As a heavyweight, Jeffries. P4P, Fitzsimmons Winning against Corbett, Tom Sharkey, while giving away pounds, is very impressive. Jeffries though was great, too.
You got to have your favourites, right? The trick is not to show bias to any of your favourites, if you can manage it. But I really like Jeffries. I like what I see of him, and the more I learn about him, the more I like about him, style wise, gifts wise, talent wise. Plain old balls wise. This p4p thing - sometimes I think people take it to far. For me, it was never about relative power or relative strength or anything like that. It was a way of comparing fighters talents without them actually fighting, and without analysing, as best you can, a potential fight. About the fighters not the fights, if you like. It sounds like Fitz was a phenominum - a kind of Tyson for his day, just extremely powerful - and durable with it. But Jeffries is the better fighter. In my opinion he would be as succesful fighting MMA this weekend in Japan as he would be fighting bare knuckle in England in the 1600's. He'd certianly be world heavyweight champ were he fighting today.
I completely agree. Pound for pound Fitz was better. But as a HEAVYWEIGHT, a prime Jeff was too big and strong to be defeated by Bob, who looked like a midget next to him. That said, if Bob had taken Jeff on in 1897, when he was fight sharp, who knows....
Fitz was the Surger Ray Robinson of his time. Pound for pound champ. We all know the REAL reason they came out with pound for pound. Forget Surger Ray. Fitz was the real deal. He held 3 weight titles.
yep, fitzsimmons is the original pound for pound king. ray robinson is the 2nd greatest p4p boxer of all times. and then comes the rest.
At the risk of rehashing what has been said before, Jeffries was the greater heavyweight while Fitz was the pound for pound king of his era. Even as a heavyweight there were area's where Fitzsimmons exceled Jeffries. He was a better finisher for example. I think Fitzsimmons still deserves consideration for a place among the top 20 heavyweights of all time today.
Their could have very well been someone earlier (or was used to describe him earlier), but Fitzsimmons is the earliest fighter I've personally yet seen where they had that exact "pound for pound" term attached to a fighter's name in print, which, if memory serves, was written about him sometime in early 1918. But like I said, there could very well have been someone earlier referenced to in such a manner, as the term itself was spoken of in other walks of life going back at least a couple of generations previous to that 1918 reference to Fitz.
I put Armstrong, Ross, Berg, Canzi and a few others as pound for pound kings before Robinson. (Before Jr titles) These guys were able to hold 3 weight title belts. Robinson had 2. Robinson try for the lightheayvweight of couse and faild. But we cant give Robinson points for a failed effort.
yea, he had joey maxim beat, but the heat was too much and almost passed out. robinson said in a interview years after he retired that if he won that fight (light heavyweight) theirs no chance that he would win or challenge the heavyweight title.
