Is Braddock underrated?

Yep, he is. He often took on fights on short notice without much in the stomach and he had those problems with his hands. When neither of these issues were distracting him he was world class. Not at the same level of Schmeling, Baer, Sharkey and Carnera but not far away.

 

Well, resume wise I think he´s behind those four and I also don´t think he would beat the Baer who beat Schmeling. But that´s just me.

I´d rank those five something like that:
Schmeling
Baer
Sharkey
Carnera
Braddock

 

I think Jim Braddock was, and still is boxing's greatest underdog story. He had no money and a house full of starving, cold children. He had a hand that was frequently injured. He was viewed as having skills and athletic ability that was average at best. A broken man if you will. All of a sudden one day, he puts together a string of wins and lands in the ring with one of the most feared champions to that point in history. He wins.........

I think Braddock was underrated for most of the last century, until Ron Howard brought his story to life with the drama Cinderella Man. From what I've both been told and read, the script had some inaccuracies ( as do nearly all films based on true stories, ) but nevertheless it gave many people some trivia knowledge and appreciation for Braddock and his life.

I suppose he is a tad underrated....

 

i find it strange that peopel forget his light heavywieght campiegn was pretty solid. he was a good 170 odd pounder. he was already world class in a sense he just didnt have the natural talent to use his generous reach and hieght.

the film made him seem like an aggresive left hooker...a rockeyesque figure.
all he really had was a limp wristed jab and a decent chin.

dropping joe louis is a decent achievment itself

 

Braddock was not lucky vs Baer. I dont called out boxing and out pointed Baer in a one sided match luck so to speak. It was not a close fight.

Sure to some extant comeing from behide to win the heavyweight title, on one punch like Fitz or Marciano did was luck. But outpointed and winning by a land slide(On my scoring of the fight) is not luck.

 

I thinkI'd put hom above Carnera ,on his best night.

 

How can you read that pararagh above and not pull for the guy?

But then put great story aside and say why doesn't this guy get more credit for what he accomplished?

So yeah needless to say he is underrated!

 

But unlike Walcott he isn't consistently afforded the luxury of people acknowledging he went into fights borderline starving and or injured.

 

Braddock is basicaly a world class fighter who was knocked down to the second teir for most of his career due to hand injuries.

His career started well and finished well but went a bit pear shaped in between.

The young Jimmy Braddock at light heavyweight was tall rangy Bob Foster type fighter with terific power. He got a shot at Tommy Loughrans light heavyweight title and lost due to one of Loughrans career best performences. When Loughran anounced that this would be his last fight at light heavyweight it was asumed that Braddock was a dead cert to inherit his vacant crown. Calzaghe beating Kessler then stepping up would be a good contemporary analogy.

Then the hand problems started and Braddock was forced to take many fights with injured hands. The result was that he was beaten down to journeyman level.

As McGrain and others have stated his period out of the ring alowed his hands to heal and brought him back to his winning ways. I dont think that Braddock was particularly lucky to get a shot at the heavyweight title. Like Primo Carnera (another fighter of the period who gets criticised) he earned the title fight by beating multiple ranked contenders.

 

I agree, Braddock is slightly underrated.

Many people simply dismiss him as a "one hit wonder" who "got lucky" against Baer, a la Rahman against Lewis or Douglas against Tyson.

In fact, he has several good quality wins on his resume, including against John Henry Lewis (Hall of Fame light-heavy champ), Tommy Farr, Pete Latzo (former champ), Jimmy Slattery, Tuffy Griffiths, Jack Roper, etc.

His career somewhat mirrored Glen Johnson's. He started off as a hot prospect at light-heavy with an impressive KO record, but after suffering an embarassing loss to the great Tommy Loughran in his first title shot, he gradually slipped into journeyman status. Still, like Johnson, his record was deceiving because he often took fights injured or on short notice, and often acquitted himself well despite losing. Like Johnson, he experienced a resurgence of consistent performances late in his career, punctuated by a single big, impressive win (Johnson's being against Roy Jones).

It's also worth noting that despite all his losses, Braddock was only really KO'd once in his career, and that was against the mighty Joe Louis in his second-to-last fight, after swallowing Louis' best shots all through the fight. His only other stoppage loss was on a cut. He definitely had an iron chin.

 

he reminds me of maskaev, someone who started out with lots of promise, lost his way for a while then pulled it back together to do something no one thought possible.

 

Probably a reasonable comparison.

Much like Oleg Maskaev, James Braddock was thrown into the fire early with top rated contenders or very tough journeyman.