Bulwark of the community here. I must learn to create convincing lies and personal attacks which offend him! "He tasks me! He tasks me, and I shall have him!" -Ricardo Montalban as Kahn, quoted in the Gang Bang Theory by the extremely gay :gayfight Jim Parsons as Sheldon Cooper.
off the board but i seriously think a prime and prepared povetkin would embarrass dempsey. just sayin'.
Awesome Awesome footage. Wills did a lot of dirty boxing and especially liked to land that inside uppercut in the clinch when he had someone hurt, Lewis style. A lot of dirty boxing actually
It's not all that different from what Harry does in the familiar brief Uzcudun footage, aside from Paulino knocking him out. How stylistically different could Wills have been during Willard's reign?
Thats so funny. "How different could a prime Wills look vs a 37+ year old Wills." Well, heres a clue: At 37 Dempsey got his head handed to him by Kingfish Levinsky... But hey, how different could the 1919 version of Dempsey look from the 1932 version... People amaze me.
I seem to remember Dempsey had been retired for for 5 years when he boxed Levinsky. Factor in also his 3 years hiatus previous to coming back for Tunney. Wills if not overly ambitious in his choice of opponents was at least an active fighter he had 25 fights during the timescale that saw him go from 32 to 37. This makes the first statement by Lord Ty Klomp the bench mark for puerility.
Klompt, here's where you left out the key word, 'STYLISTICALLY' With King Levinski he was slow and lead footed of course, but stylistically the same basically, and styles make fights. Of course WW I era Wills [the version with the best shot at winning a title opportunity] would be faster and better than what we've seen on the films so far. However, we'd still likely see the same things. Infighting, mauling, and keying his right to the body. Exactly how he broke three of Fulton's left ribs with his right is completely in evidence through the Madden/Firpo/Uzcudun films. That's perfectly easy to extrapolate. We don't see Loughran/Tunney/Corbett type jabbing and mobility from Harry. We don't see a scientist who utilized height and attempted long range boxing like Jeannette tried at Paris in Langford X. That Wills didn't really fight tall offers some clues as to how Sam could reach him to knock him out twice. [I don't see Langford reaching Willard's chin like that, as Jess did fight tall. So did the tall, thin and glass jawed Fulton, so Harry accordingly hammered his right below.] Head to head, Dempsey would be at close quarters underneath Wills, and I tend to favor a superior hook in that situation to a great right when digging to the body. Peak for peak, Langford-Dempsey and Langford-Frazier would have been an inside hook fest. Neither Jack or Joe was particularly fond of dealing with shorter opponents than themselves. Sam weighed around the same for Jeannette X that Dempsey weighed for his biggest fights. Dempsey-Langford is a very different match than Dempsey-Wills, because of Sam's hook to the body being the key contrast to Harry's right to the ribs. Earlier in his career, at the lighter weights, Sam could apparently box as the taller man very well, and reportedly outmaneuvered Barbados Joe Walcott with some fancy sticking and moving. [Conversely, we see a young Robinson as more of a Hearns type stalker against Angott behind a downward stabbing offensive jab, and aggressively ravaging the taller and lighter Dykes with infighting in the early going.] Unlike Langford, we don't really seem to have reports on the versatility of Wills. Stylistically, he appears to have been predictably consistent throughout his career.
I think fighters adjust their styles as they age ... as reflexes slow they change pace .. again, look at Ali ... I think there is a ton of info out there on Wills by the men who fought him detailing his strength, speed and power .. all were first rate and standout for the time .. I happen to be very impressed by the Firpo footage .. to me he hung in the pocket, showed superior strength and speed, ripped effective hooks and uppercuts and dominated what I saw .. Firpo was very strong and awkward so any fighter could look awkward against him similar to Lewis v.s. Michael Grant. All is irrevelant except the bottom line ... Kearns and Rickard wanted no part of Wills in the ring against Dempsey despite the fact it would have been a HUGE money fight. They knew the risk. That's really the story. It's honestly a disgrace and will always be a huge asterisk on Dempsey's record.
And without fighting at all, Dempsey, Kearns, Rickard and Wills got to laugh all the way to the bank. Jack was the highest paid athlete of 1925 without competing at all, and Harry collected a $50,000 payoff for not challenging him, money he invested in real estate and becoming a successful businessman upon his 1932 retirement in the depths of the Great Depression. [Keep in mind the 1929 Crash wiped Jack out, and he had to use his name to rebuild.] Upon Harry's passing from diabetes, he left an estate valued at over $100,000 [good money in 1958]. Perhaps that's the true bottom line. For both, it was a huge money non-fight. Reportedly, Harry joked that while he had over 100 fights, he got paid for over 700. The annals of boxing history is loaded with tragic outcomes, but Wills and Dempsey never fighting was only a tragedy for the fans, history, and boxing itself, not the involved principals. And Harry got the asterisk in place of the risk itself, along with the $50,000 payoff. As a fan, I'm both disgusted and envious. How much have things changed? [*cough* PBF-Pac! *cough*]
I disagree with you on this one ... the payoff money was small potatoes for a man like Wills who was denied his shot at the title .. look at the photo many years later ... Dempsey looks embarrassed, sheepish and can't wait for the photo op to end and Wills looks disgusted ... http://books.google.com/books?id=l78DAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA55&dq#v=onepage&q&f=false http://news.google.com/newspapers?n...AQnAAAAIBAJ&sjid=SAMGAAAAIBAJ&pg=4172,4607422
How long did Grant last against the near 35 Lewis? And,hand on heart, how long would Firpo have lasted with him? Wills looks nothing against Firpo , imo. If I told you this is some film of an unidentified 40 years old black guy , you would be underwhelmed, but , because it is Harry Wills those who have justified issues about him not getting a title shot ,read things into his performance that simply are not there. Wills was castigated for his performance against Firpo and looking at the footage rightly so, he looks as talented as Chris Arreola.In Firpo's next fight Charley Weinert took at least 10 of the 12 rds some called it a shutout.
