Now Available! - In the Ring With Jack Dempsey - Part II: 1919 - 1923

Very interesting info on Dempsey training ... I never knew he was of the school that dried out before fights ... he could have fought close to 200 if he didn't dry out ..

 

He was way thin for his fights. For speed I believe. I bet 210 would have been easy and not fatty.

 

There is a lot of Greb in the book and it's very level handed .. plenty of credit but not endless rainbows either ... interesting coverage ... Wills as well .. greatly disappointing the way he was screwed out of a bout ..

 

Interesting golden nugget ... in 1922 Dempsey actually had a short sparring session with Sailor Tom Sharkey ... Sharkey had very interesting thoughts about how Dempsey watched up with Corbett, Fitz and Jeffries ... love that stuff ...

 

I'm past the Government/Maxine v. Dempsey jury .... in my browsing-ahead, I also see that Bill Brennan, after his unsuccessful 1920 challenge of Dempsey, also says Jack was much improved over when he'd met him in 1918. This, even though Brennan gave Dempsey much more trouble time in 1920 than in their first meeting.

 

Jack was living with a woman who he knew was a prostitute and doing her business quite openly.
No worries about getting syphilis? Dempsey was braver than I thought!

 

Just ordered a copy on Amazon. Can’t wait.

 

I get the impression that Dempsey's championship-fight opponents were well respected both before and after Dempsey beat them.

Most people wanted to see Dempsey and Wills match-up. People were widely spread on whether and to what extent Will's would be difficult for Dempsey, but even those who strongly favored Dempsey head-to-head admitted that, on the sporting merits of Wills work in the heavyweight division, he deserved the shot.

One wonders whether, if congress had not -- post-Jeffries/Johnson -- banned the lucrative interstate traffic in fight films, the next quarter-century (of heavyweight title match-making) might have been quite different. A sharp Washingtonian knee to the coins-purse can make boxing managers and promoters quite cautious.

 

The book deals extensively with the attempts and politics of the Wills bout .. I came away from it absolutely convinced Dempsey would fight Wills at any time but the games played by the governing bodies, promoters, management and many unscrupulous writers was horrific ..

 

Am nearing Dempsey-Carpentier III.
I wonder if anyone will propose a Greb-Carpentier encounter (prior to a Dempsey-Carpentier meeting)? On paper, a steel-chinned, hyper-fast/active biggish middleweight against a quick, crisp punching light heavy sounds very intriguing. I think it would have been a great match-up, but maybe too good in the context of all the anticipation and excitement for a Dempsey-Carpentier encounter -- nobody'd want Carpentier to prefix such an encounter with a fight which might 'harsh everyone's buzz' ......
A bit like asking, 'Why, before the biggest fight (to that point) in gloved-boxing history, didn't Jeffries have some livelier spar partners and maybe a couple tune-up contests?' Some questions are their own answers.

 

It would have been an interesting matchup in theory but Greb's chin was iron and Carpentier seemed to gas a bit ..

 

https://hometownbyhandlebar.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/locklear-dempsey.jpg34:40 ... 35:52 (Leatrice Joy) ... 37:54 (Viola Dana) -- 41:10 remember film aviator Ormer Locklear.

Towards the beginning of Adam Pollack's 'In the Ring With Jack Dempsey - Part II: 1919 - 1923' there's a photo of Dempsey along with film aviator Ormer Locklear and actress Viola Dana

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The documentary 'Hollywood - Ep 5: Hazards of the Game' had a segment on film aviators, and several minutes on Locklear, with interview with Dana, who spoke of Locklear and (though she disliked speaking of it) of his death while filming.

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The brevity of Dempsey-Miske III 1920 is nowadayssometimes looked upon as the result of Dempsey fighting a sick man. It's interesting that most of the fight observes drew an opposite conclusion, that the blows which put Miske down in round two, and for the first knockdown in round three, were so terrible that Miske's continuance argued that he he in a good shape to fight, as well as dead game. [EDIT: some observers also thought that, even if it were possible that Miske had gone back, Miske on his 1918 form wouldn't have done any better; Dempsey had imply imprved too much since Miske first met him].

 

Miske had 23 fights after losing to Dempsey. Beating guys like Brennan, Fulton, and losing to Gibbons. Certain Dempsey haters herle knock him for "fighting a sick man" but Miske had KO'd a boxer several months earlier. If he was so ill with Bright's Disease how the hell could he have fought 23 more times over a three year period?

 

There seems to be several schools of thought on this matter and the one thing I've never read is hard medical evidence to his condition and cause of death ... he did die young of something .. that said one thing the book spells out to me is that Dempsey is underrated today .. the 1919 - 1920 vintage was a pretty bad ass 190 pound terror ... he did slice through a still behemoth rough guy in Willard, he was a brutal guy against Miske, he showed terrific grit, stamina and chin against Brennan on Brennan's best night .. Dempsey peaked in Toledo .. that was at his best when active and even the fifteen months off between Willard and Miske didn't help him .. rumors dispelled to me are Dempsey had weak stamina, not true .. Dempsey was overwhelmed by Greb, not true, Dempsey ducked Greb, not true. Dempsey ducked Wills, not true .. what is true is that Dempsey and Greb had intense sparring sessions under different conditions. As far as a title bout, just like Wills, Dempsey would have fought either guy but the other issues kept them from happening , manipulated for sure , especially Wills but Dempsey personally was not scared, my opinion.