Is it weird that I don't see anything special in Jack Dempsey?

Ali was WAY more shot against Spinks than Dempsey was against Tunney. He was also 5 years older than Dempsey and had fought all of his top challengers include some of the best HWs in history which is bound to put some mileage on the odometer. Meanwhile Dempsey, during his 7 year reign was inactive 2 yrs and 3 yrs respectively, sitting on the shelf, and avoiding his toughest challenges when he decided to grab some low hanging fruit for easy money (and still managed to get wobbled, knocked down several times, and completely outboxed by several guys he was massively favored to beat (and rightly so if you want believe everything the hype machine wrote about him was true). So yeah, when you watch Bill Brennan outbox him, Georges Carpentier wobble him, Luis Firpo drop him, Tommy Gibbons tie him into knots, and Gene Tunney absolutely dominate him all while he avoided his top two challenges its not a stretch for someone to wonder why he gets so much love. But I wouldnt call him ordinary. He was always in great shape, he had speed and power, and his skills are both underrated and ahead of their time. With all that being said he wasnt unbeatable and was a product of a lot of hype and a lot of careful matchmaking.

 

Sorry, brah. My bad. I apologize unreservedly.

 

There was the question of Harry Wills who didn't get the chance because of racism. Do you think Wills would have beaten Dempsey?

 

Obviously you're no fan of the guy, but as you yourself said, Dempsey was inactive for a couple of years at the time, which isn't how you normally gauge a fighters performance. (even one's you don't like)

 

Then look at it this way: Dempsey was only recently active on film against Willard, Firpo, Brennan, and Carpentier. Against Miske he had been inactive for over a year. Against Gibbons he had been inactive for two years. Against Tunney he had been inactive for 3 years. So we have a performance against a guy who was nearly 40 and hadnt fought in three years, so by your criteria we can throw that out because Willard obviously couldnt put up a good performance. We are left with Firpo, a totally unskilled brute who despite a total lack of finesse was able to knock Dempsey down two or three times and wage a life and death struggle with him. Brennan, who Dempsey had already beaten once and who was expected to be a gimme, was ahead on points, had badly wobbled Dempsey and nearly tore his ear off with a punch before gassing and getting stopped. Carpentier was outweighed by 16 pounds and had lost to the best fighters he had faced all the way back to WW but still managed to wobble Dempsey badly. Gibbons was arguably Dempsey's best filmed performance in that he was facing a live body and a very good fighter. Im not sure what that says about Dempsey that he fought a guy whose main qualification for facing Dempsey was that he lost the only title eliminator he fought in one sided dominant fashion to a middleweight... Yet somehow was leading after five rounds against Dempsey before basically packing it in mentally and fighting a defensive fight. Now one could argue that a guy fighting a purely defensive fight is tough to KO and I agree but a devils advocate could also argue that a rampaging killer with dynamite power in each hand and blinding speed, as Dempsey was supposed to be, should have been able to catch a guy whose defense revolved around standing in the pocket and slipping or catching punches and who was giving away height, weight, reach, age, power, etc.

Just saying.

 

No.

 

And the fact that he was better equipped to beat Dempsey than literally anyone he fought as champion with the POSSIBLE exception of Tunney. Anyone who thinks that didnt play a major part in Wills not getting a fight with Dempsey is living in a dream world.

 

How can we know?



Oh, I know, Dempsey could have fought his top contender sometime during the 7 years he rested on the crown.

 

See how he threw the heavyweight bag like it was a speed bag try it out! Dempsey was fast on his feet as well.:hat

 

You do realize your unadulterated hatred of Dempsey goes against virtually all the historical evidence of him as both a boxer and a person. Firstly, there's amble evidence that he wanted to make the fight with Wills and the majority of those who had an opinion felt he would have won.

Wills Wikipedia website:

Wills spent six years (1920–1926) trying to land a title fight with Jack Dempsey. Dempsey was willing to fight Wills and contracts for the bout were signed by both fighters. The fight, however, never took place because Dempsey did not receive a $100,000 guarantee from the promoter, after Wills received a $50,000 check, from George Barton's "My Lifetime in Sports".

So basically the fight was signed Dempsey was promised $100,000 guarantee and he never received it so he didn't fight. You want to translate that into hatred instead of a business decision, be my guest.

 

Well done.

 

Oh god the grammer police have arrive. I once had a university professor tell me, about a paper I submitted, that he should fail me on my grammar alone. Nice to know that after 25 years, nothing has changed.

 

THanks for taking that in the lighthearted spirit in which it was intended. I was only f'ing with you.

