Many people on this site question the value of Jack Johnsons wins over Sam McVea based on the fact that Sam McVea has a record on boxrec of 6-0-0 coming into the first fight with Johnson. Acording to boxrec McVea fought his profesional debut in Oxnard on 12/04/02. This was McVeas first fight in Oxnard which became his base of operations. It is clear from the contemporarly press that McVea had a significant number of fights prior to this date. The press refer to one fight in Salinas and one in Australia. The fact that McVea was traveling to Australia to fight shows in itself that he was a significant player prior to his boxrec debut. It is unlikley that he traveled to Australia simply to fight some local toughman. Some acounts of the period credit McVea with a record of 6-0-2 going into his Oxnard debut. If this is corect then McVea had a record of 12-0-2 going into his first fight with Johnson, 14-1-2 going into to the second and 14-2-2 going into the third. This would mean that he had 14, 17 and 18 profesional fights respectively. The contemporary press were talking about the first Johnson McVea fight as a faceoff between the two most logical challengers for Jeffries crown. While it is not my intention to imply that McVea was at his prime going into the series with Johnson he was clearly already a significant force. . This content is protected
Another thing to take into account is that McVea was very young when he fought Johnson. Depending upon the date one accepts as McVea's date of birth, Johnson didn't fight McVea the latter was over 20 or 21 years of age.
True, but as has been pointed out in these forums in the past, McVea was in the mold of a Mike Tyson in this sense; he was built like a fully-grown man by the time he was 18 or 19 years old.
McVea was a great in the historic sense but on the little film available he looks like he's making it up as he goes along. Chin out, leaning back, smothering his own punches, poor balance. He just doesn't look that effective compared to boxers twenty years later. I know this is unfair and probably not popular to say, but I can't tell myself I'm not seeing what I am most certainly seeing. It is so painfully evident that boxing, especially heavyweight boxing, made a quantum leap somewhere in the 20's, 30's, not that some cromag's still didn't exist (Max Baer) but barring some footage of a great slickster from the earlier days, they certainly seem rarer than they were 30 or so years previous.
I disagree with the quantum leap thing. Boxing adjusted itself to the new rules and so changed but that doesn´t mean it got superior.
