During Jeffries career, this was the most talked about fantasy match up. The Louis vs Ali of its day. One think that is interesting, is that most seem to have agreed that Jeffries was not the puncher or finisher that Sullivan was. The weight of consensus started in favour of Sullivan and drifted over to Jeffries later in his career.
dammit i'm trying to plan my lessons for the rest of the week and keep getting distracted by the threads on here! for the record, I only recently looked in depth at john l sullivan, but it seems clear to me, from what i've read, accounts etc. that people couldn't stand up to his power. the question is whether jeffries had the skillset to avoid sullivans shots and decision him. of course jeffries does have the ability to not get knocked out by sullivan, but prime for prime it is very hard to say whether or not he would have done. so i'm gonna give a slight edge to jeffries, but wouldn't consider it an upset if sullivan scores a knockout.
One person who favours Sullivan in this match is Adam Pollack, who gave a glowing review to both fighters in their respective biographies. His reasoning is that Jeffries style depended upon taking his oponents best shots, at least early in his career, and this would play into Sullivan's hands stylisticaly. I think that at least, he is right with respect to the younger Jeffries who won the title from Fitzsimmons and fought Sharkey. One thing I am sure of, is that if you took Jeffries out of his era and replaced him with Sullivan, you would get the same result. A dominant champion.
how many of sullivans best shots do you envision jeffries taking? do you think he could avoid them all fight or that he'd eventually get stopped?
That is the question. I think that Sullivan was the most destructive heavyweight champion before Jack Dempsey. Jeffries did however take some helacious shots from Fitzsimmons, who was no featherfist himself. I see the younger Jeffries taking too may shots. He fought reactivley and let his opponent throw the first punch in order to counter them. This would be suicide against Sullivan. Latter in his career, Jeffries got a bit smarter defensivley and forced the fight more. This version might be able to impose himself on Sullivan and win.
Interesting debate. I was always under the impression that the people who saw both thought Jeffries was the more complete and greater champion. However, comments on this thready thus far seem to tell a different tale. I have not done enough research (yet...) to give a good opinion but cool debate.