To me, Dempsey looks great one minute and then has lapses the next. He seemed to have lacked real discipline and focus in the ring. What can be said of him is that he had legit power… serious concussive power generated by the speed and leverage. And that he was fast on his feet and with his hands. Disregard the film, his contemporaries compared his speed to that of lightweights. Enough said it that it must be accepted as the truth.

The problem with him is that he was a high risk/high reward type of fighter. As such his management kept his matches as low risk as possible in order to keep the earning power of the belt. No Wills, No Greb… sick Miske, retread Brennan (who still got them worried), French pastry Carpentier, and general ****** Firpo…

What a waste.

 

I dont need wikipedia to tell me Dempsey wanted nothing to do with Wills. Its easy to claim years later you wanted that fight. Its a lot harder to refute the multitude of interviews you gave drawing the color line, the multitude of times you did everything in your power NOT to sign to fight him up to and including staging a fake contract signing for a fight to be held a full year into the future and another fake contract signing in which you demanded that the contract have no fight date, no purse details, in fact no details in particular AT ALL about the fight other than to basically give you the right to reject any offer for the fight you didnt like (which would be ANY offer of the fight). How many excuses can one guy have. First Wills was too black. Then he wasnt serious. Then he wasnt qualified. Then no promoter would stage it. Then no commission would allow it. Basically Dempsey ran so far out of excuses that in the end he just threw his hands up and said "uhhh gee Im tired of Wills demanding a fight with me so Im not going to fight him." Its absolutely laughable that anyone who can read would buy into the idea that Dempsey wanted a fight with Wills and was willing to face him. Bull****. Go back and read until your eyes bleed about just how creative Dempsey got in avoiding Wills. Every time an objection was raised by Dempsey it was quickly hammered down only to be met with another one.

Whether a majority of people felt he would have won or not (which is debateable) is immaterial. So from now on every champion who is a favorite going into a fight just gets a pass and doesnt have to defend his title unless hes and underdog? Pardon me thats ****ing ******ed. Lets flip that on its ear and state without a doubt that Wills was BY FAR the consensus pick as Dempsey's top challenger for the VAST MAJORITY of his reign. That alone makes Wills not getting a shot unforgivable and leaves a huge black mark on Dempsey's record. Nevermind the fact that Dempsey's next most logical challenger had defeated Miske, Bill Brennan (4x), Gibbons (in a title eliminator no less), Bartley Madden (who Dempsey tried for years to get a soft defense against to his shame), Gunboat Smith (in another title eliminator and who Dempsey also wanted to defend against in a soft touch), and Gene Tunney and had both Carpentier and Firpo turn down fights with him. That guy happened to be white, what was Dempsey's excuse there? Hes too small? Good thing Jess Willard didnt follow that line reasoning.

Anyone who wants to believe that little fantasy that Dempsey signed to face Wills needs to look at the details of that contract signing: It was orchestrated by one of Dempsey's closest friends, Floyd Fitzsimmons. Wills never received $50,000. That was put out in the papers but it never happened. This was admitted to by Dempsey's own business manager later that year. Dempsey was supposedly paid a sum of money upon signing by Fitzsimmons but this same manager detailed that Dempsey actually put this money up himself to give the signing an appearance of legitimacy. After Dempsey was supposedly not paid the rest of his money he publicly rebuked Fitzsimmons yet later that winter Fitzsimmons was out in LA staying with Dempsey and the two were the best of friends and remained so until Fitzsimmons died. The entire setup was a sham because Dempsey was being forced by the NYSAC commission to defend against Wills or face being stripped and banned in all states that did business with NY. In order to avoid that Dempsey had to put on the appearance that he was trying in earnest to make a fight with Wills. Meanwhile Dempsey was already in talks to defend his championship against Tunney the same month that he was now signing to defend against Wills. Thats odd isnt it? Why agree to defend your championship within weeks if not days of a title defense against Wills that you just signed? I could keep laying out details but anyone with any sense and a bit hindsight can see that he had no intention of going through with that match.

 

After losing the world heavyweight title in his first bout with Gene Tunney, Jack Dempsey also seems to have had some rocky moments during in a heavyweight title elimination bout with Jack Sharkey and his second world heavyweight title bout with Gene Tunney. To be sure, he had some very good moments in both bouts, notably capitalizing on a huge mistake by Sharkey to score a one-punch knockout with a left-hook to the head in the seventh round and scoring the famous "Long Count" knockdown of Tunney, also in the seventh round. But Dempsey reportedly had quite a bit of trouble coping with the boxing skills of both Sharkey and Tunney in the two bouts. Even with the "Long Count" knockdown, Tunney won the second bout with Dempsey handily, scoring a knockdown of his own in a late round.

- Chuck Johnston