Is Dempsey/Willard the Most Overrated Victory Ever?

Discussion in 'Classic Boxing Forum' started by Seamus, Dec 21, 2011.


  1. burt bienstock

    burt bienstock Obsessed with Boxing Full Member

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  2. JohnThomas1

    JohnThomas1 VIP Member

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    Yours :D
     
  3. Conn

    Conn Well-Known Member banned Full Member

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    mythologized maybe but i dont see it being rated higher than it should be. when it comes to rating the best heavyweight wins ever i think we would come up with fights like frazier-Ali 1, Schmeling-Louis 1, Ali-foreman, foreman-frazier 1, douglas-tyson, Louis-schemling 2 ... etc. before we mention dempsey-willard.
    if you ran a thread asking best hW wins ever i really doubt many would have dempsey-Willard in their top 5. Generally the win just isn't rated that high.

    but as a display of pure aggression & power and an emphatic title wining domination by a primed 'killer' it deserves to be rememberd. and thats how it is remembered
     
  4. burt bienstock

    burt bienstock Obsessed with Boxing Full Member

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    C, only a paronoid Dempsey hater would argue the fact that the massacre of the 260 pound Willard ,who was arguably the best chinned HW of all-time wasn't an amazing feat...I have recently read accounts of Jess Willard's fantastic ability to absorb the most powerful blows,prior to the
    Toledo fight,and shake them off casually. I have read accounts of this by the great boxing writer Bob Edgren who saw Jess Willard fight large heavyweights and his great strength and set of whiskers shook off the hardest shots...I have read what young Dempsey did to Carl Morris, Gunboat Smith, Fred Fulton and others that Bob Edgren was witness to.
    These accounts of those bouts were written soon after by Edgren, who was known for his great knowledge of boxing, going back to Fitzimmons, so his
    opinions should be taken very seriously .
    What Dempsey at 187 pounds did to Willard at 260-70 was for all those 100,000 fans,and boxing writers,a remarkable display of power and savagery never displayed before. With ONE left-hook Dempsey dropped the giant Willard,for the FIRST time in Willard's career. And Dempsey's mgr.
    Jack Kearns, foolishly bet a great wad of dough,that Dempsey would ko Willard in the very first round. With this in mind Dempsey threw all cautions to the wind,and dropped Willard seven times. In any other era or heavyweight title fight Dempsey would have won by a tko after the 3rd or 4th but knockdown, but the ref Ollie Pecord foolishly let the slaughter continue....And yet today's naysayers who despise the name of Dempsey
    are now saying 90 years later,"so what",who was Jess Willard?...Well Jess Willard, slow that he was had probably the best chin ever for a HWT.
    Jack Johnson at Havana bounced dozens of powerful blows off Willards chin and body for 25 rounds with no effect until big Jess ,sensing Johnson was tiring [26th round] went on the offensive and flattened Johnson with one right cross.
    As I have posted before the great Joe Louis hit lumbering Abe Simon with
    every punch in the book, but Simon lasted to the 13th round before the ref stopped the bout...Ali threw everything at Chuvalo, Frazier, Bonavena,and others without even dropping them, and he is never criticized for his lack of power as well. But Jack Dempsey ,who murdered Jess Willard in one rd flooring him 7 times in 1919 ,weighing 187 pounds , flattening Carl Morris, Gunboat Smith, Fred Fulton, in short time,still get's the shaft by some posters, but a Louis, Ali and others somehow escape their wrath...Cheers...
     
  5. Seamus

    Seamus Proud Kulak Full Member

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    Did Mr. Edgren live long enough to see any real heavyweights?
     
  6. burt bienstock

    burt bienstock Obsessed with Boxing Full Member

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    Very CUTE S. If you would get over your Dempsey bashing, and realize that
    CONCEIVABLY there were some people of the PAST as knowledgable as you,we could have an intelligent dialogue. For your information the great writer Bob Edgren was born in 1874. He boxed some with Fitz and others.
    Was considered the premier boxing writer, was friendly and friends with Fitz,Jeffries, Langford, Jeannette, Jess Willard, Harry Wills, Jack Johnson, Dempsey, Sharkey, Tunney, Schmeling,Max Baer, and Joe Louis whom he held in high esteem.... What Bob Edgren saw and experienced was I believe on a par with your vast knowledge of the sweet science....Read some of this man's works S, you'll learn something....Cheers...
    P.S. I believe Joe Louis was a REAL HEAVYWEIGHT ! :hi:
     
  7. manbearpig

    manbearpig A Scottish Noob Full Member

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    I don't see how Willard has the best chin ever now
     
  8. manbearpig

    manbearpig A Scottish Noob Full Member

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    This ****ing over rating. Jesus Christ just calm the **** down and people would have a much more balanced opinion on Dempsey. Blatant, blatant bias.
     
  9. Seamus

    Seamus Proud Kulak Full Member

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    I used to enjoy his works when I took The Evening World. They must have lost my subscription. The horseless carriage no longer drops it at my doorstep.
     
