Is there any good reason why I shouldn't rate bob fitzsimmons as the goat?

There is no film of a prime Bob Fitzsimmons! You can see patch grainy film of an old Fitzsimmons knocking out Corbett, which tells you nothing. And you can see a few clips of an old man where he looks a lot better than say Joe Louis, Muhammed Ali, Joe Frazier and most other all time greats look, at the same age.

I am sorry but you lose a lot of credibility when you talk about the all white titles from back then, because it just isnt true. Name one coluoured fighter around Fitz' time of champion who could mount a claim to fight him. Could it be the coloured champion Peter jackson? Jackson as great as he was, was shot by the time Fitz reigned as champion, he was blasted by jeffries and there is no doubt that he was past it by this time. He did spar Fitz as a champ, but was in no condition to fight him. It is also forgotten, that while he was the best fighter in the world for a while, he was not able to beat Jim Corbett when both were at their best. Something which Fitzsimmons was able to do.

And other than Jackson who else was there? Was it George/Joe Godfrey the previous coloured champ, who Fitzsimmons knocked out twice? And which coloured middleweights or light heavyweights were in the same league as Fitz? You can not in anyway say that Fitz drew or profited from the coloured line and to try to do so, really does show that you need to do a bit more studying of what Fitz actually did before you make a final decision on Fitz merits. As the starter of this thread is learning, your opinion will only go up.

If the title was in existence, Fitzsimmons would have owned it from as early as his victory over Choynski and who knows maybe sooner. And for the record, if the welterweight title and Lightweight titles were in existence, Fitz could have very easily takne those titles as well. In fact, there is a very good argument that he was the best lightweight in the world as early as 1881. If accepted, this gives Fitz easily the longest period of activity as a world class fighter, imo.

by the way, Langford is indeed a very good choice as a Goat. I dont rate him close to Fitz, but that could change when i look more into him.

 

I love where you have Duran, but I am interested to hear how you have him, Pep or Charles over Greb. IMO if you have Greb outside of your top four then your list is wrong, even in something as subjective as this can be.

 

the lean back style is what allowed him to have his hands low and his stance is what allowed him to use the lean back style. Im sure if you praticed the low leanback style with the stance of the old masters and were educated enough to use it properly you would be amazed at the defensive and offensisive attributes just as every one at the gym would be.

you would probly have to tuck your chin a bit more and depending on your ability to faint and the style of punches you throw you might want to keep your right at your chin.

 

You don't see that many 185 pound crouching come forward pressure fighters at heavyweight nowadays either.

 

I don´t think you should rank people on how they look on film or skillset. Marciano, for example, doesn´t look special on film nor does his skillset look especially good but what he achieved still isn´t surpassed by anyone. Can you really justify ranking him lower because he doesn´t look spectacular or overly skilled in comparison to others? Perhaps even despite beating them and overall better opposition at hw?

Personally, I can´t rank fighters on how they look on film, on their skillset or how modern they are or how somebody else would do trying to emulate their style.

Absolutly. You look at what a fighter did in his era and than compare that to what fighters in other eras did. And what Fitz did is even today very, very special and unique.

http://www.eastsideboxing.com/forum/showpost.php?p=5352986&postcount=1
http://www.eastsideboxing.com/forum/showthread.php?t=182240&highlight=armstrong

 

I have him at #8 after Pep and Ezzard Charles..

 

Well, millions of people will watch the wdding of Prince William. Does this mean I have to, too? :think

btw. this was not a critic of you especially, you were just the first one in this thread to post something like that.

You think he looks special? He lloks uniquie but neither special nor spectacular nor very skilled. Both Charles and Walcott look more special, spectacular and skilled on film. You aren´t rating them above him.

 

they all look special if you know where to look and the film is clear enough.

the defensive right hand of marciano allways at his chin waiting watching the elbow winged out powerful straights unique to him and possibly greb that while the elbow was winged out still incredibly straight and incredibly powerful. the falling step right straight that took out louis and walcott and the fainting of the jab against walcott the falling step lunging left hooks reminicent of langford that took out harry mathews the crouch and the tucked chin.....really theres sooo much that marciano was good at so much thats special and spectacular

 

Yes, you have a point. But compare that to Charles, Walcott and Moore, fighters he beat and who IMO look more special and spectacular than Marciano. He looks crude compared to them. And my point wasn´t that Marciano doesn´t look special but that you don´t need to look special on film to be ranked highly. I picked Marciano as a example because for one he owns a unique achievement and two he fought 3 greats with awesome hw records that look better on film than he does. Still nobody argues anyone of them above him. That´s was kinda my point. :thumbsup

 

I think it is an excellent point. Film is not as important as record and achievements in their own time frame, imo. If it was, we would all be able to study film and make a living off fight predicting, which would be a pretty decent way to earn a living to be honest.

 

By the way, what does everyone think about Jack Blackburn's claim as a pound for pound great. Langford is a pound for pound top 6 certainty, yet Jack gave him weight and was never stopped. Do you think he has a claim to rank near or above Langford based on what is in this article?
http://news.google.com.au/newspaper...J&pg=4624,6458152&dq=langford+blackburn&hl=en

here is a good article where Doc Kearns points out how difficult it is to rank fighters. I think he is right, which is why i always think it a little funny when people on here say fighter A MUST be top 10 or fighter B always beats fighter A. the fact is there are too many greats for anyone to be a guaranteed top 10 or win.
http://news.google.com.au/newspaper...J&pg=6676,2853451&dq=langford+blackburn&hl=en

 

To me most oldtimers films,ala Fitz, Jeffries, Ketchel etc, meeds nada to me. If less than\2% of a fighters career bouts are now seen on film,how in hell can that one or two films be indicative of their true abilities, that made their hard-nosed contemporaries laud them to the skies? If for examples we today have access to Fitz flattening Non.Jack Dempsey,
Peter Maher, Tom Sharkey,Gus Ruhlin etc, or if we now have film of Stanley Ketchel
koing the likes of Papke, Joe Thomas,Mike and Jack Sullivan,Hugo Kelly, Phil Jack
O'brien,etc, we would have a more valid picture of the true greatness of these fighters.
What woukd boxing fans 100 years from now think of a Ray Robinson,when the only films available to them were Robinson being soundly whipped by Tiger Jones or Randy Turpin,
or eeking out a controversial decision to Georgie Abrams? What would their thoughts be of
Ray Robinson,seeing only these films ? Or for that matter ,a century from now seeing a couple of clips of Ali with doug Jones, or Trevor Berbick, or Larry Holmes,or Leon Spinks ?
What would our descendants than conclude ? That Ray Robinson and Ali were not that good and were hyped by writers of their times better than they truly were. And so with a Fitz,and a Ketchel. They were great fighters judged on their entire record, not on one or two films
available a century later.

 

Fitzsimmons claim to P4P honours is quite simple; he went through durable men much heavier than himself in a manner that Pacquiao, without so much as a drop of exaggeration, couldn't sniff at.

What 'Pacman' did to Hatton, Bob did to fighters amidst a much more impressive weight disparity.

As a super middleweight, Fitzsimmons blasted durable heavyweights.