From The Ring, April 1949. NO-DECISION BILL AN AID to GAMBLERS By AL BUCK WHEN Jimmy Walker drafted the boxing law that bears his name, he gave the judges equal power with the referee in rendering a decision. He did this because he wanted to provide for a majority opinion. If one arrived at a verdict that did not square with the facts, the other two would correct it. It was a reasonable supposition and it has worked down through the years. Senator Walker was familiar with the Frawley Law which had been killed in 1917. The Frawley Law provided for 10-round no-decision fights. Supposed to discourage gambling, it didn't. People will always bet and they left it to the newspapers to give the decision to decide their wagers. The Walker Law came into existence three years after the Frawley Law died. Operating under the rules and regulations written into the bill by Jimmy Walker, boxing has enjoyed its greatest prosperity in the last 29 years. Of course the Walker Law is not perfect, but it is surprising that the attempt to amend it in the New York State Legislature this year calls for a return to the no-decision days. Assemblyman A. Joseph Ribustello offered the amendment to end decisions in boxing bouts for the purpose of driving "gamblers and unwanted persons out of the game." NO doubt Assemblyman Ribustello means well, but he has only to look at the varying opinions expressed by the different boxing writers following the recent Ike Williams-Kid Gavilan fight at Madison Square Garden to learn that the reporters are no different than the State Athletic Commission's officials. The two judges voted for Gavilan and he received the decision. Referee Ruby Goldstein called it a draw. Lewis Burton of the Journal-American, Lester Bromberg of the World-Telegram, Jimmy Cannon on the Post Home News, Nat Fleischer of this magazine among others, all thought Williams was the winner. So did this writer in his article in the Post Home News the following day. Dan Parker in the Mirror agreed with us. On the other hand Jim Jennings, Mirror; Jess Abramson, Herald Tribune; Leonard Cohen and Barney Nagler, Post Home News, all thought the judges had arrived at the correct verdict. Under Assemblyman Ribustello's amendment there would have been no official verdict. The paying public would have been at the mercy of the boxing writers, of which I am one, and it is obvious that we can't agree. We seldom do as a glance into fistic history will reveal. IN the old days when decisions were not permitted, bets were made on the newspaper verdicts. According to Francis Albertanti, veteran sports scribe, it was customary to make the wager payable on the majority opinion arrived at by the boxing writers on the Evening World, the Globe and the Mail. Occasionally the bet was left to a single sports writer, and it explains the famous "decision" arrived at by the late Walter St. Denis following the Packey McFarland-Jack Britton bout in 1913. Walter was a great friend of Dan Morgan, Britton's manager, and he was a friend of Britton, too. Everybody gave the fight to McFarland. St. Denis wrote in his newspaper that Britton was the winner. Asked to explain why he differed so widely from the opinions of the other experts, Walter St. Denis replied in all seriousness : "From the southwest corner of the ring, where I was sitting, Britton was clearly the winner." There were no-decisions permitted in New York. The same was the case in most other cities. About the only places where the referee was allowed to decide were Boston, New Orleans and California. In Denver you could have it either way. Youngstown, Ohio, was a no-decision town, yet you could get an official decision. In Youngstown the referee was Mike McHale. He was also the sports editor of a local newspaper. He couldn't give the decision in the ring, but when his paper came out the next day. his verdict was that of the referee. "I'd call it a semi-official decision," explained Jersey Jones, veteran boxing writer and manager, the other day. THE Associated Press paid little attention to fights out of town in the no-decision years. The managers usually made their own decisions, wiring the results to the New York newspapers. Frequently their thrilling stories of ten round battles were written long before the men entered the ring. More often than not they were filed before the fight was over. "This was the case at least once when Jack Britton and Ted (Kid) Lewis met in the ring. They fought so many times, Dan Morgan, Britton's manager, doesn't remember the date or the town, but he does know he had an agreement with the late James J. Johnston, Lewis' manager, not to send anything out until the bout was over. "About the fifth round I looked over to Lewis' corner and there was no Johnston," Morgan recalled. "I told my assistant to take over, and I went looking for Jimmy. I went straight to the telegraph office and who should I meet at the door? Jimmy Johnston of course. "We both started laughing. Then we shook hands and agreed to wire the New York newspapers that the fight ended in a draw," Dumb Dan explained. "Johnston and I had many a race to be first on the wire. Sometimes he won, but usually I held my own." THE champions had a tendency to keep their titles on ice in the no-decision days. The only way they could lose them was to get knocked out. Morgan managed Al McCoy, a Brooklyn southpaw. McCoy was game, tough and could punch. Nevertheless by championship standards he wasn't much of a fighter. McCoy was to box Joe Chip, but when Joe became ill, his brother George, the middleweight champion, gladly substituted. What could happen in a ten-round no-decision bout in the Broadway Arena, Brooklyn. Nothing? With the first punch McCoy flattened George Chip and became the world middleweight king, or the cheese champion as they called him. "He was a 'bum,' but he was tough and you couldn't knock him out in ten rounds," Morgan declared. "Everybody outpointed him, but there were no decisions, George Chip almost killed him in a return bout, but McCoy was on his feet and still champion at the finish." Tad, the famous cartoonist, on seeing McCoy in action, shouted to Morgan : "Will you tend to your other champs and give that stiff away!" Morgan did, giving him to his father. On November 14, 1917, die night the Frawley Law died, McCoy was knocked out in six rounds by Mike O'Dowd, who succeeded to the middleweight crown. Jimmy Johnston liked to tell the story about the reporter from the North Side News, who had a social engagement and passed up the Gunboat Smith-Boer Rodel fight. The Gunner knocked Rodel down four times and won going away. Later the reporter phoned