John L Sullivan a decade or two later...

lpr are my favorite rules, i think john l would of suffered, because the "movement boxers" were around and he didnt have to face them also, the fitness was alot better.

 

People from the era romanticised him and picked him over those who came after, as is the case with all great champions.

I think that Sullivan could have adapted to most rule sets, because he fought 4 round queensbury bouts on the one hand and 3 hour LPR bouts on the other. I also think that he would have been OK with greater regulation, because he was clean and by the book relative to the other fighters of his era. He wanted to take things in the direction they eventualy went.

So how would he have done against the top fighters.

I certainly think he could have beaten Jeffries and Johnson title challengers and probably more quickly than they did. It is hard to say how he would have fared against the best of that buch e.g Jackson, Jeffries and Johnson, but I would expect those to be competitive fights.

 

He would have kicked the absolute **** out of Jim Jeffries. Almost literally. You know how Pachilles has a picture of Duran that says, need a poo. It would be like that but the title would be, need a transfusion with a picture of Jeffries hemorrhaging like a smashed blood mobile.

 

Jeffries might have matured into a fighter who could have beaten prime Sullivan by the time he retired.

Ask yourself this though.

Would Jeffries have beaten a prime Sullivan when he won the title?

I don't think he would, and I think other people who have studied the era are thinking the same.

 

I thought the bouts were either MQ or LPR, didn't know anything about mixed rules. How would that even work ?

 

There were a couple of hybrid bouts in Sullivans era. The McCaffrey fight had some prety eccentric rules.

 

I wouldn't say he did just fine against Mitchell.

Photos of some of those bruisers shows a few of them carrying surplus.
Pics of the Sullivan /Kilrain fight do not suggest that either man was in great condition as we know it today.
As to how Sullivan would do against those that came after?

He had bigger one shot power than Jeffries, and was certainly more aggressive than Corbett ,Fitz, or Jeff.

In his prime John L was fast on his feet and ,did not mess about, it was attack, attack!


Johnson rated Corbett Fitz and Jeffries over Sullivan whom he did not think much of , but, like us, his opinion was based on hearsay.

http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=SCE0ypLQHGcC&dat=19290427&printsec=frontpage&hl=en

[Page 27.]


Jack thought Fitz the best of the bunch.

 

It's hard to say really. The guy was so far above his opponents it's hard to say how good he was and what his limitations were.

Had he fought godfrey and jackson we'd have a better idea of his skillset when tested because one thing is for sure and that's that the level of fighter's around the turn of the century was generally higher than the level of fighters during sullivan's era.

As a natural athlete chances are he'd have succeeded to some degree for sure. Providing their chins are solid enough natural athletes always seem to succeed.

I've no doubt he'd overpower fitz. I'm also convinced he'd spark maher, ruhlin and sharkey none of whom were exactly durable.

I've no idea how he'd get on with a prime corbett. Would he be able to effectively cut the ring off? Almost impossible to say because he's so romanticised and so little is known about the skillset of his contenders.

I think he'd get outboxed by jeffries and johnson.

So yeah there's two guys i'd favour over him and one i'd put him as a very tight favourite. Other than that I struggle to see him struggling.

 

Why in the world would you think that a Godfrey and Jackson fights would tell us anything?

Godfrey wasnt in the same league. You can pretty much assume Sullivan knocks him out.

And Sullivan was semi retired and well past prime by the time that Jackson came along. I suppose, if Sullivan had beaten Jackson, it would tell us plenty, but realistically he didnt really have a chance against Jackson adn it would have proved nothing.

Incidentally, the thinking of the time was not that Sullivan enjoyed the easier era than those after him (particularly Johnson) although i do tend to agree with others that he seemed to.

 

I think Fitz would be a very dangerous opponent for any of those within 30 years of him. Prime Sullivan v prime Jackson would have been a great fight imo.

 

Always dangerous because he's a huge power puncher. I'd still confidently favour him over fitz though.

It certainly would have been tremendous ice the two got it on just before john l's semi - retirement.