Harry Wills v Gene Tunney15rds?

Ed,
Since I am not the master of the quote button. lol I will take your questions and answer them one by one.

 

I will follow your lead, my answer is: It's not as complicated as you make it out to be.

 

My answer: Not really, for you maybe.

 

My answer: Right Wills had no movement just forward and back. Nobody said that Wills had to bounce around that's your interpretation. Wills would look pretty foolish bouncing around, not his style, imagine Liston trying to float like a butterfly, not happening.
Wills might have come up in the 20 rds or longer era, and stayed stuck in that era cos in the new era that style was fading into history. Take for instance his stance, now look at Bob Fitzsimmons a guy who started in the late 1800's. Wills and Fitzsimmons had the same stance. Boxing had progressed. What worked in the late 1800's and the early 1900's wasn't going to work in the '20's.

 

My answer: Yes it is obvious but Wills bouncing around are your words

 

My answer: I watched the fight again in slo mo, I didn't see seven jabs but I will give you the benefit of the doubt. The jabs were really a poking jab with no snap to it. FYI, a snapping jab doesnt mean the jab has to snap a guys head back.

 

It's not that hard to say count how many times Wills head snaps back after getting hit by Madden, and what punches did the snapping. This is relevant cos those are the same shots Dempsey would have landed, if Madden could land them, Dempsey could do the same but with way more power. Ck out the punches Dempsey used to destroy Firpo, nice short inside hooks.
Of course the Firpo and Madden fights were fought differently, Firpo was a brawler and Madden was a boxer who Wills had to chase. Wills best work was in the inside he rarely landed a big shot on the outside. What I saw was there was more inside stuff and clinching then there was any outside stuff. If you watch Wills throw on the outside it's mostly swings and misses.

 

You maybe are forgetting that Tunney was a well versed fighter and worked out strategies. He would have trained to fight Wills and would have seen what he had to do to beat Wills. My guess would be to fight on the outside and pot shotting Wills from the outside where Wills was vulnerable with jabs, and rights. He would have to stay away from Wills who would try to rough him up on the inside and stay away from the ropes. Wills as you saw in that "short' clip tended to lash out to try to catch a moving Madden, and he wasn't that successful.

 

[/QUOTE]

Please Tunney fought plenty of Jabbers, and quality jabbers at that. A plodding poking jab would have been easy meat for him.

Hope this clears up any questions you might have had.

 

Dempsey1234

I replied to your posts on the Gibbons thread. I don't have the time now, but I hope to come back and reply to you on this thread later, perhaps tomorrow.

 

I cant wait, I answered most of your posts on the Gibbons thread. Now I want to hear what you have to say about Tunney.

 

Tunney looks fantastic in film but to be fair we have Prime Tunney on film.

Wills looks pretty bad to me but he is past prime who knows how much of a drop off he had from his younger self. Dempsey himself looks much better against Willard than he does 8 years later vs Tunney.

Hard to know without seeing prime Wills. However going by the footage we have I would easily take Gene

 

All three were under six foot tall.

We don't have film of Loughran and Weinert against Tunney. As the Loughran fight was very close it is hard to judge without seeing it how much Loughran's jab bothered Tunney.

Weinert?

All I can say for certain here is that Wills handled him easier at 36 than Tunney was able to at 26.

Gibbons?

Had a jab, but it didn't seem all that effective on film against either Dempsey or Tunney. In fairness to Tommy, by the time he got around to these fights, his best days might well have been far in the past.

Wills was probably 6' 4". He weighed about 210 to 215.

Did Tunney fight anyone who was both 6' tall and 200 lbs. I don't think so. The about 5' 9" Heeney was the only guy over 200 that Tunney fought.

Wills would bring physical challenges to the table that Tunney never faced.

 

Here is the technical argument, not mine--

"One thing you need to know about the old silent movies. Sure they were shot at slower speeds than today's movies. But the main thing was that the camera was hand-cranked. The only form of speed regulation was the cameraman going 'one on thousand, two one thousand' as he rotated the handle. As a result, there wasn't any such thing as a standard silent speed. Old flicks ran at anywhere from 12 to 22 frames per second, with 16 to 20 fps being average."

I know. You see what you see, but what you are seeing is a film, not reality, and subject to speed variation.