Johnston and asked him who won the fight. Johnston told him and with details. Only he reversed everything. As Jimmy told it, Rodel floored Smith four times, and won going away. That's the way the fight was reported in the North Side News the next day. THE sports writers had their problems. Bob Edgren used to write his column at the ringside and send it down to the paper. He noticed that a gambler was looking over his shoulder. Bob promptly wrote that Smith had won the fight, although Jones had a clear margin. That was all the gambler waited to see. He was off to bet on Edgren's decisiona sure thing, or so the gambler thought Edgren put the story in his pocket, went to his office and threw it away. He then sat down and wrote the correct account, declaring Jones the winner of course. The sure-thing gambler was clipped. In the scramble to get the results into the newspapers it was common enough for a sports editor to receive two stories by wire, one from each manager, and of course two different results. Silvie Burns, who handled many fighters, was not above wiring the result of a fight that never took place from a town where fights were never held. That was his method of building up his boys' records. The smart managers were the ones who could get there first with the result. In their haste, they frequently forgot a round or two, and sometimes this proved disasterous. For instance there was the time Willie Gibbs took Ray Rivers, a California lightweight, to Allentown to box Mickey Donley of Newark. Gibbs was on his toes. When the sixth round ended he wired the New York papers telling how Rivers had outpointed Donley in a fast ten round bout. In the ninth round, Donley knocked out Rivers! DICK CURLEY was involved in a similar incident. He managed Young Brown. He had him fighting Paul Doyle one night, and at the end of eight rounds hastened to a telephone booth. He was phoning the result of Brown's victory when in the ninth round Doyle won by a knockout. "The telephone was important," Dan Morgan explained. "There was only one phone in the Broadway Arena for example. The night Britton fought Mike O'Dowd there, I took a walk through the neighborhood. I discovered there were four public phones around there. Now I knew Britton had to beat O'Dowd. "First I put Abe Yager in the phone in the club. Next I hired four fellows and put them in the phones in the neighborhood. I had Paddy Mullins, O'Dowd's manager, shut out, and in the papers the next day Britton was declared the winner," Morgan declared. "We had a lot of fun in those no-decision days. There were a lot of near-sighted writers."
MANY of the arguments caused by newspaper decisions continue down through the years. Abe Attell still insists he defeated Jem Driscoll in their famous ten-round no-decision fight at the old National. The majority of the newspapers gave Driscoll the nod, but the Little Champ claims the Morning Telegraph was official. The Telegraph declared Attell the winner. Attell also has a letter from Jimmy Johnston, in which the late manager said he thought the fight was a draw. Johnston was one of Driscoll's representatives in America. There is no doubt the fistic greats of the no-decision era frequently carried opponents. Return bouts were the rule, rather than the exception, but as Morgan explains it, "The public could be sure of ten fast rounds." Titles did change hands in no-decision bouts. The Jack Dempsey-Jess Willard heavyweight championship fight at Toledo, Ohio, was signed for 12-rounds no-decision. Jack had to knock out Big Jess to win, which he did. Willard, a better fighter than he is now credited with being, also defended the title in a ten-round no-decision bout with Frank Moran in the old Garden. All newspapers said Jess won, but to keep the title all he had to do was stay on his feet. Freddie Welsh, the lightweight champion, thought he was safe when he took on Benny Leonard in a no-decision fight. They had met twice before and nothing had happened. It was reasonable for Welsh to believe he could dance through ten rounds with Leonard. Only Benny was improving and the third time was out for Freddie. The knockout came in the ninth round. AL McCOY was the only champion to both win and lose a title in New York under the Frawley Law. McCoy, Mike O'Dowd and Leonard were the only champions crowned in New York rings during the six years the Frawley Law was in existence. That in itself is a powerful argument against Assemblyman Ribustello's amendment. He proposes to turn back the clock by returning to a system that failed. The amendment to the Walker Law seems destined to die in committee, but it has served to recall an amusing period in boxing when the fighter with the fastest manager usually was the winner. As Francis Albertanti puts it: "Under the Frawley Law, Willie and Dave Astey never lost a fight. They were managed by Joe Jacobs." Leo P. Flynn was another manager who was quick in getting to the telegraph office. And sometimes there was the double cross. Bob (Papa) Levy was associated with Joe Smith in managing Tommy Loughran, who was to fight Jeff Smith in Scranton. Levy agreed with Al Lippe, Smith's manager, that he would telegraph the newspapers that the fight was a draw. Papa forgot or something, and the papers all stated that Loughran had won. Jeff was an easy-going sort, but he felt his manager had been "double-crossed," and tactics of that sort didn't set at all well with him. For one of the few times in his long career, the Bayonne globe-trotter became incensed at the opposition. "Get me that Loughran again," he said to Lippe, "and I'll make somebody wish he had played fair with you." Smith and Loughran met again a few weeks later in Philadelphia. This time there was no mistake. Jeff Smith, as clever a fighter as ever lived, gave young Loughran a boxing lesson for eight rounds. Just to make certain there would be no chance of the newspaper decision going astray, with the Philly writers voting for their home-town pride and joy, Jeff dropped Loughran a couple of times. He probably ceuld have won by a knockout had he wanted, but he was satisfied to give Tommy a real licking, and let it go at that. There are endless stories about the no-decision days, most of them amusing, although doubtless it was serious business at the time. Nobody wants to revive the dead past, and while Jimmy Walker's law isn't perfect it is better than any of the other fistic codes that have existed down through the years. I'll have to vote an emphatic "no" on Assemblyman Ribustello's amendment, but remember mine is only a newspaper decision. The people's elected representatives will decide at Albany.
