Holyfield vs Jim Jefferies

The thing is, we don't know how good a boxer Jeffries was when he retired.

There were some people arguing that he had matured into a very good technician by the time of the second Corbett fight.

I wouldn't make Holyfield an automatic pick, even over fifteen rounds.

 

I have provided primary sources for some of Jeffries feats of strength previously.

Most of them you can dismiss, but the ones supported by primary evidence have to be taken seriously.

 

The strongest man who ever lived, Paul Anderson was absolutely useless when he tried boxing,so whats your point exactly?

 

We know two things.
1.Corbett was totally washed up for the second Jeffries fight so beating him easily proved Jack ****!
2. We know,because we have the news reports of the fight, that in the second Fitzsimmons fight, Fitz was able to hit Jeffries when and where he wanted,the accounts state he hit him at will .Given that Jeffries had no intervening fight between the 2nd Corbett fight and the 2nd Corbett fight a year later, what improvement in his technique could we reasonably expect him to have made!

 

Here's a feat of strength accomplished in the boxing ring... Going 12 rounds, largely at close quarters, with a 260 pound George Foreman. Now that was a feat of strength.

 

My point is that Jeffries strength is reliably documented.

Nothing more and nothing less.

We should acknowledge that, and move on to the next variable.

 

Do we really know that?

It doesn't seem to me that we can prove it one way or another.

There were people saying that Jeffries technique improved after the second Fitzsimmons fight.

I have produced the quotes previously.

We have to at least consider that they might have been on to something.

 

I think we also have to consider, that those who felt that Jeff "had matured into a very good technician by the time of the second Corbett fight", based that on what they saw almost 120 years ago.

So we have to ask: What did it take to be considered a good technician back then?

 

So has Holy's strength. And frankly, I find those testaments more credible and more impressive.

And, look, I'm not trying to rag on Jeffries. He was a strong, tough dude who was an athlete and seemed to have the makings of a very good heavyweight. But the style he employed against a bunch of spindly midgets seemed so counter intuitive and so bad a translation to the modern division that is doesn't give me any confidence he could compete today UNLESS he had a complete makeover and became something he just wasn't. But I do agree to an extent that the components of a very good or possibly great fighter were there.

 

Any
Take your pick 10-15
Of course hahaha

 

Evan Fields makes it look easy here, folks don't get it twisted.
Jeffries was from a time when "feats of strength" meant something because there wasn't much to separate the fighters skillwise and technique-wise. Those who were standouts had their own qualities and those qualities were reported.

Jeff had less than 20 fights? Am I right? Fought by leading with his chin, didn't have much of a right hand, and went life-and-death with smaller guys who could simply never compete against modern heavies.

When all you can say about the guy is that he was strong, had a great chin and could take a beating with the best of 'em, that doesn't go well against a guy you could say all the same about, plus being technically superior and a master counterpuncher...

 

What about Johnson? He weighed 212 against Jeffries.

 

Holyfield only maxed 190? That sounds awfully low, when was this? I benched ~210 when I was sixteen and weighed 165 pounds (and I didn't regularly work with weights, only dips and push-ups).

 

Wow, that's actually pretty accurate. My dad resumed lifting weights in his late forties and without having touched a wight in ten years benched 275 10 times. His one rep max around the same time (365) was pretty much exactly what that calculator predicted. (God that mother****er was scary when I was growing up.)

 

Could you briefly summarize, just because I missed that thread, what some of the more reliably attested feats are?