According to Wikipedia: In 1924, he had a friendly sparring match with the future champion Gene Tunney, an admirer of Corbett's scientific style. Tunney was amazed at the ability of Corbett to spar, even at the age of about 60, and claimed that Corbett had better defense than Benny Leonard. Any ideas if this is true and was Corbett really that good?
Yes it was true, and yes Corbett was that good. He was the single best pugilist in the world for a little while. There is a very small number of men to have ever reached that kind of level. These guys don't waste a thing; they are always in position to punch. Those two things alone make for an experience, being in the ring with them. Ali was good in the ring even when he was very sick. Tyson is still terrifying in the ring. These guys are the one percent, of the one percent, of the one percent of the one percent.
When you actually get decent footage of Corbett (people have stabilized it), it becomes apparent that he was a complete box of tricks. He is constantly feinting with both his hands, and his feet, and keeping his opponent guessing what he is going to do. Standing in front of a heavyweight boxer doing that, must be incredibly mentally draining, because the man is a heavyweight boxer, and you can't afford to get tagged with something that you don't see coming.
It's always been hard to paint a clear picture of Corbett. While I never thought he looked as abysmal as others here say he does, he still does some very bizarre things in the footage we have of him. However, I am more inclined to believe Gene Tunney than I am to judge Corbett off of one fight and a bit of training footage.
You can already tell that Corbett, despite his technical flaws, was a phenomenal athlete and appeared to be the 1890s equivalent of Ali athletically. He's almost 60 here and he's able to keep up the footwork pace with a prime Tunney.
Perhaps my read on this wrong - but it seems Fitz garners a lot more respect and love than Corbett. He certainly does from me. Obviously there were Fitz’s amazing, P4P qualities - primarily a big punch carried through the divisions. Those P4P attributes in their own right put him ahead of Jim. However, when the time came to face Fitz himself, a complacent, inactive and perhaps less than perfectly conditioned (can’t say for sure, Corbett might’ve trained hard - he simply always looked quite fit) Corbett put quite a beating on Fitz up to at least the 6th round - the round when he dropped Bob hard and really went for the KO for the remainder of the round. Fitz’s famed durability, more than anything else, came to the fore which allowed him to survive and see out the round. Not to oversight Fitz’s steady work, but after the 6th round, the round in which Corbett let it all hang out, it appeared the fight was notably marked by Corbett’s increasing fatigue, allowing the momentum to progressively shift over into Fitz’s favour. We know Fitz could and did roll much bigger men with power hits to the chin - but Corbett somehow dodged those bullets for near 14 rounds - ultimately succumbing to a body shot of all things. Cornett also looked a lot better on film in an actual fight than some of his heavily orchestrated exhibition clips. We are actually quite fortunate to have a reasonable amount of vision from the Corbett - Fitz fight, for due analysis of both men. Also, if set to punch, it reads as if he wasn’t the proverbial powder puff hitter - as it is reasonably well corroborated that he was able to hurt no less than Jeffries in sparring and in their first match. This is def. not a nostalgic, rose tint view for me. I didn’t give Corbett his just due for a long time - and I def. don’t like the person that he was - an acute racist even relative to the social mores of his day. @apollack ‘s book on Johnson was more than illuminating when it described even the spectators at Reno yelling at Corbett to shut up - indicating that his remarks toward Johnson during the fight were even unacceptable to them. Jimbo said, during the fight, he felt like jumping in the ring and taking on Johnson himself - yeah, okay Jim, too bad you didn’t. Lol. Instead, Jeffries was getting beat up even worse due to Corbett’s big mouth. Apparently even Jeffries told Corbett to shut the **** up.