  10. burt bienstock

    burt bienstock Obsessed with Boxing Full Member

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    S,now your feeling your OATS !:hi:
     
  11. janitor

    janitor VIP Member Full Member

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  12. choklab

    choklab cocoon of horror Full Member

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    it was a good chin. gloves during that era were often 3oz in the knuckles and 2oz in the wrists. UFC fighters cant seem to hold a shot well with the gloves they use yet the willard era boxing gloves had less protection.
     
  13. Bugger

    Bugger Active Member Full Member

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    :rofl:rofl:rofl
     
  14. McGrain

    McGrain Diamond Dog Staff Member

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    A strong argument can be made for wearing your underpants outside of your trousers too, i'm sure, but it doesn't make it a good idea. This would lead to an inherent bias in rankings towards punchers rather than winners. Although, looked at fom my point of view, it helps me to understand ways in which this win might indeed have become overated.

    Knocking your opponent out in the fashion Dempsey did proved that he was outside of Willard's class inspite of his size advantage. Totally dominating Tunney in Greb I indicated that Greb was outside of Tunney's class at that time inspite of his size advantage.

    Cleanly knocking your opponent out is obviously better than squeaking past in a decision though.

    It absolutely is not. The depth of skill and will involved in outpointing and outboxing a much bigger boxer is fathoms beyond the depth of skill and will involved in knocking a fighter out. In fact, to score a great KO you literaly only need one attribute on occasion. Usually more than that though, obviously.

    You are also proving that you are unequivocally their superior in a way that you do not by achieving a knockout. Most would argue that Griffith is better than Carter, but Carter knocked Griffith out in a single round. If Carter won every single round against Griffith, the picture becomes different.

    All in all, it would have been more impressive and a greater achievement for Careter to outbox Griffith and win 10 rounds to 0.


    Just recently we've had Pacquiao over Oscar and Adamek over Maddalone, so although it's not common, it does happen. Two things here. Firstly, discrepancies in weight are rarer. A man has to weigh over 200lbs to fight at HW, and there is, generally speaking, only fifty pounds to play with here. In other words, fighters fighting small opponents is pretty rare. But i'd expect Tyson, Dempsey, Marciano and Tua to blast out bigger guys when they fought them occasionally because they are such incredible punchers regardless of their size.

    Secondly, it probably happens more than you think. It is possible for a welterweight to fight as a middleweight without your knowledge due to modern weigh in rules. It doesn't say there was a 12 or 15lb weight difference on Boxrec, but there was. At certain weights such differences become almost impressive on paper due to the percentage of the body weight in question.

    Size is just an issue to be overcome, like strength or speed. You have preached this more firmly than anyone else on the board.


    It is easier to finish an opponent though when you can stand beside him as he gets up and punch him as hard as you possibly can when he is completely unable to defend himself. Using Willard as testimony to Dempsey's great fishing skills is a little like praising a shark as the ultimate killer for taking bait.

    What rendered Willard desperate was Dempsey's punches, but what made it so easy for him to tear him to pieces in round one were the rules of his day. It doesn't mean all that much but I, personally, would guess that Tyson, Lewis or...Frank Bruno would have got Willard out of their in round one under identical rulesets - presuming they landed the first hurtful punches.

    Dempsey famously struggled to finish a hurt opponent when he had to go a neutral corner.



    Could be. Impossible to say either way really. He could have been utterly useless, he could have been at his best!



    I'm not, not really. What I'm saying is, you over-egg it because of its uniqueness. Once upon a time it was deemed impossible to climb Everest without oxygen. Doing it made a legend of a man. Now it doesn't make the news. Four minute mile, too.

    Dempsey's feat hasn't been repeated in part because the circumstances are so rare. I do think the weight difference is the crucial factor. In fact, if Willard was 6'0, his inactivity makes the win routine.

    Dempsey's excellence as a puncher combined with Willard's rare size and the ruleset of the day, I should say, make it unique.
     
  15. burt bienstock

    burt bienstock Obsessed with Boxing Full Member

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    Mc,"methinks you doeth protest too much". Why not admit the obvious...
    What Jack Dempsey did to Carl Morris, Gunboat Smith, Fred Fulton,and of course the 260 pound Jess Willard at Toledo , made Dempsey the "idol of fistania" to the American public in 1919 for a simple reason...No other heavyweight before had shown such a display of savagery and punching power previously...Mc, why you whom I respect very much and I,are talking about this very topic NINETY TWO years later, if this was not ingrained in the heart's of the boxing fraternity of that time.? Just admit that if Dempsey had "outpointed "Morris, Gunboat Smith, Fred Fulton and Jess Willard we would not be discussing this subject today,almost a century later... Jack Dempsey became an icon in those harsher times, because
    of not only his wins ,but the manner in which he won.
    And yes I love the punchers as Dempsey, Louis, Tyson [young] were, as they put finality to their wins.... Cheers...