https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Re_eAb2qHsQ Darn this system is so bad, any other forum getting YT videos to work on posts is easy... not here.
Yes I would call that a UD and really the only decisions not to be argued with. Who cares if 10 newspaper give X the win and 8 give Z the win... meaningless, proves nothing.
Of course not You can't go rewriting history. People understood in ND fights that if no ko occurred they relied on the interpretation of the press and it would not be added to their official record. You can't revise that.
yep they are just silly fights, fact is they rarely resulted in a KO so why is that ?..... makes NO SENSE.
Even official decisions go by majority verdicts. If two judges think you won by a point and the third thinks you lost every round, you still get the decision. Why shouldn't the same apply with newspaper decisions? That's how it was applied at the time. Newspaper verdicts were widely accepted and reported, and fighters went up and down based on how they fared in them. Obviously if the papers are split there's doubt over the result, but that's the case even with official decisions. How many people agree that Tim Bradley beat Pacquiao in their first bout? I don't really see how a dozen pressmen determining the winner is any worse than three judges doing it. Judges can be paid off too, and often have scorecards at odds with the majority. In Pacquiao-Bradley I the judges were 2-1 for Bradley. The ringside press were 121-3-1 for Pacquiao. Had there been a newspaper decision rather than a judges' one, the right man would have won.
These ND fights could have had any Joe from any newspaper saying anything, the whole idea is not tenable, what is the point when titles are at stake ? and why would a title be at stake over a pathetic 10 rounds anyway........ no matter which way you look at it these were not half as legit as the usual 20 rounders held all over the rest of the world and even in a US state or two
Just because these writers were "any joe" to an uneducated crumb like you doesn't mean they weren't respected at the time. I think its pretty telling that you keep coming on here trying to bash the ND process at that time in favor of decision fights, with the idea that ND fights were too open to interpretation and too open to corruption and then go on and on about how Tunney beat Greb in their second fight, completely ignoring that a wide majority of onlookers not only thought that decision was a complete robbery but also thought it warranted a criminal investigation. That's how infallible your precious judges were/are. I will take a consensus of opinion over a judges decision any day of the week in the absence of actual footage. I will also take any ND fight over a fight held in Australia and choreographed by Stadiums Ltd. I mean how unbiased can fight be where the favorite is fighting in his promotional outfits stadium, where a custom path has been cleared ringside to allow his manager free movement all the way around the ring to coach his protégé, where the referee is that managers brother, where several fighters alleged they were paid to lose, and where there is a financial incentive to keep the favorite winning?? You have more faith in THAT process than in the ND process? That's funny. Odd that you condemn the ND law so much and yet your hero left the "safety" of his mothers bosom to go to the United States and take part in those fights and even then he was doing everything he could to fight the weakest competition possible. Good thing he avoided guys like Gibbons, Smith, and Dillon, and died before Harry Greb got ahold of him. At least the way his story ended you still have your hero fantasy. Another laughable thing is how you steadfastly insist that Tunney was a novice when he fought Greb the first time despite the fact that he had 49 fights and dozens of military bouts yet at the same time you insist that Darcy was a seasoned veteran and all time great with 50 bouts as a defense against the people who say he had a lot to prove to get to that point. So which is it? Or was that one bout difference in their records the difference between a novice and a pro?
if you are saying they are exhibitions or even works you are just wrong and anything else means a fight took place and whoever the majority of the chosen judges had winning is the winner. if you were saying nd bouts shouldn't be wins on boxrec then i would agree but you're going much further than that.
You are entitled not to accept newspaper decisions when ring officials could not legally render official decisions in bouts. But newspaper decisions generally give people a good idea about which boxers did better than their opponents during bouts. At time, people were very much interested in who won or if there were draws in boxing bouts regardless if the decisions were official or of a newspaper variety. - Chuck Johnston
This is the part we cant agree upon. Whos says that they were accepted at the time? IT was agreed at the time that there was NO Decision. In modern times, Evander Holyfield used to fight in spurts at teh end of the round to impress the judges. Muhammed Ali would look at the judges and try to convince them he was winning. These were the only guys whose decisions mattered. If Newspaper Decisions were they way it was accepted back then, then fighters could have simply slung a few more dollars the way of key newspaper men, or planted people next to them to create a false perception that they were winning. But this wasnt the situation there were no winners either way. If it is a close fight (and if newspaper decisions are split say 60 40) then it is a close fight, then why in the world should a decision be given 100 years later. If there are 10 papers for one fighter and 6 for the other, whose to say that those 10 reporters were not sitting next to and influenced by that fighters entourage. If the rules are that the papers make a decision then that is one thing. But given that the rules are that the fight is a draw then it is obviously too close to tell if many papers pick each different fighter.
Big fights were mostly reported by more experienced and respectable writers, at least that's the way it was in New York and Philadelphia. The spectators chose which newspapers their bets were depending on, usually knowing who was going to report for this or that newspaper, and they chose reporters who had a reputation (for being an expert and being honest). Boxers' managers usually either picked the reports that were most favorable to their man post hoc, without bribing anyone or trying to influence them, or they sent out their own wires to out-of-town newspapers and then referred to those (their own) wires to claim the result that was favorable to them. That's why klompton refused to include anonymous wire results in his book, one of the reasons as I see it, anyway.
Very valid points. Again these details of history are lost in time. Very difficult so many years later to understand the truth. Another factor to consider is that ND bouts may have been thought of one way by the boxing public early on and as decades past the reliance of newspaper reporters opinions became important as to who had actually won. It is also very possible and probable that reporters were paid off to favor one fighter over another. Like everything else a system evolves over time in a multi dimensionally.
You will take everything as good and legit if it suits your agenda and throw out everything that runs contrary to it. Simple as that.