I'm not at all on the interest of rewriting history I'm more bothered about whether this was ever the case. McCoy did knock out Chip although Chip was overweight. He then went on the world's worst run of nws fights (can only lose the title is knocked out). Some fights in boxrec allude to McCoy never being widely recognised as champ. I know a few like Ahearn and Gibbons refuted his title claim (or at least some of their fights as listed as title claims). Can anyone shed any light here? For instance some people say Jones was never champion because Hill unified, lost to DM who blah blah blah and whether or not you think DM was the best LHW, that lineage does run true. Can the same be said for McCoy given the overweight issue?
Nobody rated him but there was a begrudging acceptance of him as champion, with no respect, by a large section of the media.
Loads of fighters claimed the title, most if not all were better than McCoy, but McCoy had the most acceptance as the "champion".
McCoy was the real champion for good or bad. In that era if you made weight and beat the champion (and sometimes even if you didnt make weight) you were regarded as the champion. McCoy did that. Was it a fluke? Yes, probably. But thats on Chip not McCoy. That being said McCoy's reign was dismal. He shamefully hid behind the ND rule and often utilized his own handpicked referee on top of that. Gibbons disputed McCoy's claim because he had beaten McCoy prior to McCoy winning the title and after that McCoy refused to risk the crown against Mike because he and everyone else knew Mike would have beaten him easily. Regardless, many many fighters claimed titles (one of the two books Im working on now documents this period and particularly the MW title claimants from 1910 to 1923) for themselves that they had no reasonable claim to. It was just a way to promote yourself. Most regarded Gibbons as the best MW and P4P best fighter on the planet at the time which is why on one card Gibbons headlined McCoy, as champion, fought on the undercard LOL. It was an odd time for boxing and writers often remarked that the MW boxing picture was as clear as mud.
strange time after ketchels death...even led to darcys claim on it...from papke, klaus, clabby, mcgourty, jeff smith, darcy...and its all very confusing...clabby had got a newspaper decision over mccoy, but mccoy kept the title.. then darcy beat clabby and australia claimed it based on that....i think thats how it went..i read a lot of different family tree scenarios of it. but you lot will know all this better then me.
In actual fact at the time the journeyman McCoy was not widely accepted as champion... if Chip was overweight then he was never champion even slightly. He certainly never had recognition outside the US... at least not in the UK, Aust or Europe. Yet some here resent the fact that McIntosh recognised McGoorty Smith etc yet accept every other title in every other era like the 30's when the NYBC was incredibly corrupt and there were two champions in some divisions and of course we have countless champions today. If being a good fighter was the minimum requirement Al McCoy falls far short of that.
Totally legitimate. A weak fighter won the title, but that happens sometimes. Even if Chip dived, nobody was ever able to prove it.
