How good was Jack McAuliffe compared to the proceeding era?

I honestly can't say, either, outside of what should have been a loss to Griffo. However I am reading Dunn's book on Jimmy Barry and McAuliffe is mentioned as a hero to Irish fight fans.

 

Trenton Evening News, 3/11/1918
"The only man who ever retired from the ring as the undefeated lightweight champion of the world was the great Jack McAuliffe, who took the crown from off his bean and made his farewell bow just 22 years ago tonight. He was the only lightweight title-holder who was wise enough to quit when the quitting was good. McAuliffe was the first lightweight champion of the world under the Queensberry rules, and, many folks think, the greatest of them all. Ritchie and Welsh and Benny Leonard have never shown anything that would put them in the same class with the mighty Jack. A gamer or more scientific boxer never entered the ring than McAuliffe."

Jimmy Wakely (backer of Sullivan) was interviewed in 1917 and had this to say...
"I had one ideal. Little Jack McAuliffe. WHAT a fighter! He could hit, he could think, he could do ALL the things that any great man in the ring did and then more. There was class in every line of him, class in every move. There was seen something aweinspiring and individual in the way he crawled thru the rope. But IN there! Ah, my boy, it was a pleasure to have your thousands down on him, so sure, so accurate, so heady, so unbeatable.":

In the lead up to the Gans-Britt (1907) fight an article out of Chicago printed in various newspapers stated...
"On the other hand, how will Jimmy be able to elude the rapid fire deliveries of the champion, the greatest lightweight the world has ever known not excepting Jack McAuliffe."

Again out of the Trenton Evening News (they had a real thing for Jack) 3/24/1916...
"In the opinion of as good a judge of boxing as Charlie White, the Old Eagle Eye of American referees, McAuliffe has never been equaled in skill and general boxing ability by any of his successors on the lightweight thrown.
'McAuliffe, the first man to hold the lightweight title,' says Charlie, 'to my mind was the greatest all around fighter the class has ever seen.'
McAuliffe was a more scientific boxer than his successor, George Lavigne, and the latter, great and as he was, lacked the height and reach to rank as the lightweight champion of champions. Frank Erne, the next man to hold the title, was equal in cleverness, but not the possessor of as good a punch. Joe Gans was more scientific than either McAuliffe or Erne, but in gameness and durability and punching power and stamina he fell far short of McAuliffe. Battling Nelson, Ad Wolgast and Willie Ritchie would have looked like dubs if pitted against McAuliffe at his fighting best."