Jack Dempsey openly stated he would not fight black challengers

Klompton lays it out very well in lengthy posts, but I don't think anything more is needed than Occam's razor really (the simplest explanation generally being the correct one).

And if the top contender goes some 5+ years, winning three title eliminators in the mean time, without fighting for the richest prize in sports against the most famous athlete of his day, the simplest explanation is that it is because the man holding this prize don't want to.

I think the decent thing is just to admit this.

 

Yeah, nothing more really needs to be said to understand the likely crux of the matter.

 

But it will be, likely in about a months time,it will be rehashed again.

 

Agreed, it's almost as inevitable as death and taxes

 

"Wills was the defacto champion"

This was the reality of it, wasn't it. Wills has to keep fighting top contenders for years while Dempsey mostly sits on his "title" and nothing Wills can do will open up a shot at Dempsey. And after Tunney wins the title, and before Wills loses to Sharkey, Tunney is announcing he will not defend against a black man, either Wills or Godfrey.

Interesting that Gibbons is sometimes thrown out as someone Wills should have fought. If Wills did, Gibbons would be put down both as small and a Dempsey leftover. And another contender would then have been dredged up to deny Wills his chance.

 

"Who has trashed Wills"

Dempsey for one--quoted by Time Magazine--"Just get me into the ring with Harry and I'll win in a round or two."

And this post--"Who had Wllls beaten from '22 to '26. A blind in one eye much smaller Langford who was long past prime? A much smaller Norfolk? He struggled with Dempsey's sparring partner Tate in '22--one loss and one draw. Firpo was the only legit opponent he fought in '25 . . . Dempsey's leftovers who Dempsey beat much quicker and easier a couple of years prior."

That was not your post. I am not quite certain why you are responding.

As for this take. Wills had beaten Langford as early as 1915. Norfolk was as big or bigger than Carpentier and Gibbons. The loss to Tate was a DQ after Wills KO'd him. Perhaps Wills deserved to be DQ'd, but then Dempsey is on film doing things which could and perhaps should have DQ'd him.
Firpo fought Wills in 1924 not 1925, and only one year later. Dempsey did beat Firpo quicker, but easier? This is like arguing that Foreman beat Lyle easier than Jimmy Young did. No. Quick is not the same as easy.

"Firpo had sacked his trainer"

Yes. Weeks before the Dempsey fight. "During the weeks prior to the Dempsey fight, when reaching peak condition was critical to his chances, he fired Jimmy DeForest, the outstanding trainer who had prepared Dempsey for Willard. DeForest had asked for a raise."
Roger Kahn--A Flame of Pure Fire, page 323. (I have read this from many other sources)

"trained very desultorily for Wills"

Firpo seems to have trained desultorily for everyone. To save money, he stinted on paying sparring partners, and so did not spar enough. As for his weight, perhaps and perhaps not. Seven lbs. is not that much for a guy that big. Firpo was four lbs. heavier for Dempsey than he had been for Brennan. This proves something? The bottom line is Wills agreed to fight anyone Rickard chose for an elimination and Rickard picked Firpo. There is simply nothing to criticize Wills for, and questions for which we have no answer about whether the still in his twenties Firpo had gone back are out of place. He was the guy Rickard put in front of Wills.

And Weinert in 1925 was rated only behind Wills and Tunney as a contender.

"Trashing" is the word I used, and some might think it too strong, although I don't, but one-sided is certainly obvious.

 

Speaking only for myself,I don't believe I have ever trashed Wills.

You seem rather emotional on this subject,I sincerely hope I haven't offended you with my comments?
Being that this subject comes up every couple of months or so,I think I' ll bail here .as I have no wish to alienate posters I have respect for.

 

"I sincerely hope I haven't offended you with my comments?"

Nothing to worry about. You haven't. I understand that people have different opinions, and boxing history is not exactly a crucial subject, which in a way makes it more fun to debate, because being wrong doesn't really matter. And I'm sure all of us have been wrong more often than we would like to admit.

 

Great wisdom in this post.

 

I'll respond to any post I feel like responding to particularly if I disagree with someone's statement.
Mentioning Firpo's lack of dedication is trashing Firpo ,not Wills.
Dempsey saying he would ko Wills in couple of rounds may have been his honest opinion,or maybe he was caught on a bad day .Other quotes have him saying," I think I would have licked Wills,I could always beat those big slow moving guys",I don't consider that thrashing.

 

Archie Moore was 5'11 and more importantly 43. Walcott had a 63% KO rate Morris was almost 80% and Firpo was even better at 83%. The crude but powerful Firpo did not lose to so many journeymen as Walcott either, but more importantly, Walcott was 38 and at the end of his career.

 

I don't know where you get your statistics, but Carl Morris KO'd 41 men in 83 fights, for a percentage of less than 50%. Firpo KO'd 25 men in 36 fights for a percentage of 69%.

I would say the evidence off his record, all we have, paints Morris as not really the puncher Lee Savold was.

Firpo was more dangerous, but taking a look at his record, it is pretty heavily padded with setups. That said, he did KO Willard, Brennan, Weinert, and Spalla.

At the end of his ringside report on the Marciano-Moore fight, reprinted in The Sweet Science, A J Liebling recalled attending the opening boxing show at Yankee Stadium in 1923 in which Firpo KO'd Jack McAuliffe and Jess Willard KO'd Floyd Johnson. Here is his comment on Firpo:

"The two winners, of whose identity there was infinitesimal preliminary doubt, were to fight each other for the right to meet the great Jack Dempsey. Firpo was so crude that Marciano would be a Fancy Dan in comparison. He could hit with only one hand--his right--he hadn't the faintest idea what to do in close, and he never cared much for the business anyway. He knocked McAuliffe out, of course, and then, in a later 'elimination' bout, stopped poor old Willard. He subsequently became a legend by going one and a half sensational rounds with Dempsey, in a time that is now represented to us as the golden age of American pugilism."

"I reflected with satisfaction that old Ahab Moore would have whipped all four principals on that card within fifteen rounds, and that while Dempsey may have been a great champion, he had less to beat than Marciano. I felt satisfaction because it proved that the world isn't going backward, if you can just stay young enough to remember what it was really like when you were really young."

*Ahab Moore--Leibling had compared Archie Moore in his pursuit of Marciano to Captain Ahab's pursuit of Moby Dick.

Off film that is available on these men, I agree with Liebling's take.

 

KO percentage is the percentage of a fighter's victories that they won by KO. You don't take the percentage out of their total number of fights, only those they won.

 

Not for me. Why should you get credit as a puncher for going the distance and losing? Or for being stopped yourself. Makes no sense to me.

Using KO's against just wins is a way to penalize a guy who can win a decision, like Robinson or Moore, in favor of crude and limited sluggers who only have a puncher's chance.

 

First off, you directly contradict yourself in that you used this modified method of KO% to declare that Morris and Firpo weren't powerful punchers. Just being a powerful puncher doesn't necessarily give you the skills and technique to automatically win more of your fights.

Also by your method, of calculating KO percentage, ya boy Savold had a KO percentage of 46% considerably less than Morris and far less than Firpo. Archie Moore has a knockout % of 60%, still considerably less than Firpo.

Math is simple and worth checking before you post.