Jack Dempsey-John Lester Johnson, July 1916

Kid Norfolk
Harry Wills
Sam Langford
Joe Jeanette
George Godfrey
Jack Johnson


What do the following fighters have in common? All were either highly rated fighters who dempsey never fought, or fighters that challenged dempsey to fight in a professional fight that jack turned them down. All were coincidently Black.

 

None of them have ever eaten in my kitchen?

 

See, this saves you the time of forming your own opinions when you can just transcribe the opinions of others!

The article *clearly* shows that the organizers of the charity event tried to screw Dempsey over and Dempsey's manager did the appropriate thing and told them to get bent.

No offense kiddo, but if you think Kearns was in the wrong here, you should never apply for a manager's license in boxing. LOL at the idea of any manager worth a squirt of **** letting his prized heavyweight fight anybody for free with 30 seconds of preparation! :rofl

 

seems to be all the rage on this board.

ergo my increasing disinterest...

 

You just might be right.

 

UpWithEvil, you can't seriosuly mean that Dempsey didn't use the colour line to avoid dangerous contenders? You can go on all you want about "PC" and whatnot, but this is a pretty obvious fact,

 

I don't think Mr. Dempsey cared who stood across from the ring from him. His primary interest was in getting paid, preferably in stacks of $100 bills, delivered by the truckload. Tex Rickard, the man who made Dempsey the wealthiest athlete in the world, openly disparaged the idea of a black man fighting for the heavyweight title. If you want to find a scapegoat, you should probably start with him.

 

No it doesn't, it just offers one writer's personal opinion that Dempsey "ducked" him, or at least should've fought him anyway regardless of the injustice done to him. The article clearly states "There is no alibi for anybody involved in this disgraceful episode," and then goes on point blame at the managers and others behind this whole charade, although the article then gets cut off there.

The anger over Dempsey pulling out was only limited to those people in the arena, who were deprived of the expected opportunity to see him fight. There was no real backlash against him outside of that for his decision.

 

Agreed, it is getting to be absurd here, and increasingly inaccurate as well.

In the "zale vs hearns" thread, someone responds by saying "This fight couldn't happen, Zale didn't fight black fighters," which is not only silly but completely inaccurate.

Elsewhere, there's people saying Pacquiao's resume suffers because not enough of his big wins come against fighters who happen to be black. That's just childish and plain ******ed IMO.

 

this is random but Manny Pacquaio seriously claims to be part scottish. i wondered where he got that bravery from

 

its amazing that u can accuse him of ducking johnson, i mean ur bias is obvious.

 

Chris, I just caught your post and truly thank you for an amazing piece of research and history that I have never read or seen about Dempsey .... great stuff !!!
Talented posters like this are why I come to these sites ...

A few thoughts ... the article tells a lot between the lines putting the bias reporters opinions aside ...boxing is a business and Dempseywas Kearns investment ... in everything I read about Kearns and Dempsey, Kearn was always considered about Dempsey being fed a "ringer" at the wrong moment.

To me it is clear Dempsey was on the rise, Jeannette was not and Joe was trying to take advantage of an opportunity Jack was not prepared for ... Kerans as his manager had every right to say f-ck off ... why take the risk ... in addition, notice how the article stressed that Dempsey did not look the least bit concerned upon seeing Jeannette ..

 

you've made your point over and over on this board. I used to be unconvinced but now it's simply a fact:

no white man has ever beat a black man cleanly, throughout history nor will they ever in the future

 

Not the point. Both races lost by the color line in boxing ... blacks lost the opportunity to try for the top and be compensated for it ... Whites suffered far less, receiving only question marks from the handful of historians like us ...

 

How about this for a fact:

1) Dempsey got a painful beating from a black man in 1916, John Lester Johnson.
2) Dempsey never fought a black man after that.
3) Dempsey did the longest during and most blatant case of ducking the #1 contender in Harry Wills in the entire history of the sport, ALL weight classes.
4) That contender happens to be black.

Yeah, well, it's always easy to hide behind your promoter/manager. He doesn't give a damn about losing face or being called a coward. Ducking the best opposition while hiding behind and blaming your promotor who picks the easy opponents that you never wanted, poor Jack. The exact same thing happened with Bowe and Newman. If Bowe really wanted Lewis he would've got him. Same with Patterson and Liston.