Jack Dempsey and The Color Line...

Let me get this straight, Dempsey didn't fight the best of his era and Joe Louis did. Correct me if I am wrong the bulk of Louis' title defenses were against hapless white guys. Were there no blacks deemed worthy enough at any point in their careers to have faced Louis while he was champ? I know he faced two black fighters when he was at the end of his title reign when he fought Jersey Joe, and Ezzard Charles. And the white guys he did fight were that much better then any of the black contenders of Louis' era?

 

I am not confused I just asked a question. FYI ranking's are subjective. Subject to bias's and the agendas of the people who do the rankings.

 

Who were the black heavyweights that Louis should have faced? Most of the best contenders of Louis' reign (pre-war certainly) were white, just like today most of the best heavyweights happen to be white. Post-war, when Walcott got to #1 in the ratings, Louis fought him.

 

Louis was pretty scrupulous in taking on the most qualified challengers.

You might have a point in the sense that it was harder for a black fighter to get financial backing then.

 

I feel a couple of times Dempsey got close to crossing the colour line :think

did he not look very tanned in a few of those old films?

 

I don't have access to the rankings as you do that is why I asked you. What race has to do with is my question, the title of this thread is "Jack Dempsey and The Color Line...", and I was wondering why only Dempsey is subject to this. When it was apparent from the Newspaper articles I posted that there were real or imagined concerns about fighting Harry Wills. The Harry Greb fight I don't know enough about. This past weekend I was in Omaha, for the Crawford fite, cos one of my guys fought on the cardand I met Adam Pollack and sat with him and Bruce Trampler, I naively said Greb would've beaten Dempsey, he straightened me out on the subject.
I am just curious about the history of the sport. I learn a lot about the history from guys like yourself and others who know.
Excuse me are you the one writing about the top 50 MW and LHW's.
I love it I never knew about about some of the guys you mentioned, thank you for that.

 

S. That was my question to Adam and I did acknowledge I didn't know enough about it to form an opinion as to whether he deserved a shot or not. From what I have read on this thread he deserved the fight. The fight didn't happen for whatever reason. I believe Greb would have given Dempsey hell for however long the fight lasted. Greb had an awkward style that could give anybody fits. Dempsey sparred Greb with 10oz gloves, they both sparred(whenever Greb did spar)as they fought so based on that I guessed that he would've given Dempsey a better fight and had a chance to outpoint him over the short haul. Burt I think had it right, it was a no win situation.

 

In a New Orleans bordello maybe.

 

A few names that did not receive a title shot from Louis

Ezzard Charles- 6'0 185lb 72"
Elmer Ray- 6'2 195 78"
Archie Moore- 5'11 185 76"
Jimmy Bivins- 5'9 185 76"
Lee Q Murray- 6'4 210lb
Lem Franklin- 6'2 200lb 76"
Larry Gains- 6'1 205 77"
Turkey Thompson- 5'8 210lb 73"
Tiger Jack Fox- 5'11 175lb 75"

 

You are all over the place with the rankings and the timeline here.

 

Charles was not rated until 1948.
Moore was never a rated heavyweight during Louis's reign.
Gains was not rated after 1932,5 years before Louis won the title.
Thompson was rated for 3 years 41,42 ,43. Louis defended against Baer,Conn,Nova,Mauriello all rated above Thompson. Fox was never rated at Heavyweight he was the number one lhvy contender. Louis fought the then champion in that division Lewis who held a 3 rds ko over Fox and a 12rd ko over Ray.


We've done all this before and you were shown to be way off with your dates and timelines ,[Larry Gains! ArchieMoore! ] ,no point in indulging you again.