How great could Jersey Joe Walcott have become if...

It's nice to see Jersey getting this kind of love. Something to think about his potential under better circumstances, though I can't say I see much of a chance of him getting into Louis territory.

 

Jersey Joe Walctott is one of my favorite heavyweights in history.

You bring up a very good point, and indeed I wonder what would've happened.

 

"How great could Jersey Joe Walcott have become if..."

What? if he wasn't Already Great !!!

and here 'lies' the problem with "Acheivement based status..."
it quickly and terribly wrongly gets translated into so and so is better or beats so and so, why because they never reached the same acheivement height???

this in my mind is the most futile and inaccurate way to rate fighters... Jersey Joe IS A GREAT and he has at the very least an even chance of beating most HWs that have ever lived, including most of the giants...

fighters should be rated on:

Skill, Ability
Competion, win or lose
Longevity - champion or contender
and ERAs - stongest vs weaker

much more accurate, true and respectful.

and again it eliminates the affore mentioned bullshite, like Hopkins or RJJ beat the great MW's & L-HWs from MUCH Stronger Era's!

farr too much of that ****, with far too many "acheivement based rated fighter!"

 

Walcott to my mind had the talent to be up there with Ali and Louis if he had got the same kind of management and chances they got, the question is rather if he'd have the same discipline to stay at the top that they had. We'll never know.

But just think if Walcott was well managed from the start, got the right training and the right fights, and he and Louis squared off when they were both young. Could have been an even more epic series, perhaps Ali-Fazier like.

 

How about this: If he got more time to train and become physically superior, he may not have needed to have learnt all the defensive tricks against lesser opponents

When exactly did Walcott get to train full time, is this 'he worked 80hour weeks' bull****, considering he also fought 9-10 times a year sometimes, with all the pay that would provide. Ofcourse the World War would likely take away Walcots ability to earn and ofcourse an earlier title shot. But then again, he'd of had to face a younger fresher Louis if he got his shot earlier, he'd have to face a younger fresher versions of Elmer Ray and Bivins

 

Sometimes it is the school of hard knocks that molds a fighter and makes him great. Walcott had poor nutrition early on but so did so many fighters of the day, Dempsey,Braddock were also sometimes hungry going to the gym or fights.

I think Walcott had his moments of greatness, Louis,Charles and 1st Marciano among others. When he became a champion it gave him additional confidence.

Walcott knew the benefits of condition and his boxing style saved him from wars. It was not his style to go in for the kill or KO but he was out of character in the 2nd Louis fight because he lost the 1st.

I think if Walcott had been carefully managed like Foreman or Tyson, Holmes or Cooney he would have had a more impressive record but would he have matured late as a great fighter. Sometimes it is not the win/loss record and sometimes it is but Walcott was erratic but on a good night he could have upset any of the best including, Foreman,Tyson,Lewis,Lewis,Dempsey and Ali ...he ALMOST got past Marciano but not sure the rest would have the determination to get past Walcotts pin-point-power punching and great legs.

Records mean a lot but EYES can also determine who was great and who was not...Walcott was one of my favorites style wise and for pin-point punching and ring generalship

 

Walcott was a sparring partner for LOUIS,in 1936 ,for the first Schmeling fight,according to Louis,in his auto biography,
Walcott looked good in their first session,, but after the second one he left camp abruptly.

 

1. Walcott beat the very best prime version of Jimmy Bivins. Bivins was coming off the best winning streak of his career and was 26 years old. Walcott ended that huge winning streak and knocked bivins off his # 1 rated status. Elmer Ray seemed a bit of a late bloomer. He was another on a mega huge winning streak with a # 1 rating who Walcott knocked off. If you don't buy that, then perhaps you should look at the fact Walcott did face Elmer Ray when both were younger and Jersey Joe knocked him out in 3 rounds.

2. Walcott had a string of bad luck in the 1930s. He contracted Typhoid, which set back him back for years, and prevented him from training with Blackburn. Blackburn was so high on Walcott, that he convinced Roxborough to allow him to bring Walcott to Chicago to train with Louis. After recovering from typhoid, Walcott was forced to work long hours to feed a family of 6 leaving him no time to train. There was such little food, that walcott claimed "for a period of 10 years, i went to bed hungry every night". He had such a big family, he played the role of a loving father, and fed his children over himself. He took on many fighters(Ettore, Simon, Fox) on 24 hr notice with no training and weeks, and barely a sandwhich in his stomach in the last 48 hours. Walcott said in one fight "I got hit in the ribs, and my insides hurt so much from my stomach being empty that I had no choice but to go down".

 

Food for thought,is n't it ? I agree with your view on this. I posted a similar thread not so long ago.

 

I think we all can agree that good training and good nutrition makes a fighter better. That is the basis for your standpoint (which do have merit) that today's fighters have evolved from the ones of yestertyear. This is no different.

If you wanted to become the best fighter you possibly could be, which path would you choose: the one Louis/Ali etc got or the one Walcott got?

There may well be some exagerrations (there often are), but there's no doubt that Walcott didn't have ideal circumstances, to put it lightly, during his early pro career.

 

Even in the 30s... a poorly fed, untrained Jersey Joe put on some good performances that made you see the "early potential". Walcott defeated solid young fighters like Willie Reddish, Elmer Ray, Henry Taylor, Hatchetman Sheppard, Lorenzo Pack. Pack was the Mac Foster of his era. Never made a splash on the world class scene, but could crack like no other. All his victories came by way of knockout. Reddish went on to become a top 10 fighter and beat some very good fighters, as well as become sonny liston's trainer. Taylor went on to beat some good fighters after a long layoff, a solid boxer stylist type. Ray and Hatchetman went on to become top contenders of the 1940s. A young walcott even gave a Prime Tiger Jack Fox a schooling for 6 rounds before running out gas(hard to have gas when your stomach is completely empty in the first place).

 

The excuse making going on here is truly pathetic. Like you guys would cut this amount of slack for any other fighter. Like Walcott was the only fighter to ever have a hard scrabble background. If anything, his is the typical story of boxing. A lot of great fighters trained far less than Walcott and did far more. Next we will hear about how great Braddock was.

Walcott was an average cutie who looked good against an aging champion and caught a natural light heavyweight with a great shot to win the title. That he was beating Marciano in the first fight is hardly remarkable. Ted Lowry did that. Roland LaStarza did that. Otherwise, Walcott was knocked out by Abe Simon amd outpointed by Joey Maxim - among his several other losses that no great or even very good heavyweight would suffer.

The reality of Walcott's career - and herky jerky isn't smooth or graceful - is the source of all the excuse making, what ifs, and other rhetorical props designed to manufacture the presense of greatness when there clearly isn't one.

Had Walcott not landed that hook on Charles, the conversation would go like this: "We all knew it was time for Louis to retire when we saw how terribly he looked against that nohoper Jersey Joe Walcott."

 

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