwork is another major plus to be considered, based on these videos, also.

 

Firpo looked a dangerous lump. That caveman right hand comes out of nowhere. Wills had his hands full with him. Wills had some moves but I was surprised most of it was based around infighting. I'd expected him to be more of a long range boxer, but fighters of the Jack Johnson- Dempsey period were expert at the shovel uppercut, arm pull turns and hitting and holding so it is not so surprising. He was very good at it. Top heavyweight, no doubt about it.

 

[url]http://www.boxing.com/the_trouble_with_harry.html[/url]

That is a good link and a fair assessment of both the Firpo match and a potential meeting with Dempsey. Boilermaker and choklab you make good points too.